Tree Planting – New York State Urban Forestry Council

Liverpool NY 2nd Annual Arbor Day Celebration

February 6, 2020February 6, 2020 by Michelle Sutton

As part of the Village of Liverpool’s 2019 Arbor Day celebration, elementary students wrote and performed skits about trees.

Thank you to the Village of Liverpool and Deputy Mayor Christina Fadden (Fitch) for forwarding this terrific account and photos of their 2019 celebration, funded by a NYSUFC grant. Fadden says, “The grant funds were a great encouragement, and we also now stand on the cusp of finally being designated a Tree City USA. Thank you to the NYS Urban Forestry Council for your support of our efforts and program.”

Location of the Village of Liverpool, in Onondaga County, greater Syracuse.

On Friday May 3^rd, 2019, the Village of Liverpool celebrated its 2^nd Annual Arbor Day Celebration at Liverpool Elementary School. At 9:00 a.m., an assembly of approximately 280 students, teachers and staff gathered in the school cafeteria. Village of Liverpool Tree Advisory Committee members Lisa Ballantyne, Yvette Hewitt, Diane Recor and Adam Woodburn joined Mayor of the Village of Liverpool Gary White, DEC Senior Forester Matthew Swayze, and Officer Sean Pierce in attendance.

Partnerships, Fruit Trees, and Land Restoration in the Peruvian Amazon, with James Kaechele

January 30, 2020January 28, 2020 by Michelle Sutton

In his capacity as Arborist for the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation, James Kaechele demonstrated how to properly plant a limón sutil tree (*Citrus aurantifolia*) to a community in the Peruvian Amazon.

All Photos Courtesy James Kaechele & Fruit Tree Planting Foundation

What skills does an urban forester use when planting trees on disturbed land along an Amazon River tributary? “All of them,” says New York Tree Trust Director and Council Executive Committee Member James Kaechele. In early December, 2019, Kaechele, also a consulting arborist for the Pittsburgh-based international charity Fruit Tree Planting Foundation (FTPF), went with a team of staff and volunteers to the Loreta Region of Peru to plant 6,000 fruit trees in five Amazon River communities.

“As urban foresters, our job is equal parts plants and people,” Kaechele says. “We’re uniquely positioned to coordinate both the arboricultural and human aspects of a project like this. The land-use questions are the same; the site assessment process is the same; tree planting techniques are the same; you have to address any concerns people have—for example, the worry that some have about whether a tree will fall on their house—it’s the same skills that I use in the work I do with street trees and residents in NYC.” Furthermore, the land along the Amazon River is often severely degraded and in need of restoration, just like in the tree beds, parks, and natural areas of NYC—just degraded for different reasons.

i-Tree Planting Calculator Analysis of Buffalo’s Fall 2018 Tree Plantings

December 27, 2019December 27, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

The planting sites used in Buffalo’s i-Tree Planting Analysis project as part of City Forester Ross Hassinger’s participation in the first-ever i-Tree Online Academy.

As part of the first i-Tree Online Academy, participants were asked to complete a comprehensive final capstone project that demonstrated their ability to utilize the i-Tree tools to analyze trees in their community or to engage community residents in examining the greenspace in their city or town. Projects were developed by each student and they were responsible to carry out all aspects of the design, planning, and implementation of each program.

Buffalo City Forester Ross Hassinger’s project involved the City’s 2018 street tree planting. In the fall season (Oct 15-Dec 31) of 2018, the city of Buffalo put out bids for a local licensed landscape company to plant 56 street trees in the City in various locations as shown in the map above. This is Ross’s report created after conducting his i-Tree Online Academy capstone project.

Callery Pear Tree Buy-Back Event: A Template from Missouri

December 9, 2019December 2, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

Like so many regions in New York, nearly every corner of Missouri has been hit hard with the invasive spread of Callery pear (Pyrus calleryana spp.). Callery pears are self-sterile, but it turns out they readily cross-pollinate with other cultivars. Also, the rootstock upon which a Bradford pear is grafted will sometimes sprout, eventually yielding flowers and viable pollen.

Fortunately, Missourians are often out in front with innovative approaches to urban forestry and invasive plant control. Here’s how they reduced the number of Callery pears and increased the use of native, non-invasive trees. Special thanks to Tina Casagrand of the Missouri Invasive Plant Task Force (MoIP) for her help with this post.

Watertown’s Fall Tree Planting Attracts >60 Volunteers

December 2, 2019November 29, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

Watertown’s 2019 Annual Fall Volunteer Tree Planting Project attracted more than 60 volunteers (many from Tree Watertown) to plant 28 bare root trees. The volunteer tree planting project was paid for in part by a $3000 grant from the Northern New York Community Foundation, which paid for the purchase of trees and planting supplies.

