In October President

Museveni asked all

schools to grow trees.

Did your school start?

Many did.
With this Tree Talk,
15,000 schools will Be one of those
receive free seed for schools. Use the
eucalyptus! eucalyptus seed we
send you now to start
your tree nursery.
Other readers are
welcome to buy seed The 20 g of
from the National eucalyptus seed we
Tree Seed Centre, PO are sending you is
Box 23889, Kampala:
arch 2003 enough to grow
Tel: 286049 No.1 M 27,000 seedlings!
Vol. 2

Eucalyptus: great
tree for Uganda When we grow
Q The best tree eucalyptus, we do not
have to disturb our
for a woodlot in natural forests for
wood. We do not have
every school to cut down the big trees
around our villages.
Q Takes pressure
Our forests and those big trees
off our natural are precious. They give shade and
medicine and are mother trees for
forests seed. They attract rain and
conserve soil.
Q Helps us to
Eucalyptus is a tree that can solve
preserve our community problems.
African trees Use your seeds to start growing
eucalyptus today!
Eucalyptus is an Australian tree that grows
very happily in Africa. "These are my seedlings,"
says Patience Katono, 8,
Eucalyptus is not an indigenous tree. But P2, Fairway PS, Mbale.
used wisely, it can help us to preserve our
African trees. A eucalyptus woodlot at a school in
Tororo gives shade to pupils and
Eucalyptus gives firewood and poles in just firewood for mid day meals.
three years. By growing fast, it supplies our
cooking and building needs. Eucalyptus is a tree that can solve
many school problems.

We are busy with trees! All over Uganda teachers, pupils and students are busy
with trees: growing trees, planting trees, making tree
nurseries, talking about trees!

With the last two issues of Tree Talk, we sent you seed
for musizi, lusambya, podo, mahogany, teak, tamarind
and many other trees, depending on where you live.

Did you grow your seeds? How big are your trees now?
Higher than the roof of the school? Or did a cow eat
them?!

Send us photos and tell us what went wrong and what

went right.
We have 50 beautiful Tree Talk T-shirts to give away.
Make sure your letter is a winner!

rWite to Tree Talk, P

OB
ox2
3
6
,K
ampala.

Headmaster of Buvulunguti PS, Kamuli, Moses Gabula teaches about the

presents lusambya seeds from Tree Talk to importance of trees at Busalamu PS,
Mr A Kawuzi, head of the environment Iganga. He is using Tree Talk as a
department. Pupils prepare the seed bed. teaching tool.
2 Tree Talk, March 2003

Eucalyptus: helpful tree

By This Tree Talk is distributing seed for two

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Sebastian different types of eucalyptus:
Walaita,
forester, Q Eucalytpus grandis for the wetter
Uganda areas
National
Tree Seed Q Eucalyptus camaldulens for the drier
Centre areas.

The seed has been collected from the

best eucalyptus trees in Uganda.
In Uganda we depend on natural forests
for firewood, charcoal, construction and
Growth rate
furniture. This puts tremendous pressure Eucalyptus grows very fast.
on those forests.
After three years, you get small poles and
We need to reduce this pressure by trees. After five, you can start cutting for
planting fast growing trees. firewood.

Eucalyptus is a good tree. There are over After eight years, you can get timber.
400 different types, a useful one for After 13 , you get electricity poles.
almost every environment.
Uses
This natural forest Eucalyptus is a great firewood. Grown at
is being conserved. school, it provides fuel for midday meals.

Eucalyptus is a windbreak and gives

shade where children can rest
and play.

It conserves soil and Eucalyptus is a high-yielding fast Eucalyptus sprouts after it is

protects water grower. It has many purposes and cut. This gives posts for fencing
catchments. helps us to protect our forests. and branches for firewood.
The forest is

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protecting the water Eucalyptus is great for fencing and building They can then teach their families. All
catchment and roofs, huts, tables and chairs. Having a homes need firewood and poles.
supplying valued eucalyptus woodlot is essential for every
forest products such school that needs to expand. Money earner
as wild fruits,
medicine and vines. Your school can earn income from
Eucalyptus produces gum as well as tannin eucalyptus!
that can be used as a wood preservative.
After three years, you can sell a pole for
The people in Bees make honey from its flowers. 3000/=. After eight years, you can sell it
this school do for 8000/=.
not need to Eucalyptus makes beautiful avenues.
damage the Avenues are roads with trees on both A eucalyptus big enough to be an
natural forest. sides. electricity pole sells for over 15,000/=.
When schools plant eucalyptus, pupils One one hectare you can plant about
learn how to grow it. 2500 trees. That is a lot of money!

