Read more.

In most cases, they are far too deep. 

This is a flaw in the planting and harvesting operations that happen at the tree farms where the trees are purchased by the nurseries. Sometimes it's just sloppy work because of workers going too fast without the proper guidance and attention to detail. It also happens on purpose as dictated by the owners and managers. 

Many landscape folks and homeowners think trees should have perfectly straight trunks. Setting small trees deeply in the potting soil causes them to grow straight up. But this unhealthy growth does not create the best trees long-term. 

Read more. 

reducing utility costs, landscape eautification, habitat for songbirds and other wildlife. If you are planting a tree, here are some tips to remember.

First, put the right tree in the right place. Consider the size the tree will become both above ground and below. Look up for potential interference with overhead wires and look down for driveways, sidewalks, and pipes that may interfere with root growth. Consider species suitable to the soil and planting zone where you live. Native species tend to be hardier and are easier to take care of.

Read more. 

Geffen and Michael Eisner — and almost nothing is out of bounds.

Her carefully structured yet naturalistic environments are known for their subtle Blakeian radiance. In a collaboration with the Italian designer Renzo Piano’s firm for the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center in Athens, which was completed in 2016, she turned a 42-acre section of a former parking lot for the Olympics into a public green space with 1,500 olive, pine, almond and pomegranate trees interspersed with more than 300,000 perennials and shrubs, including Jerusalem sage and fragrant yellow-blooming coronilla; in the late 1980s, at the Southampton estate of the art collector Paul Walter, she installed roughly 140 feet of copper beech hedge and a pair of soaring cedars trimmed to look like Italian cypress that became as well-known as his accretion of late 19th-century photography and Indian miniature paintings. While contemporary landscape designers rarely have the name recognition of architects (as they did during the late 19th-century era that Edith Wharton conjures, when wealthy patrons were as obsessed with collecting plants as they were constructing mansions), Nevins is among the few who inspire reverence.

Read here. 

The Arboriculture Association has set up a working group to promote tree surgery, tree nursery work and contract management roles to women.

Almost 90% of the association's members are male.

Inverness-based Jacqui Waring, who is involved in the effort, said had worked in "beautiful places" in her 23 years in the industry.

Ms Waring, who specializes on preparing plans for protecting trees on development sites, said jobs in arboriculture also included research, lecturing and charity campaign roles.

She said the industry was traditionally male dominated, but added that a number of women had already filled various roles, including "climbing trees with a chainsaw".

Read more.

levees and canals to nutrias and rising sea levels have converged to decimate our coastline. Every hour, a football-field sized swath of Louisiana disappears, according to an oft-cited (and accurate) analysis by the U.S. Geological Survey. Since 1932, we’ve lost 1,883 square miles of land to the sea—that’s more than the entire state of Rhode Island.

Yes, Louisiana is slowly and inexorably (for now) becoming a modern-day Atlantis. The silver lining? Your shriveled, crusty old holiday fir can help stem the tide of land loss and restore the wetlands. The city’s Office of Resilience and Sustainability is funding a recycling initiative to collect Orleans Parish trees and airlift them to Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge. Once in place, the mulched trees help keep sediment in place and serve as a base for new vegetation. Last year, the city collected more than 8,000 trees.

Read more.

trees?

The two states are the largest producers of real Christmas trees in the country, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

In fact, just six counties in the two states accounted for 51 percent of the more than 16 million trees harvested nationwide in 2012, the most recent year government data is available. In all, North Carolina and Oregon trees constituted 79 percent of that year’s harvest. Industry insiders say the trend hasn't changed.

Read more.

The holiday season can be a trying time. Parents in particular face the stress of sending out

picture-perfect holiday cards, attending school concerts, taking a halfway decent Santa photo, remembering to move that damn Elf on the Shelf, getting all the gift-shopping done and just generally keeping the magic of the season alive for small, impressionable humans.

Read more here.

most thankful for by creating a thankful tree that can take center stage throughout the Thanksgiving holiday.

Get the steps here. 

Once you’ve raked the leaves and needles, it’s tempting to stop thinking about tree health.

This is a great time, though, to do a few things for your trees. Here are some tasks that should be completed over the next couple of months.

Read more. 

and plant shade trees. Nursery associations have been touting it for decades: “Fall Is For Planting.” But too often we’ve cast it aside as some kind of marketing ploy. Fact is, it really is true.

Reasons fall plantings are better…

• Trees (and shrubs) planted now have the longest possible time – 6 or 7 months – to establish new roots before the next bout with hot weather rolls into town. Spring plantings, by comparison, come just weeks before summer.
  
  
• You can easily judge a tree’s vigor at this time of the year. It should still have most of its leaves and they should be full-, or nearly full-sized.
  
  
• If it’s a container-grown tree, it has probably spent the entire growing season in the same pot. Its root system should be well developed and ready to jump out into its new home.
  
  
• Many nurseries have sales going on as they reduce inventories before winter.
  
  
• You, and those you hire to help you, probably have more time to complete your tasks now that you will in the spring.

Read more. 

field has miraculously got itself standing back upright again. 

The 40ft tree has left residents in Chiddingstone, near Sevenoaks, Kent, baffled after it somehow returned to its normal upright position after being blown over on December 23 last year.

Donna Bruxner-Randall, who owns Moorden Farmhouse and the surrounding fields where the tree fell, found it uprooted following high winds just before Christmas. 

Read here. 

bacteria brought by this year’s wet weather.

Fire blight is brought on by wet weather like Idaho Falls experienced this spring and can strike apple, pear and some other fruit trees and bushes. It normally enters trees through cuts in the bark, which many of the trees had due to this year’s hailstorms, said Idaho Falls city spokesman Bud Cranor. The bacteria then shows up when the weather gets warmer and more humid.

