In Monday’s edition of the LaGrange Daily News, we wrote about Keep Troup Beautiful’s  Bring One for the Chipper event. LaGrange residents were encouraged to donate Christmas trees along with electronics and non-commerical tires at the LaGrange Recycling Center Saturday.

People could come and take trees to sink in their own ponds or in West Point Lake to help create fish habitats. Fish use the trees because it helps them hide from predators. Algae also will grow on the trees.

The trees that were not taken are going to be made into fertilizer. This reuses the trees so they can be used for local gardens.

More than 20 people donated trees and more than 40 people dropped off items overall at the event.  Around 20 tires were donated at the event.

Most of these items could have ended up in a landfill.

It’s important to remember how much of an environmental impact we leave on the world through commercialism. Technology changes so often and society will buy new gadgets without giving much thought of what to do with the old ones, which end up in a landfill.

People start driving when they turn 16 and uses those four tires for and average of three to four years per tire. That’s a lot of tires used in a lifetime.

And every year, trees are cut down, decorated for almost a month and are then disposed.

While Earth Day is celebrated every year, its easy to forget about caring for the environment for the rest of the year.

What Keep Troup Beautiful did Saturday not only helped the environment but also re-purposed.