AUBURN - Walt Aikman devoted his Saturday morning to helping the community of Auburn add some more trees to its landscape.

He was also making sure that everyone was having fun while doing it.

Aikman, a community forester with the organization Grow Auburn's Trees, was one of many Auburnians who went to Memorial City Hall for the third annual Auburn Community Tree Planting Day.

The city of Auburn, Auburn Rotary Club and Grow Auburn's Trees put the day of planting together.

“The (city) council voted unanimously about the partnerships for this project to be able to allow us to plant all these trees in the community,” Aikman said.

After a crash course in tree planting, groups were set out to plant the trees at the designated locations. When they were done with one tree, they came back to get another.

“The people really love this event,” Aikman stated. “We all just want to have fun and build a better community - that's all we want to accomplish.”

The planting had already begun this fall due to an early shipment of 31 trees, which were successfully planted last weekend. Saturday, 56 more trees were planted around various locations in Auburn.

Auburn Rotary has been a big part of the tree-planting project. Three years ago, the organization developed a project that would plant more than 100 new trees in the city of Auburn, commemorating the 100 years of Rotary in the United States.

The project came to a close on Saturday with more than $6,000 worth of trees donated by Auburn Rotary.

The trees are more than just a visual uplift for the city. The majority of the trees that were planted were small varieties, making them compatible with power lines because they won't grow tall enough to create any interference.

Many of the trees were also different species, which helps bring some more diversity to the area.

The trees can also provide the area some geographical support.

“It's nice to be a part of something like this because we are all working together,” said Vanessa Gibson, a Cayuga Community College student.

“People don't realize how important (trees) are to the community,” Gibson continued. “The trees help with so many things - like stream-water runoff and the process of erosion - the things that trees do that many of us don't respect.”

The planting ceremony finished with the entire group planting trees on a portion of South Hoopes Avenue.

“We're a hopeful society, and trees are a gift that we can give to each other,” Aikman said.