 A new three-year study will evaluate several tree-planting programs, assessing their direct effects on the survival and growth of urban trees and their indirect effects on the involvement of organizations and individuals. Photo courtesy of Urban Ecos |
A team of Indiana University Bloomington researchers will spend the next three years studying the effects of tree-planting programs in six cities. The principal investigator is Burnell C. Fischer and he and his colleagues will expand urban forestry research they have been conducting in Indianapolis to include Detroit, St. Louis, Philadelphia, Atlanta and Des Moines, Iowa.
The research is funded in part from a $173,206 grant awarded by the U.S. Forest Service. The National Urban and Community Forestry Challenge Cost-Share grant was awarded to IU’s Center for the Study of Institutions, Population and Environmental Change.
“This large-scale, holistic study will help us understand how people influence urban trees and also how trees influence people in urban settings,” Fischer said. “We’re deeply grateful to the U.S. Forest Service for funding this research.”
The IU research proposal was one of three selected for funding, out of 60 applications, in a national competitive grant proposal.
The interdisciplinary, collaborative project will evaluate several tree-planting programs, assessing their direct effects on the survival and growth of urban trees and their indirect effects on the involvement of organizations and individuals. Researchers will collect data using mixed methods in the tradition of research on social-ecological systems. For example, they will inventory planted trees to gather data on environmental variables; and they will carry out surveys and interviews to measure effects on community engagement.
 Dawn redwood is being planted in more progressive cities. Dawn Redwood: Villanova University |
Results of the research will:
- Improve knowledge of the impact of tree planting for researchers, urban foresters and urban tree-planting nonprofits.
- Help close the gap between knowledge and practice for community tree-planting organizations.
- Generate data for a national assessment of urban tree planting in the face of climate change.
- Inform best practices for volunteer tree planting and environmental stewardship.
Partner organizations for the project include the Alliance for Community Trees and six community organizations: Greening of Detroit, Keep Indianapolis Beautiful Inc., Forest ReLeaf of Missouri (St. Louis), Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (Philadelphia), Trees Atlanta and Trees Forever (Des Moines).
For more information, visit www.indiana.edu/~cipec
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Pests are changing the urban tree selection Invasive pests, especially the emerald ash borer (EAB), are modifying planting patterns of urban trees. Make sure you’re communicating with cities and urban forestry departments and know changes. During the past few years, city budgets were slashed, and urban plantings were casualties in the fiscal war. But pests have caused an uptick in some city budgets because of the loss of trees, said Scott Jamieson, vice president of Bartlett Tree Experts. “Whether it’s a loss of trees from an invasive pest like [EAB] or from storms, cities are realizing they have to replant, and they’re adding money to the budget for new trees,” he said. And there’s another silver lining to the pest problem. Jamieson said there’s now a greater diversity in city tree plantings. “There’s a lot of swing back to natives, including a resurgence in oaks,” he said. “Oaks have good storm resistance ... and the species is easier to transplant and grow than once thought.” Jamieson has noticed other nontraditional species for urban plantings, including sour gum (Nyssa sylvatica), Turkish filbert (Corylus colurna), some larch species (Larix spp.) and dawn redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides). “The more progressive cities are leading the charge with the better mix of trees,” he said. Get to know the nonprofit tree-planting associations like Openlands (www.openlands.org) in the Chicago area and Alliance for Community Trees (ACT,http://acttrees.org), a national organization with more than 200 member organizations. With so many volunteers planting trees in cities, you need to be in tune with the sizes requested by groups. “The size of trees being planted is ratcheting down a bit,” Jamieson said. “Many of the nonprofit groups want sizes that are smaller and easier for volunteers to handle. They’re also requesting more trees in containers, some bareroot or smaller B&B trees.” That doesn’t mean the door has been closed on the large tree market. But it’s a good idea to establish relationships with these groups to know what they anticipate. |
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