MARYSVILLE — An estimated 30 Boy Scouts, and as many adult volunteers, from five area troops came together to collect as many as 2,500 Christmas trees on Saturday, Jan. 4, which city of Marysville Parks and Recreation workers converted into mulch for Jennings Park.

Wanda McKinney, one of the committee members for Boy Scouts Troop 80, reported that each troop collected roughly 500 trees during the eight-hour collection window that Saturday, and judged the numbers of Scouts, adult volunteers and Christmas trees to be about the same as last year’s numbers.

“It always kind of fluctuates, but it’s held pretty steady,” McKinney said, before laughing, “That’s still a mind-boggling number of trees.”

This number doesn’t include the trees that were subsequently picked up by Scouts on Sunday, Jan. 5.

According to McKinney, the annual Christmas tree collection and recycling has alternated between Jennings Park and Strawberry Fields from year to year, so that both sites can benefit from the mulch that city maintenance workers make out of the trees with their wood-chipper.

In addition to providing a resource for the city of Marysville, the annual Christmas tree collection and recycling also helps the Scouts fund their own programs.

“We drop off envelopes at each house in December, letting them know when we’ll be picking up trees,” McKinney said. “If they want to leave donations for us in those envelopes, we’ll take them, but we’ll pick up their trees no matter what.”

While McKinney didn’t have figures available for the other troops, she put Troop 80’s donation total for this year at around $2,700, which will aid them in sustaining their monthly camping excursions throughout the year.

“We just want to thank everyone who did donate to support our local Boy Scouts,” McKinney said.