[RP TownTalk] Oak Trees

[Alice Ewen Walker]

The Town awarded a contract to a licensed tree service to survey the town,
identify hazardous or dead trees, and do pruning + tree removal where
necessary.  Like most cities, we have a backlog of tree removals and
untended old trees - so when work actually does get performed, it can seem
like a shock to residents to see the  trees removed.
I am a fan of trees, and it is true that there are often trees that one
might consider a judgement call -- the tree may be dying, but it takes a
tree a long time to do it - so you can ask whether a particular tree might
have lasted five or ten more years, could there have been cabling and
bracing to extend its life (also very costly), etc. It's sort of like
consulting a doctor - different arborists may have differing opinions about
the course of treatment.

It is quite costly to take down large old trees, so the Town was not
predisposed to removing trees if it were possible to simply do pruning.
These were trees where the arborist made an assessment that  it was
dead/dying/hazardous.

Planting new trees to replace our old trees - especially with a focus on
tall shade providing native trees like oaks, maples, tulip poplars etc. is
something we can all help to do. The town right of way often has overhead
wires or space constraints that makes it difficult to plant anything larger
than an ornamental tree. Homeowners may have space in front and back yards
that could accommodate a tall growing shade tree. If you're interested in
adding a new tree to your own yard, you can look at a nice list of native
trees at MD DNR's website here:
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/criticalarea/trees.html

I know Public Works has a tree replacement list they are going to be working
on in the spring to add some new trees to right of way locations.

Alice
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://riverdale-park.org/pipermail/towntalk/attachments/20090301/489399ce/attachment-0002.html>