This eucalyptus
woodlot is
giving the Collect your own seeds
school an
income from to grow different
poles, wood for trees. Choose the best
cooking, and
shelter from
wind.
mother tree.

But not for wetlands!

Wetlands are the water and allows our streams
granaries of Uganda. to flow for the whole
year.
Never drain your local
wetland by planting Without wetlands, our
eucalyptus! land would become dry
soon after the rains.
Wetlands catch rain
water and runoff from Wetlands protect our
hills. They slowly water. We cannot live
release this water into without water.
our rivers and
groundwater. Preserve your
wetlands. Do not use
Wetlands purify water. Wetlands give us fish. We grow
They produce valuable papyrus This replenishes our eucalyptus to drain crops and graze our cattle in
and swamp palms. boreholes and springs them! wetland fringes.
 3 Tree Talk, March 2003

Wood the most important energy

Only 1% of our rural Earlier Tree Talks promoted trees
people have that are Ugandan.
electricity. But this one promotes a tree that is foreign. Why?
Some foreign trees grow very comfortably and yield
highly in plantations. These include eucalyptus, pines and

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Trees provide cypress.
over 90% of
our energy In contrast, most indigenous trees die once put in a
plantation. They want to grow in a forest. Eucalyptus is
and are our self-pruning and grows very tall when closely spaced. This
main source of is not the case with most indigenous trees.
energy for There is no Ugandan tree that can be an electricity pole.
cooking and Plantation-raised trees are very useful. In fact, Uganda
lighting. cannot manage without them.

Without plantations, we will lose our Ugandan trees to

Even if all our firewood, charcoal and timber.
hydro-electric Without forests and our big freestanding trees, our
potential were country will become dry, dusty and infertile.
used, trees
That's a big reason to start planting!
would still supply
more than 75% of
our energy in
2015!

We are cutting more

trees than we are growing. This burden falls on women and
children. It robs them of time
In 2000, the average they could spend on productive
household travelled ten times activities and books.
further to find firewood than
it travelled in 1992. Lack of trees makes us poorer.

Germinating and planting eucalyptus

remove the young from children and cows. Keep reducing the shade and
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seedling from the soil and remove it after three weeks. This prepares the seedlings
put it into a plastic sheath. for the outside environment to where they will soon be
transferred.
The soil for the transplant
bed should be 50 to 60% During the dry season, water the plants in the
forest top soil, 10% rough morning and evening.
sand and 10% small
stones. Planting the
Depending on the fertility, seedlings
there should also be 10 to Eucalyptus seedlings should be planted
20% manure that is old. in a hole 30 cm deep and as wide as a
Fresh dung burns the hoe.
Pupils of Mporo PS prepare baby plant. Make the soil
soil for their eucalyptus firm but not hard. Erect a If the land is not very fertile, plant
seeds at Mwenge, Kyenjojo. shade to prevent strong eucalyptus trees 1.8 metres apart. This
direct sunlight. Keep the enables the trees to compete and grow
nursery clean. Do not waterlog it. fast.
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Making the seedbed

Eucalytus is very easy to germinate. You Keep cutting the roots that out grow the If the soil is fertile, space the plants 2.4
will have great success with these seeds. pot or lift each sheath regularly so that the metres apart. Put the topsoil back in the
Take fertile soil from a grassland or forest roots do not get stuck in the ground. If the hole first and the sub-soil last. Step on the
or from under a tree. Mix it with rough roots start feeding from the soil below the sides for it to be firm.
sand. sheaths, transplanting will be difficult.
Intercrop eucalyptus with beans or maize but
Eucalyptus seed is very tiny. The seed Make an enclosure to protect young plants not climbing beans and potatoes. Climbing beans
needs loose soil to sprout and for the and potato vines straggle and can
roots to grow. Mix the seeds with a handful suffocate the eucalyptus.
of sand. Then spread the seed and sand
mixture over 1sq metre of prepared soil. Weed around the eucalyptus.

