Green Palghar initiative: 53 primary school students prepare 23,000 seed balls in 2 days

Palghar: Primary school students studying in a remote village in Gholvad in Dahanu taluka have expressed their commitment towards the environment by preparing 23,000 seed balls in two days.

These seed balls will be dispersed in the forest area in the coming monsoon. The students in the remote villages are taught their belongingness to nature along with the school academics which is the uniqueness of this project.

53 students studying in standards one to four in Zilla Parishad (ZP) School in Tokepada have improvised their last year's record of preparing 10 thousand seed balls to 23 thousand plus seed balls in two days. This project was conducted after the school exams got over on April 15 & 16. 

Black soil and cow dung flakes are mixed with water to prepare the clay. The balls with a seed in each ball are prepared and dried in the sun. The seeds required for this project were collected by the school students a few weeks ago. All the seeds are of trees of indigenous variety which helps to maintain the ecological balance.

After the reopening of the schools and the onset of the monsoon, the seed balls are dispersed in the hilly area as suggested by the forest department officials with their due permission. ZP teacher Deepak Desle is the person behind this unique project.

How are seed balls a better way of forestation 

The mass forestation is difficult to be carried by saplings. There are limitations to the preparation of saplings and difficulty to carry on hilly terrain. The seed balls help to extract the moisture in the seeds which increases the germination rate. The seed balls which has a fair content of manure along with the soil. The soil dissolves in rainwater and the manure helps the first shoot to grow faster than the surrounding weeds and plantation thereby increasing the survival ratio by reaching out to sunlight.