Shepparton has reached a global milestone, planting the largest number of trees in the world as part of the One Tree Per Child initiative.
Gardening Australia guru Costa Georgiadis was in Shepparton this week to help the city celebrate its 100,000th tree planted for the program.
"I'm blown away by the numbers," he said.
"This shows children that their volunteering matters. They're doing something for the next generation.
The global initiative was co-founded by Olivia Newton-John and John Dee, with the aim of encouraging millions of children to plant trees.
Mr Dee said it was "incredibly exciting" to see Shepparton reach this milestone.
"The first city in the world to do One Tree Per Child was Bristol in England. They've done 75,000 trees over there," he said.
Since the project launched in Shepparton in 2016, 33 schools have planted trees at more than 100 sites, with the help of council and landcare groups.
"I actually thought 10,000 [trees] was quite a good aspiration ... it's exceeded our expectations," Greater Shepparton City Council Mayor Kim O'Keeffe said.
Cultivating the next milestone
But now they've reached one milestone, they're already planning the next one — another 100,000 trees over the next four years.
The majority of species planted have been Indigenous shrubs and ground covers, largely cleared from the region.
These include river red gum, kangaroo grass and emu bush.
About 95 per cent of these shrubs survived each year.
Biodiversity corridor will bring life to land
It was hoped through this planting, woodland species could be restored, providing habitats for native species.
"It's creating a biodiversity corridor to generate more insect life," Georgiadis said.
"More insect life feeds the entire ecosystem so there'll be more birds and marsupials.
Cr O'Keeffe said she now planned to write to mayors across the country, encouraging them to get involved in the initiative.
"I think we should be sharing successes, and it's not just for our region, it's for our state and our country," she said.
