VERMONT — Do you know of a special ash tree worth celebrating? Perhaps it’s the largest in your town or a backyard tree that you planted when your youngest, now a college student, was born.
The Vermont Urban and Community Forestry Program and the Vermont Land Trust are partnering to gather stories and photos from Vermonters about ash trees. Many of these will be posted on the land trust’s website, vlt.org/ash.
If you have stories, photos, drawings, maps, poems or anything else to share, you can send by email to [email protected] or mail to Allaire Diamond, Vermont Land Trust, P.O. Box 850, Richmond, VT 05477. The project is ongoing with Nov. 15 as the next deadline for submissions.
Ash trees are an important part of woodlands, wetlands, towns and cities as they provide habitat for wildlife, stabilize soils of floodplains and shade town greens, streets and yards. However, the state’s 150 million ash trees are now threatened by the emerald ash borer, an invasive insect.
The project also will help raise awareness of this destructive forest pest, which was first detected in northern Orange County in 2018 and has now been reported in several other counties, including in Addison County. Once infested, an ash tree is likely to die within five years.
For more on the ash stories project, to see previous submissions and learn about the work of the Vermont Land Trust, go to vlt.org or contact Allaire Diamond at [email protected].
Visit vtcommunityforestry.org or call (802) 651-8343 for information about the Vermont Urban and Community Forestry Program, a partnership between University of Vermont Extension and the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation.