Thousands of trees replanted in Wadena after a devastating tornado

In Wadena, A single tree has never meant so much. Until one June day last summer, when Mother Nature uprooted 3-thousand trees and scatter them around town.

Ann Oldakowski: "Down on certain blocks, it's really, really hard to look at."

So today the town of just over 4-thousand will be growing by more than 2-thousand. Trees that is..

Rocky Wells: "They should last a long time, God willing. Unless another tornado comes by and rips them out."

Rocky Wells, leader of Boy Scout Troop 45 out of Brainerd Minnesota gathered up his gang to help plant trees all over the town. His group is just a few of the 250-volunteers planting small trees, back where mature ones once stood.

Dylan Lee: "There's a cemetery over there, we didn't even know there's a cemetery because there was so many trees. We thought it was woods. Now they're gone its kind of amazing, just like wow."

In a huge fund raising effort the city of Wadena in less than a year raised 64-thousand dollars to plant all these trees on the boulevard.

Ann Oldakowski: "It kind of turns people around to realizing the stuff that's out there in nature that we take for granted."

As each tree was loaded in to trucks and shipped out to the groups planting them. The people here know, they are planting the roots for a stronger community.

Rocky Wells: "You can tell, this is going to be a big part of the healing process for the community to have all these trees back."

The fundraising started last July and the city plans to continue planting more trees in the future.

Tags: reporter stories, dylan wohlenhaus, charity, environment, brainerd, minnesota, weather