Welcome to the July e-news letter. In July we celebrate National Tree Day and I am reminded of the inspiring wisdom found in this old Chinese proverb: The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. For those of us in the Yass region, we are fortunate that many of our Landcarers did get started 20 or more years ago. However, for the rest of us, now is a great time with many opportunities available. Landcare has been successful in obtaining funding through the NSW Environmental Trust and NSW Saving our Species program. Yass Habitat Linkages, Burrinjuck to Bango Habitat Hops and the newly announced Saving our Superb Parrot focus on protecting, restoring and linking habitat. There is also opportunity for riparian restoration to improve our waterways through the Rivers of Carbon- Yass River Linkages program. Landholders can apply for funding from small individual paddock trees right up to large whole of paddock restoration works. For those just starting out, the Murrumbateman Landcare group held a workshop on July 5, titled Planning for Planting, which guided landholders on what and where to plant. Locally, we have three community nurseries that are able to supply local provenance tubestock for these restoration projects and for anyone interested in purchasing native tree and shrubs. And for those who just want to get out and get planting, National Tree Day is coming up and we are having a volunteer tree planting day along the Yass River- Details about this and more below in the newsletter.