About Tree Steward
The Tree Steward Program is a community-based program where city/county staff or representatives will request bringing in Tree Steward education. This education allows the public citizens to get involved with caring for their community's urban and community forests through volunteerism. Essentially, Tree Steward volunteers act as leaders in their community and act as a second pair of eyes within their community.
Tree Steward volunteers can be trained in a wide array of topics related to trees. This education can include, but is not limited to, the following topics:
- Properly planting trees and leading others at planting events
- Properly pruning young trees to improve the overall health and structure
- Pruning suckers and sprouts from young and mature trees to ensure safety and proper sightlines for the public
- Watering devices available for use and the benefits of utilizing watering devices for young and newly planted trees
- Installation of watering devices on public trees
- Identification of common tree diseases and pests
- How to identify trees of concern - we want to keep the public safe!
- How to report trees of concern to your community so action can be taken
Tree Steward Participating Communities
How To Get Involved
Since the Tree Steward Program is community-based, education is brought to a community upon request from city/county staff and representatives. Training events take anywhere between 3 to 8 hours, depending on what type of curriculum city/county staff and representatives want the volunteers to learn to volunteer in their community. At the end of training, volunteers will be asked to complete a short competency assessment to ensure volunteers can answer important questions related to trees and to ensure volunteers are prepared to get out into the field.
After training, Tree Steward volunteers are asked to complete 10 hours of volunteer work every year to keep their active Tree Steward status. Every 3 years, volunteers will be sent a recertification assessment to keep up their active Tree Steward status and as a way to share any new developments in the research of urban and community forestry.
Check with you community representative to see if it is currently participating in the Tree Steward Program, when the next trainings may be, or if you would like to see Tree Steward brought to your community. If you have any questions, feel free to contact [email protected].