A beautiful breeze rustled through the trees at Hardin Park on what could only be described as the perfect spring day.

The weather was more than welcomed by the city of Mexico’s parks and recreation staff as they finished setting up the park for an Earth Day/Arbor Day joint celebration on April 22.

“Our actual Arbor Day celebration got rained out,” said Michelle Robinett, city of Mexico parks and recreation’s administrative assistant.

Arbor Day at Hardin Park was slated to be on the first Friday of April. After it got rained out, parks and recreation decided that, since they had Earth Day already scheduled, they would combine the two holidays because canceling was not an option.

Mexico is recognized as a tree city, and one of the stipulations for receiving that designation is hosting an Arbor Day observance.

“Tree city is a huge thing in this community and this will be the 46th year that we have had that distinction,” said Robinett.

There are four requirements in order to be designated as a tree city, said Private Lands Forester Hayden Dorrell from the Missouri Department of Conservation. The city has to have a tree board, a tree ordinance, at least $2 per resident allocated towards tree care and management annually and there must be an Arbor Day proclamation and observance.

There is also a lot of extra record keeping required in order to be in compliance. For example, the city has to keep track of how many trees are trimmed, cut down and planted throughout the year, Robinett said.

Dorrell was there to witness Mayor Steve Haag’s proclamation and present him with a tree city flag along with a commemorative “46 years” sticker.

He was joined by Robinett, Missouri American Water, the Mexico Garden Club, city of Mexico maintenance team, and the new recreation supervisor Dante Billups.

Mexico parks and recreation, in an effort to get more children to learn about Earth Day and Arbor Day, invited area schools to visit the booths.

The garden club and the maintenance team were also giving out bare-root trees and teaching families how to plant and care for them.

In 1872, J. Sterling Morton proposed that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees to the Nebraska Department of Agriculture. This holiday, known as arbor day, was first observed with the planting of over 1 million trees.

Aside from their beauty and natural shade, trees protect our topsoil from erosion, clean the oxygen we breath and are habitats to natural wildlife.

At the end of his proclamation, Mayor Haag encouraged all Mexico residents to care for the community’s trees and woodlands and support the city by planting more trees.