Beatty’s Cottonwood Park celebrates Earth Day

Beatty’s Cottonwood Park will attract more butterflies, bees and hummingbirds than ever thanks to this year’s Earth Day event held April 22.

The Beatty General Improvement District partnered with the Nature Conservancy and the Southern Nye County Conservation District to plant a variety of native plants that attract pollenators. It was an expansion of the pollenator patch started last year in the northwest corner of the park.

Cheresa Taing, from the Nature Conservancy, instructed the children in proper planting techniques. They seemed to particularly enjoy “tickling” the roots of the plants before planting to help them spread.

Species planted included firecracker and two-tone beard-tongue penstemons, desert marigold, white sage, narrow-leaf milkweed, and alkali golden bush.

The Beatty General Improvement District is the local entity that manages the town’s parks, including the swimming pool.

Richard Stephens is a freelance reporter living in Beatty.