Cover the seed with a layer of sand until After the first cutting and burning of the
you cannot see it. Water very gently to field, the eucalyptus leaves provide very
avoid washing away the seed. good nutrients to the soil for the crops.

Do not overwater. It attracts black ants that Pupils of Mutukura PS,

eat the seeds. It soaks the soil and can Ibanda, grow
make the delicate shoots rot. Continue eucalyptus with beans
watering until the seeds germinate. It will and maize. Grow maize
take 4 to 15 days. as a sacrifice plant in
the first two years.
Maizeis sweeter than
Transplanting eucalytpus. Termites
As soon as two leaves have grown, gently prefer it.
4 Tree Talk, March 2003
PO Box 7027
Silver Spring,MD
20907-7027 USA Note to
Trees for the Future is
teachers
an NGO promoting There have been
leucaena, an agroforestry worries that
"miracle" tree. eucalyptus damages
soil and consumes a
Left is a valley in lot of water.
Nepal. All the trees
are gone. No! But our species
improve alkaline soil.
Right is the same They lower the pH and
valley after planting percentage of sodium
leucaena! Yes! and potassium. They
increase the organic
carbon.

Our species are highly efficient

Hot water users. In drought they stop
Cool
and + = and growing but do not die.

When there is water, the wood

barren fertile they produce per unit of water
transpired is higher than for most
other trees.

Letters from Tree Talkers Write to Tree Talk

PO Box 22366
Kampala
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Richard Eulu is our science teacher. He taught us on Dear Tree Talk, Pupils of Butobere PS, Kabale, admire their nursery
environment and decided to start agroforestry at school to: The first lot of trees you sent to us have done well, and bed of sesbania seedlings (munyeganyegye) sent by Tree
Q
Be remembered in the future we have managed to plant some in our compound. The Talk in March 2002.
Q
To provide shade for our PTA second lot is already in the nursery. We expect to
Q
To safeguard our school buildings from wind transplant them soon. We are with you for a greener
Q
To provide food for our school Uganda.
Q
To prevent soil erosion. Wani Maju, Bugerere Sacred College, Kayunga
Pupils of Kiniaga CU PS, Nakasongola

Pupils of Walukuba PS and their teacher in charge of

agriculture Openjtho Geofry plant mahogany seeds in
their nursery bed at Biiso-Masindi.
We pupils of Mukole PS are planting our trees with our
teacher, Mr Mumbere Godfrey. We got our seeds from
local trees. Well done. It’s great to collect your own seed!
Choose the best mother trees.

These are the seeds

for Warburgia
ugandensis, a very
famous Ugandan tree.
Called mukuzanume
in Luganda, this tree
provides many
“Trees are friends of man”. medicines.
Members of the Straight Talk Club, Buwembe Can you find its seeds
SS, Busia, preparing a nursery seed bed. Pupils of Bulighisa PS next to their seed bed.
and grow it? "We thank the National Tree Seed Centre."
They say: “This is for the musizi seeds which
HE the President donated. On the left is A TREE TALK is a joint venture programme of the organisations below.
Funded by DFID and produced by Straight Talk Foundation: EDITOR: Catharine Watson WRITERS: Edith Kimuli, Sebastian
Mayende, our agriculture teacher. On the Walaita, DESIGN: Micheal eB. Kalanzi, George B. Mukasa, D. Lutwama PHOTOGRAPHER: Hector Mutebi ILLUSTRATORS:
right is I Odulingo, our deputy headmaster. “ Joseph Mugisha PRINTER: The New Vision Technical Reviewers:: Sebastian Walaita, Ambrose Kyaroki, Gaster Kiyingi

We encourage all students to make tree Uganda Forest Sector Coordination

Uganda National Tree Seed Straight Talk Foundation,
Secretariat, Baumann Hse, 45 Bukoto St. Kamwokya,
planting a priority. We have planted several Parliament Avenue, Kampala
Centre, PO Box 23889
Kampala Tel: 286049 PO Box 22366, Kampala
beds of different tree seeds." Tel: 340684/250311 Fax: 340683. Tel. 543025/542884