Communi-TREE Week

To start off National Forest Week, Green Venture and CanPlant have partnered up together again, with the support from the City of Hamilton Forestry Section to plant another Mini Forest at Morton Park. Join us on Saturday, September 17, 2022, from 10:30 AM to 3:30 PM to help plant over 600 trees/shrubs at Morton Park. 

There will be two slots available for volunteers to join, 10:30 AM to 12:30 PM and 1:30 PM to 3:00 PM. Spots will be limited! Sign up early!

National Forest Week is here and so is Communi-TREE! Trees are SO important to our everyday lives. From the air, we breathe to the shade that shelters us. Here are some highlights:

• Supports Local Biodiversity: Trees support local wildlife by offering shelter and food.
• Climate: Trees help our climate! Trees remove pollutants from our air and water, reduce rainwater runoff and flooding, help regulate climate temperatures, and much, much more!
• Economic  Benefits: Trees are a great economic investment! ROI’s include: energy savings, atmospheric CO2 reductions, noise and glare abatement, runoff reduction, and more!
• Health Benefits: Several studies have found that living in areas with a higher number of trees correlates with higher reported levels of mental and physical wellbeing.

Urban Forestry professor and researcher Dr. Cecil Konijnendijk recently put forward a guiding rule for cities and their urban forests called the 3-30-300 Rule. 

Every resident should have three trees in view of their home, there should be a 30 percent tree canopy in all neighbourhoods, and there should be a high-quality park or greenspace within 300 metres of every home.

The 3-30-300 Rule is a best practice and science data-driven inspirational challenge and call to action for cities. Trees in cities help make our lives better and that includes our mental health, physical health, and social connections. 

Planting trees and growing our urban forest canopy can help improve Hamilton’s overall air quality, protect water quality, reduce flooding, fight climate change, support biodiversity, provide our yards with shade and noise buffering and increase property values.

Planting trees on private property in Hamilton is especially important because many areas of our city have disproportionately lower urban forest canopy cover. For example, the recent urban forest technical report recorded 7.6% canopy cover in Ward 8 and 27.4% in Ward 5 (based on data from 2017).

Get to know your neighbourhood and put it to the 3-30-300 test: 

• Can you see 3 trees? 
• Is your neighbourhood approximately 30 percent shaded by a canopy of trees? Compare your ward in the Urban Forest Strategy.  
• Can you walk 300 metres to find a greenspace, park, or a treed boulevard? 

As part of National Forest Week, we are launching our Communi-TREE contest!

Who am I? 

• I am a large shrub and/or small tree
• I have showy white flowers that bloom in spring just as leaves emerge
• I attract birds with my edible fruits that turn blue-black by the summer
• I am native to Eastern North America

How to Win? 🏆

1. Comment your best guess to the tree, by Friday, September 23 at 4:00 PM.
2. Following @Green_Venture on Instagram
3. Signed up for Green Venture’s Green Post (e-newsletter) – link in bio if you aren’t already signed up!
4. Check out our contest details and rules above!

Today is #NationalTreeDay as part of @CIF_IFC’s #NationalForestWeek! 🌳

To celebrate National Tree Day, we are hosting our tree stewardship volunteer event today to give the newly-planted trees at King and Nash some TLC and will be hosting another Mini Forest planting event at Lake Avenue Park on October 15! 

There are so many reasons to volunteer with Green Venture:

• Earn community volunteer hours 
• Spend time outdoors
• Learn about urban forestry
• Meet other tree enthusiasts
• +More

Did you know Urban Forests provide SO many benefits to our communities, from providing food and shelter to critters to keeping cities cool.

Chapter 1: Tree Benefits Overtime 📖

BUT…these benefits take time to establish ⌛As a tree matures the benefits increase! (see graph) 📈

For example, the USDA Forest Services cite that 100 mature trees catch about 139,000 gallons of rainwater per year! 🌧️

Chapter 2: Keep our Forests Growing 📖

So what can we do to speed up these benefits? Here are some ways groups in Hamilton are helping the cause: 

• Reforestation programs 
• Native tree plantings
• Ongoing maintenance 

🧑‍🌾Innovative planting like the Miyawaki method helps to speed up this process, mini forests that mimic the maturity of a well-established forest. This past Saturday volunteers helped plant 600 native trees and shrubs in Morton Park in Dundas! Thanks again to our partners CanPlant, City of Hamilton, Trees for Hamilton for the help and to our amazing volunteers! Stay tuned to learn how you can have your own mini forest in your backyard! 

🌲Our mini forest partners CanPlant have created a database dedicated to helping folks find native trees and plants! Trees for Hamilton helps plant trees with various groups across Hamilton! Plus our friends from Environment Hamilton and Hamilton Naturalists’ Club run the Trees Please program to plant on community sites and giveaways to get more trees on private property! 

🤗The Hamilton Stewardship Network was created by Green Venture to connect volunteers to community greening sites that need ongoing help! Our previous tree plantings from the past two years are all listed on the map and you can connect with our team or check out the map to find other opportunities to engage! 

Chapter 3: Speak for the Trees 📖

There’s something missing tho…tree protection! Not yet established is a  by-law to protect trees. The City is preparing the final version of the Urban Forest Strategy that we hope will provide further direction for private tree by-law (when polled 97% said YES!). And continue to advocate for better tree protection in Hamilton! 

Thanks for reading! 📕

As #NationalForestWeek continues, we want to talk about the importance of trees for humans! 

Exposing ourselves to trees can have an array of benefits! So what are these benefits?

• Urban trees can improve our mental health by decreasing our cortisol levels and increasing our ability to recover from stress;
• Urban trees can increase our immune functions by increasing our natural defence against cold, flu, and viruses;
• Urban trees can foster active living by increasing our level of activity;
• Urban trees can increase air quality by filtering CO2 levels and releasing oxygen back into the atmosphere;
• Last but definitely not least, urban trees can cool our city streets by providing shade and lowering our surface air temperatures by up to 10 degrees celsius!