Almost a month ago, a group of volunteers from the University of Guam's Center for Island Sustainability made their way down south to plant hundreds of trees as part of the Guam Restoration of Watersheds or GROW initiative. Joan Aguon Charfauros has more on how the use of technology is hoping to aid in the process.

One morning in April, a group with the Guam Restoration of Watersheds or GROW initiative made their way down to the jungles of Talafofo to plant native trees to help with the exposed red soil. What happens when it rains, the soil runs off, creating badlands, where all of the topsoil and nutrients are washing downstream into our rivers, and into our oceans.

Extension Assistant Teddy Concepcion is with UOG's Sea Grant Program and is tasked with the GROW initiative.

"Our primary focus is to stop the bleeding or erosion from getting into our rivers," he said.

What happens when it does get into our waters, it smothers the coral and potentially kills them," he said. So, GROW initiative's objective is to stop it by planting trees. As for the area they are focusing on?

"If you look down here, it actually discharges into the river, the river is really close to us right now. And that is the Ugum River," Concepcion said. "The Ugum river is responsible for 4 million gallons of water traveling through. It's about 2 million gallons that gets pumped and treated and distribute to southern parts of the island: To gain access to the hard-to-reach areas of the jungles, Concepcion said they have utilized the assistance of a drone.



"There are patches everywhere, that's extremely hard to reach," he said. "The drone is going to help up get to those spots without being there physically."

Research is ongoing to see which seeds would be successful and they hope to disperse during the island's rainy season.

"We're preparing all our seeds, doing small experiments here and there to see what the successful seed varietals would be to actually utilize for higher success rates," Concepcion said. "Like I said, around July or August is when we're targeting, same as our primary out plantings."

Concepcion has this message for the island community.

"Planting trees is one of the biggest solutions we have," he said. "Don't take it for granted because trees are doing so much for us than what people realize."