FARMINGTON —  Forestry students at Foster Career and Technical Education Center put their skills to work Tuesday and helped the school system.

Tom Ward, Regional School Unit 9 Superintendent, asked Forestry instructors Chris Maxim and Rod Spiller about their students helping with some unsafe trees and upcoming trail work, Spiller said.

On Tuesday, Forestry students were able to test their directional felling techniques, use of safety equipment and save the school district the cost of having the trees taken down.

Eight Forestry students took down two Red Pine trees at Academy Hill School in Wilton and three trees near Cascade Brook School in Farmington, Spiller said.

Students who participated included advanced students: AJ Wilbur, Ben Rackliff, Darren Curtis, Dalton LaMontagne, George Wheeler and first year students: Courtney Grundy, Zach Clark, Robert Ladd.

The trees, causing concern, were near parking lots and buildings.  One tree, between the bus garage and Cascade Brook School, had rotted and would have likely fallen on the road, Spiller said.  After they arrived, they found another two were in a similar condition. So, the class worked on the three trees which were beyond any further use.

The Red Pines at Academy Hill were chopped in to chunks.  Spiller thought they would be used or donated for firewood.

Within the next couple weeks, the class will begin work to clear out dead trees on a trail system at Cascade Brook School.  The trail is used for nature walks and for different studies by science classes, he said.

The improvement project was given a small grant to enlist some help from an E.L. Vining & Son crew to also work on the project, Spiller said.

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