About half of the 450 trees on the stretch of Sunnyside between Yellowstone Highway and Hitt Road have been infected with fire blight, Cranor said.

Read more. 

“The plants are just scorched,” she said.

Scorch occurs when plants can’t move water up from their roots fast enough to replenish the water they lose through the tiny holes in their leaves. Without enough water, the leaves start to dry out.

Read more.

Question for Dan Gill: One of my Bradford pears has an area of the tree that is covered in a

sort of web. The leaves within this web had already turned brown and when walked up close to it, it appeared to have particles that are perhaps eggs or bugs. Can you possibly tell me what it is and what to do to get rid of it? -Paul Schexnayder

Get the answer here.

your neighborhood, saying they could fall over at any time. These are trees that appear to be alive on the outside but are dead on the inside.

Arborists say hurricanes are the culprit for a lot of dead and dying trees, and after hurricanes Irma and Matthew, many of them have already been removed.  Often the wind and rain from a hurricane are just too much. 

“Trees will respond to stress. They'll manifest leaves and flowers and growth, and then they can die. It's not an uncommon thing.”

Read more.

weather, without being able to move and, while providing shade, often not getting much shade themselves. Of course trees have evolved in very different ways from humans. This article will talk about how trees deal with regular summer heat and the long-term aspects of how climate change will affect trees.

The Days of Summer

Just like humans, trees sweat out water. The process of evapotranspiration is how trees transport water through their roots, trunks, branches and eventually out of their leaves. This process brings nutrients and water to all parts of the tree, and essentially allows the tree to breathe. A large oak tree can transpire up to 40,000 gallons of water per year. This process is extremely useful in stormwater reduction, as it returns the moisture back to the atmosphere, instead of having it run off into our streets and streams.

Read more.

strategically when it comes to keeping cool long-term (and lowering energy-costs). Rising temperatures and drought in many communities make planting even harder. But don’t worry, here are 10 shade trees with drought-tolerance that will keep you cool and add beauty to your yard.

1. Eastern Redcedar

Juniperus virginiana

The eastern redcedar tree is a common sight throughout most of the plains states and eastern United States on road cuts, in fence rows and scattered across abandoned fields—especially where limestone soils are present. It is an aromatic tree, with reddish wood giving off the scent of cedar chests and crushed fruit providing a whiff of the gin they once flavored.

Thanks to its tolerance of heat, salt, a wide range of soils and other adverse conditions, the eastern redcedar can be put to good use on the farm in windbreaks and in city landscapes for hedges, screens, clumps or even as specimen trees.

Hardiness zones 2-9

Read more.

edge of Mosswood Park in Oakland, weaving through the desolate branches, piling on the base of the tree, squeezing into the natural grooves of the oak, and resting on fallen leaves in the yellowed grass.

Thousands of them have hatched this week as part of an unusually large annual bloom, according to experts. And even more moths are on the way. Experts say they will strip the trees — but won’t do any real damage.

Roughly 20 to 40 percent of the moths are still in cocoons clinging to oak trees, said Damon Tighe, a member of the California Center for Natural History, a nonprofit naturalist collective based in the San Francisco area.

Read here.

bad for trees. Saturated ground makes trees more susceptible to toppling.

Arborists say the average tree only has a root system that goes 12 to 18 inches deep. When the ground gets saturated, even a light wind can create danger.

“We’ll see more trees fall over in a situation like this where you you have days and days of rain, and a small wind then from the hurricane situation,“ said ISA certified arborist Jared Kibbe with Bartlett Tree Experts.

He says you need to inspect trees on your property looking for signs of the soil lifting or cracking around the base of a tree, or for ground that’s become loose or spongey.

Read here

It's finally spring, and the Callery pear trees – white and beautiful – along highways and suburban cul-de-sacs are flowering again.

Once called a "marvel" by those who first brought them to America, they are now described as a scourge on the environment.

This January, the trees were placed on Ohio's invasive species list, meaning in-state nurseries and landscapers must phase out selling the trees over the next five years, said local scientist and University of Cincinnati biological science professor Theresa Culley.

               Read More

Arbor Day is April 27. For those not in the know, Arbor Day, according to timeanddate.com, is a yearly holiday meant to illustrate the important role trees play in our day to day lives by promoting the cultivation and care of the plant.

Founder J. Sterling Morton, of Nebraska, began recognition of the day in 1862. He stated, “Other holidays repose upon the past; Arbor Day proposes for the future.” It’s a legitimate holiday in Nebraska, resulting in some state offices and historical areas being closed for the day.

Read More

The showy white flowers and distinctive bark of the dogwood tree make it a popular ornamental tree, but the tree’s blossoms have also become symbols of Easter.

For the third year in a row, cherry blossoms are likely to reach peak bloom on the early side in Washington. Already, green color has emerged in the buds at the Tidal Basin, indicating the bloom process has initiated, somewhat earlier than normal.

We are predicting peak bloom during the window between March 23 and 27 this year, centered on the 25th. This is roughly a week ahead of the recent (30-year) average of March 31.

Read More

Although many people prefer an artificial tree due to the expense and care of a real tree, as an arborist and a forester, the thought of an artificial tree in my house is blasphemy. To each his own, however, and for those of you who prefer a real tree, I will offer some tips regarding the selection, setting up and caring for your real tree. I probably should have written this several weeks ago, but hopefully it will still be of benefit for some of you.

When selecting a tree, be sure it is fresh. Shake the tree lightly or brush a limb or two. If only a few needles fall, the tree is still fresh. A good tree lot should have its trees in the shade as much as possible. Our warm Florida weather can dry a tree out quickly if kept in the sun.

Read more.