More than 50 volunteers joined employees from the City of Tampa and Hillsborough County on October 18, 2003 at McKay Bay Nature Park to continue the challenging task of eradicating invasive Brazilian pepper from the park’s nature trail. This “Give Day For The Bay” workday was sponsored by the Tampa Bay Estuary Program, the Hillsborough Invasive Species Task Force, and Wheelabrator, Inc.

City and county personnel used chain saws to cut the pepper trees and then sprayed the trunks with an herbicide to prevent them from resprouting.

Volunteers worked alongside the city and county workers to chop the branches into manageable lengths and transport them to chipping machines.

The limbs were chipped into mulch, which was used to carpet the nature trail. Removing the invasive trees, which grow in dense clumps that “muscle out” other, more beneficial plants, allows sunlight to penetrate the trail and gives native plants room to grow.

Volunteers also picked up trash from the nature trail.