After our successful 2019 summer reforestation, local communities returned to their daily activities and were busy taking part in workshops and keeping up their tree nurseries. During August, September, and October, our local partner, Alternare, held three workshops in three indigenous communities with nine women and sixteen men participating. Four cisterns to capture rainwater were built as a result in these communities, benefiting 102 women and 89 men.
Additionally, MBF continues supporting 30 existing community and school tree nurseries. Alternare visits them to ensure everything continues to work well and is maintained. Plus everyone is planning ahead - 30,000 forest trees are already being grown using new biodegradable bags. “These bags are great. Next reforestation, we won’t have to worry about leaving them behind!”, said Tomas, a community member from Carpinteros community.
Monarchs will overwinter in Mexico soon, and MBF continues supporting activities that lead to better forest management, sustainability, and an improved habitat to host them. Thanks for being a part of this effort. We couldn’t do it without you!
Local communities are busy planting trees! We have reached our goal planting 22,000 trees on 20 hectares with the participation of more than 650 children, women and men from the local communities. Summer vacations did not deter the kids who were very excited and unanimously confirmed that they didn’t mind spending their vacations planting trees. Especially since most of the seedlings came from the school tree nurseries that they created.
During the months of May, June, and July we built four community cisterns to capture rainwater benefiting 649 people. Additionally, ten women from El Rosario community participated in a workshop to build fuel-efficient stoves resulting in the construction of one stove each. One woman told us, “In spite of my husband’s hesitancy, I am glad I learned how to build this stove myself because now I can cook without having so much smoke around my kitchen and I am using less wood.”
Our local partner Alternare is also among two finalists in a contest to win a 25,000 grant! We need your votes to win. Please click on the following link, scroll down to the blue button that reads ”Votar por este proyecto”, log in to Facebook/Twitter and vote for our project:
https://www.vwporamoramexico.mx/finalistas.php
MBF continues supporting these activities which are leading to better forest management, sustainability, and an improved habitat for the overwintering monarch butterflies. Thanks for being a part of this effort. We couldn’t do it without you!
Links:
After a successful overwintering season, monarchs are heading north and MBF is getting the forest ready for the next season by supporting the summer 2019 reforestation. Alternare and 30 local school and community nurseries are getting ready to plant an estimated 24,000 trees on 20 hectares. These trees resulted from the hard work of students, parents, teachers, and community members who received support and follow-up visits from Alternare’s team twice a month. In the words of an eight-year-old from Crescencio Morales Indigenous Community in El Santísimo, “We are looking forward to this summer to get a break from school and begin planting all the trees we grew in our nursery!”
Additionally, thirty-eight women and two men participated in five workshops on construction and maintenance of fuel-efficient stoves which resulted in the construction of 21 stoves, mostly built by women. Four cisterns to capture rain water were also built providing clean and potable water to the Carpinteros, Capulín, and Santa Ana Ocampo communities.
As the monarchs did this past winter, we also hoping for a successful reforestation season and to continue our support for the workshops that empower the local communities and foster sustainable practices. Thank you for supporting the forests, the monarchs, and the local communities!
Overwintering populations of monarchs are doing very well compared to last year. The surface covered by butterfly colonies went up 144% with a total area of 6.05 hectares (14.95 acres) occupied by 14 butterfly colonies versus 2.48 hectares (6.13 acres) last year.
This is certainly encouraging news, but it doesn't mean our work is over. Insect populations fluctuate and monarch populations have been on a downward trend so we can't let down our guard. That is why during the last 3 months of the year we continued our workshops with the local communities resulting in the construction of 17 fuel-efficient stoves and two cisterns that will supply seven families and one school with rain-water. We carried out a total of four workshops in which 28 women and five men participated.
Considering that one of the main threats to the migratory phenomenon is deforestation due to changes in land use, MBF aims to restore the forest. However, it’s not just a matter of planting trees but of evaluating whether they survive. During this period, with the indigenous communities of Crescencio Morales, Francisco Serrato and Nicolás Romero, we conducted an evaluation of reforestation survival rates for 2015-2017. Our results indicated that there was an average survival rate of 86% and all of our reforestations presented a survival rate greater than 60%,
The areas with the highest survival rates were due to community surveillance and fencing of the reforested areas. As Don Jose from Crescencio Morales told us “We have to be vigilant and take care of our trees. We are happy to see that most of the trees we planted have survived!“
Just like the high monarch population numbers the survival rates give us hope but we need to continue our efforts. Therefore, during the coming months, we will start planning our 2019 reforestation and continue strengthening the conservation of the forest, the migratory phenomenon while improving the lives of the local communities!
THANK YOU for sticking with us through the fluctuations of monarch populations and the challenge of providing a well-conserved forest to overwinter when they migrate while strengthening the local communities with sustainable alternatives.
While Mexico is busy celebrating the Day of the Dead, monarchs started to arrive at their overwintering sites and local communities and kids are eagerly welcoming them! Especially one kid we met with last year who told us how excited he was planting trees to host the monarchs upon their arrival on this magical day that is celebrated in Mexico and through the month of November.
MBF and Alternare continued working in the monarch area supporting 140 men and women from two indigenous communities to build nine cisterns to collect rainwater thus providing access to water for twenty-eight families. Another workshop was held for nine people who built fuel-efficient stoves that will save wood and prevent respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases in their communities.
As one community member told us, “Now we can cook our tortillas without clogging our lungs!”
Additionally, twenty-two school and six community nurseries with the capacity to produce 20,000 pine and oak trees, are being set up in seven indigenous communities. These trees will come in handy for the 2019 reforestation next summer!
THANK YOU for joining us in all these exciting projects that are conserving the forest and improving the lives of local communities.
Project Reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you will get an e-mail when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports via e-mail without donating.
We'll only email you new reports and updates about this project.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser
Make a monthly donation & get 