Town of Kent Launches Community Forestry Program with Aid of Council Grant

September 11, 2019September 10, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

Town of Kent folks savor planting a white oak on park land around Lake Carmel. Photo by Bill Huestis

The town of Kent, NY (pop. ~ 13,500) is located in Putnam County. In 2018, the freak EF2 (110 mph at peak) tornado of May 15 plowed through a portion of Kent, uprooting or toppling 40 trees around Lake Carmel. The Town applied for and received a Council grant to plant red maples and white oaks in some key locations around the Lake. The initially scheduled spring planting activities had to be postponed due to unseasonal weather. Town of Kent Councilman Bill Huestis says, “The great news is that we finalized our initial tree planting in late June around Lake Carmel, and as of this writing all of the trees are doing fine.”

For Arbor Day 2019, Hofstra Adds Pink-Flowering Dogwoods to its Campus Arboretum

May 12, 2019May 12, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

On April 24, four pink-flowering dogwood trees were planted on the Hofstra campus in Hempstead, Long Island in celebration of Arbor Day 2019. The planting is part of an ongoing effort by the university’s Tree Advisory Committee to create a greener Hofstra.

“Urban street trees, which can be seen on Hofstra’s campus, provide benefits economically and psychologically that far exceed what the eye can see,” said biology major Penelope Ramos ’20. “Hofstra strives to be at the forefront of educating and setting the example for surrounding local governments and future generations.”

Thirty-Three Urban Forest Inventories/Mgmt Plans to Inform Your UFMP

May 13, 2019May 12, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

The Council now has 33 professional Urban Forest Inventories/Mgmt Plans from around New York State collected for your perusal. Most of the inventories/plans were funded by grants from the Environmental Protection Fund (aka cost-share grants), with applications evaluated by NYSDEC staff. This compendium of Plans could be a very helpful resource under any circumstances but especially as you think about your community’s grant application for EPF grants Round 15 later this year.

According to grants administrator and DEC Environmental Program Specialist Michelle Higgins, under Round 14, there were 29 municipalities or not-for-profit (NFP) groups who received funding for Tree Inventory/Community Forestry Management Plans, 8 munis or NFPs who received Tree Maintenance grants, 13 munis or NFPS who received grants for Tree Planting, and 2 Cornell Cooperative Extension agencies (Dutchess and Nassau Counties) who received grants for Education Programming.

Urban Forest Inventories, Management Plans, and Reports:

Akwesasne Community Forest
Batavia
Binghamton
Canandaigua
DeWitt
Fulton
Ithaca
Kingston
Long Beach
Mamaroneck
Massena
Middletown
Friends of Mt Hope Cemetery
Mount Kisco
NYC by Neighborhood
Newburgh
Nyack
Ogdensburg, Part I
Ogdensburg, Part II
Ossining
Prospect Park, Brooklyn
Red Hook, Town
Red Hook, Village
Rochester
Rye’s Crawford Park
Saratoga Springs
Schenectady
Scottsville
Syracuse
Warwick
Washington DC (performed by Cornell UHI Team)
Watertown
Watervliet

Arbor Day Ceremony in Albany Honors Mary Kramarchyk Beck, DEC Poster Contest Winners

April 29, 2019April 29, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

NYSDEC Urban Forestry Program Coordinator Gloria Van Duyne presented a framed copy of the Arbor Day 2019 poster to winner Paul Bergwall, who is from the Rochester area. Paul worked for Kodak for many years and then became an art teacher. He and his wife were thrilled to be in attendance and to see his photograph as a poster (printed by International Paper).

On April 26, NYSDEC and the NYS Office of General Services (OGS) hosted a ceremony in honor of Arbor Day 2019. The gathering included members of the State Arbor Day Committee and state and local officials, including Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan. A London planetree (Platanus x acerifolia) was planted on the State Street side of East Capitol Park, near the corner of the Capitol Building, to replace one that was lost during a storm. (Each year, a tree is planted ceremonially on the Capitol grounds).

Bainbridge Celebrates Arbor Day with Seven New Trees

December 7, 2018December 7, 2018 by Michelle Sutton

Members of the Bainbridge Garden Club admire a newly planted Japanese tree lilac (*Syringa reticulata*). Photos Courtesy Village of Bainbridge.

Reported by Philip C. Wade, Bainbridge Mayor, Leader of Arbor Date Event

The Village of Bainbridge (pop ~ 3300) is located at the eastern edge of Chenango County, halfway between Binghamton and Oneonta. The Village was awarded up to $1000 in grant monies from the New York State Urban Forestry Council to be used for tree purchase and planting materials for a community Arbor Day Tree Planting event which was held in Bainbridge on Friday, May 25th. It was a very successful event, with participation from the Village DPW crew, Boy Scouts, and the local Jericho Garden Club of Bainbridge.

As a result, seven balled-and-burlapped (B&B) trees of 1.5 to 2” caliper representing six different species were planted around the Village, including the Village Green Park, along Greenlawn Avenue, on Front Street, and on Parsons Street. All species are suitable for Bainbridge’s USDA Hardiness Zone (5a to 6a, depending on microclimate within the Village), and in respect to the local maple sugaring industry, included a sugar maple cultivar (Acer saccharum ‘Fall Fiesta’).