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Matt Crush checks out the plantings he did for an Eagle Scout project at St. Mark's United Methodist Church in Daleville.

Matt Crush is a sophomore at Lord Botetourt High School and a member of Troop 211 located at St. Mark’s United Methodist Church in Daleville. Steve Pappas is the Scout master for the troop and Crush is a candidate for Eagle Scout achievement.

When it came time to decide on the project and all Eagle Scouts must perform a community project deemed worthy by the Boy Scout council of three judges, St. Mark’s where Crush is also a member, had just done something that changed the view of the church in many ways. The pine trees out front were taken down so the beautiful view of Tinker Mountain and yes even the Botetourt Commons complex could be seen on Sunday mornings. From the road and stoplight, the hill looked barren when the trees were removed.

“The church had a landscape architect design a way to fill in the hillside,” said Crush. “They had planned to put in 72 shrubs and trees. I knew it was something I could do for my project.”

Crush approached the Church administrative board and he was given the nod. All through September Crush dug holes mostly by hand, to plant trees and shrubs. The plan shrunk a little—only 66 plantings were in the final plan, but for a dry fall and summer, digging was pretty difficult.

Yet in the brotherhood of Boy Scouts, Crush was not alone. The members of his troop came on Saturdays and Sundays to help. John Alderson a local insurance agency owner, found an auger towards the end that automatically dug holes. On the four- day weekend off from school October 11-14, he was able to get most everything completed and mulched. Now he is watering the trees on a regular basis. Some of his friends at Lord Botetourt joined in to help, too.

He planted flowering trees like plums, hardwoods like Pin Oaks and fast growing trees like cypress, shrubs of different kinds and then mulched the area. The view from the hillside church is gorgeous.

He also had the help of the community. Jimmy Ikenberry and Larry Denwood helped find the trees and bushes, Rudd Landscape on US 460 helped with the mulch and of course his pack mates, Pastor Dave Rochford at the church and the members and of course his mother Karen Crush who is the principal at Troutville Elementary and his friends made a huge difference in the success of the project.

He hopes to be finished by Christmas with a couple of badges and the project so he can take the finalized project back to the Scout Council board for final approval of his project as an Eagle Scout.