I’m a big believer in tree karma. After all, I spend much of the winter at high altitude pruning trees in the canopy. (Don’t tell my mom-she still worries about running with scissors, so she wouldn’t be so into climbing with chainsaws). So do the trees still like me? I like to think I plant more than remove, but what’s the ratio here at Middlebury?

Trees in an urban forest such as ours are under more stress than in a natural forest environment. Granted, they adapt well, growing wide, as they don’t have their brethren next to them breaking wind (wait, that doesn’t sound right). They rely on each other for support, protection, and for all we know, companionship. Trees on campus get walked upon, climbed, swung from, and occasionally cut into with an axe. Root systems are walked on, soil compressed, all sorts of little indignities befall a campus tree.

Most fight valiantly, but, sadly, some succumb. It’s our job to remove the victims before they fall on something like a building, or, more importantly, someone. In arboriculture, a hazardous tree is defined as a tree that can fall on a target. That means if a tree falls in the woods, it doesn’t make any noise, because there is no target. Many trees on campus have targets-students seem to walk everywhere. So we worry. And cut the occasional tree.

Middlebury College has a vigorous tree planting program. It’s necessary in an urban forest to be continually replacing trees, much like succession in the woods. It should be on-going, as a mixed age population is more sustainable. We aim for diversity as well. No more than 30% of the trees in an urban forest population should come from the same plant family, no more than 20% from the same genus, and no more than 10% from the same species. We’ve been planting trees all along, but also removing some. So, we wondered, what was the karma factor here, were we planting more than removing?

I spent my lunch break looking at pictures of removals, and going through my planting files, worried about our department’s karma. Happily, we’re good, and by quite a bit. I’m in my fourth year here, three growing seasons, and in that time our department has removed 37 trees from the main campus. This does not include 5 or so lost to student damage, and a couple “weed” trees growing out of woodlines. We have planted over 128 trees, for a ratio of better than 3.5 to 1.

Astute observers yesterday probably thought we in the landscape department had lost our mind. Middle of November, and we’re mowing the lawn.

We were chopping leaves. It’s really the ideal way to recycle leaves, to put them back into the ground from whence they came, as it were. (more…)

There are two issues when writing about Ginkgoes. One is giving an accurate sense of smell, the other of time.

The easiest one is smell. And the culprit would be the seeds.

Ginkgo Fruit

The tree is dioecious, meaning they have separate sexes, male and female trees. All horticultural literature describing Gingkoes state to plant only male, or fruitless trees. Why? The females bear the fruit, and, only clocking in at about 1 to 1 ½” long, the size belies the potency.  The fruit are covered by a fleshy apricot colored outer layer, called a sarcotesta. While it may look edible, the nose will give it away. The flesh contains butyric acid, which some describe nicely as “rancid butter”, but could more properly be defined as, well, people walking nearby a female tree with ripe fruit dropping to the ground tend to check their shoes to see what they had just stepped in, like some recalcitrant dog had just been on the same sidewalk. (more…)

It’s raining tonight, and the wind is going to howl tomorrow. By all means, if you live out of state, come up tomorrow and see the last bit of foliage around as it goes flying past your window at 40 MPH. If you can’t make it, here’s some final fall color pictures from around campus, the last gasp before stick season.

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The foliage is peaking now in Middlebury, and it’s pretty spectacular. My prediction was part true-the color is great this year, but the timing seems pretty normal to me. Anyway, I was gone for all of last week (in the Ozarks and Nebraska, where there are spectacular oaks, but, like oaks are wont to do, no pretty fall color, just washed out yellows and muddy browns), so here’s some pictures of plants at my house that are also in nice color on campus.

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The leaves are starting to turn on campus, and one of the first species is also one of my favorites. Black Maple, Acer nigrum, is a tree I didn’t even know about before I began working here.

Black Maple Fall Foliage Color

It’s hard to beat the bright gold color of this tree-in my mind brighter than any self respecting Sugar or Red Maple. It also turns a little sooner than the other trees around it, like it needs to jump ahead of the pack and show off. Fine by me. (more…)

Here’s some early fall color seen around campus. The smaller trees were all planted last year, and the Katsura is showing some early fall color due to recent excavation nearby. More pictures as things turn.

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