Tucson Audubon's Mason Center Gets Help, but Needs More!

Kendall Kroesen, Urban Program Manager

Volunteer applies a water seal to wood

Every year for several years now Tucson Audubon has participated in the United Way Days of Caring. We sign up as a "project" and one or more businesses and other groups sign up to come and do our project.

This year the Days of Caring were on October 22 and 25. On October 22 we had volunteers from IBM, AAA Arizona and La Paloma Academy helping out at the Center. On October 25 a group of 18 students came from the University of Arizona's Eller College of Management. We'd like to give them all a big THANK YOU!

These annual work days really contribute a lot to the Mason Center. However, we also need regular weekly and monthly volunteering for tasks that need to be done regularly. Please have a look at the list of needs for the Mason Center at our volunteer page and see if they are something you could do. The Mason Center is on the cusp of growing into a Nature Center that will attract people wanting to see upland desert birds, experience a patch of unspoiled desert in a rapidly growing region, and better understand how to live sustainably in the Sonoran Desert, which we demonstrate at the Center. Get in on the ground floor to help us move forward!

Volunteer moves a rock for the new rainwater harvesting basins

On the 22nd we put up an ocotillo fence behind the composting toilets, worked on the stage area under one of the ramadas and started some rainwater harvesting and flood control work out by the parking lot.

The rainwater harvesting volunteer team from Eller College

On the 25th we continued the ocotillo fencing by the well, continued the rainwater harvesting work, painted some wood preservative on the bare wood on the ramadas and a special team--headed by volunteer Doug Noble--worked on resurrecting the small ramada along the trail that fell down in a storm.