From the garden: Keeping Canton Beautiful

By Keep Canton Beautiful Club Member Jessica Stein

During the summer, the club breaks for vacation and our own gardens’ maintenance. But we went out with a blast at our year-end plant swap at out-going president Riddell’s house! However, a break doesn’t mean idle club members. All the chapters of Keep Mississippi Beautiful, including Keep Canton Beautiful, stay busy during the summer. Members of both the garden club and beautification chapter have planted seeds in many areas around Canton with gorgeous annual flowers and perennial wildflowers. For one of their projects, they decorated the recycling area north of town by the police station. 

Keep Canton Beautiful wants you to know that, instead of being trash or litter, a few things can be cleaned and recycled. Most paper and cardboard, as well as some plastics and metals, can be recycled; each recycling center has different rules for what they can handle. Rinsing is an important step for recycling, to keep out vermin during storage. Human employees still check each bin to make sure every item is pure and correct. Soiled items damage nearby recycling and can disgust or harm the staff. That which can’t be recycled can sometimes be re-used. I often use old containers to propagate plants.

Keep Canton Beautiful has also seeded the old high school five points walking track for the community to enjoy. Please stop by and smell the flowers – but leave them for everyone to enjoy! If you’d like to pick, please visit their other project at the Outdoor Classroom across from the Co-Op. Just like last year, the chapter has used personal time to plant cutting zinnias for Canton to treasure. Cut freely, just remember to share! 

Across the whole country next year, Keep America Beautiful will be encouraging small towns like ours to show clean, bountiful streets and yards. Can we count on you?