By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
The United States features a diverse yet complex group of people and locations. The U.S. Census Bureau regularly undertakes an attempt to catalog those people and places.
Likewise, many communities and organizations survey the trees they manage to better understand and maintain their urban forest.
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
Whenever you hear about the benefits that trees provide to a home, community or region, there is a good chance that that information came from i-Tree, a suite of software from the USDA Forest Service and the Davey Tree Expert Company that quantifies forest structure and estimates trees’ benefits to the ecosystem. Within i-Tree, for example, a user can convert easy to-collect tree data, such as species and diameter, into estimates of the tree’s carbon storage, air pollution reduction or ability to prevent rainwater from entering the sewer system.
While i-Tree has been a foundational tool for telling the urban forest story from the local to global levels, the i-Tree program needs your help to adapt to tomorrow’s management challenges. They are urging current and future i-Tree users to attend one of three Town Hall sessions where you can share your thoughts on what i-Tree has meant to your work and how you think it should change for the future. The sessions are organized by experience level, but if you cannot make your preferred time, select any that might work for you. Additionally, if you cannot attend but are interested in providing feedback, please register as comments can be captured during the registration process.
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
How extensive are buckthorn and other invasive species in our communities? We don’t know yet, but Wisconsin’s Urban Forest Inventory And Analysis (UFIA) project will be able to answer that and many other questions.
Buckthorn beneath dead ash trees at Big Foot Beach State Park. Photo by Bill McNee.
Besides simple stem counts, we can learn about the type of land where buckthorn is found, species under which buckthorn is growing and trends in invasive species expansion or decline over time.
Continue reading “Understanding The Extent Of Invasive Species And Other Urban Forest Challenges”
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
The natural world lost one of its most ardent champions last month with the passing of biologist Edward O. Wilson. Wilson was an extremely accomplished observer (especially of ants) and theorist of nature, winning two Pulitzer Prizes among many other awards and accolades. However, he dedicated himself to cultural and political campaigns to protect animal species and their homes for much of the last two decades.
Wildlife benefits are lumped in amongst other “ecosystem services” that urban forests provide, though they often play second fiddle to more human-centric contributions of trees.
Likewise, the urban forestry community’s excellent focus on species diversity (especially in light of emerald ash borer) is framed by diversity’s role in mitigating future damages and costs, rather than what diversity can offer to wildlife or any intrinsic value of maintaining many species on the landscape.
Continue reading “Protecting Our Urban Forests to Protect Our Globe’s Biodiversity”
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
Successfully planting a tree in an urban space is hard. There are so many factors to consider to ensure that the tree survives and thrives in its new home. Climate change may not be at the top of that list, but it should be one of the factors taken into consideration.
To help think through the topic, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has released a new story map that explores urban trees and climate change in Wisconsin.
The new resource is organized into three main sections. The first provides a brief overview of projected changes in Wisconsin’s climate over the past century, specifically highlighting shifts in cold hardiness zones and heat zones. Precipitation patterns and intensities have and are projected to continue changing, though precipitation is not featured in the story map’s overview. For more information on that, scroll down to the precipitation section on the DNR climate science page.
Continue reading “DNR Releases New Climate Change And Urban Trees Story Map”
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
Sunlight fades, then sunlight grows. With those celestial rhythms surrounding the winter solstice, millennia of ritual have been shaped. Winter is historically an extremely dangerous time, in a way unfathomable to those of us with furnaces and stocked pantries. But at the winter solstice, something important happens: ever so gradually, the days start to lengthen, and there is hope that a bright, warm world will return.
That’s where evergreens enter the picture, plants that have been incorporated into solstice rituals since time immemorial because they show that life can continue through hardship. The foundational value of every Christmas tree, mistletoe sprig and holly branch is thus a symbol for life and the promise of rebirth comes with the winter solstice.
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
When I returned to my hometown neighborhood in northeast Ohio this past August, I was delighted to rekindle my friendship with so many trees that I have known most of my life. There are, of course, the Norway maples and crabapples and blue spruces found in maintained spaces throughout eastern America. One also finds a fair number of sugar maples and Ohio buckeyes. But despite apparently living in a democracy, red oak is king of my neighborhood.
During this visit, I did something that I don’t always do; I looked down. What I saw concerned me. Or, rather, what I didn’t see. Few trees had been planted in a decade, and fewer still will grow into canopy-replacing size. Windstorms were slowly bleeding the neighborhood of its great oak and maple trees, but there were no longer any kings or queens being coronated.
Continue reading “What Accounts For Your Neighborhood’s Tree Canopy?”
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
One needs only to look outside their window or at an aerial image to see that trees are not distributed evenly in their community. Of course, this is often expected and not indicative of any significant problem. One would expect, for example, for many parks to have more trees than densely developed parts of town.
However, sometimes uneven canopy distribution reveals something more harmful – that some neighborhoods and communities, often more wealthy ones, enjoy more canopy cover and thus more of the benefits trees provide. To help identify and mitigate this issue, American Forests recently released Tree Equity Score.
Figure 1 – an example of Tree Equity Score used in Oshkosh, WI. See the score along with demographic and environmental information on the left column.
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, Daniel.Buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
Do you have a tree inventory but have had a hard time keeping it current, or you’re interested in inventorying some trees of your own? The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is funding several accounts for communities or organizations to edit data within the Wisconsin Community Tree Map, a compilation of tree inventories from around the state. The map shows where trees are located and includes information about each tree, such as diameter, health condition and street address.
By Dan Buckler, DNR Urban Forest Assessment Specialist, Madison, daniel.buckler@wisconsin.gov or 608-445-4578
Joseph OBrien, USDA Forest Service, Bugwood.org
Monitoring for tree health enables managers to anticipate maintenance needs. However, health monitoring is often inconsistent, generic or requiring advanced knowledge of insect pests or diseases. There can be a better way, and this might be one.
Since 2015, the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) have spearheaded a tree health monitoring initiative called Healthy Trees, Healthy Cities (HTHC) that uses a simple methodology for lightly trained observers to identify potentially problematic trees. Disparate organizations have successfully employed the procedure, from Boy Scouts to the New York City Housing Authority. And now, the Wisconsin DNR has partnered with USFS and TNC to incorporate the methodology into the Wisconsin Community Tree Map, should any communities or organizations be interested in trying it out. One does not need to have a current tree map license to pursue this effort.
