Celebrate trees! Celebrate Arbor Day!

By Sheila Cubick

Master gardener volunteer

National Arbor Day is Friday and it’s a day to celebrate the importance of trees.

Arbor Day began in 1872 as a tree-planting day in Nebraska, suggested by the Territorial Secretary J. Sterling Morton. He was a newspaperman who wrote about the importance of trees and stewardship. Trees were needed as wind breaks to slow wind erosion of the soil, as well as for firewood, building materials and shade. By 1885, Arbor Day was a legal holiday in Nebraska. Gradually all 50 states began to celebrate Arbor Day. Trees are a wonderful resource. In “The Giving Tree,” Shel Silverstein chronicles the relationship humans have with trees. They become our friends by providing us with shade and places to relax. Their fruit and nuts provide us with food and their bodies cut into lumber provide us with shelter. Throughout their lives they may provide many of these functions for us at their expense.

Trees provide many specific functions in an ecosystem. They help to slow storm water runoff and prevent flooding, regulate temperatures by expiring, provide oxygen for breathing, and remove carbon dioxide from the air. In addition, they provide food and shelter for animals, birds and insects.

However, trees are under siege from a variety of sources such as deforestation for lumber and development and more recently, invasive insects. For many years the wholesale removal of trees for resource extraction and development has concerned many citizens globally. There have been many campaigns to protect and preserve the forests around the world, but most publically, the tropical rainforest. Without large expanses of forests to remove carbon dioxide, the earth will warm even faster than we are beginning to experience.

A more recent threat to our native forests are non-native invasive pests like the emerald ash borer, which targets a relatively small range of tree species, but a substantial number of trees. These trees include a significant number of our crop species and their economic loss is substantial.

With these threats to our trees, it is especially important to honor them and celebrate Arbor Day. The Arbor Day Foundation suggests many ways to celebrate. Some simple things you can do include planting a tree, reading a book about trees, conducting a “largest tree” and “oldest tree” hunt, and organizing a tree identification hike. You can even attend OSU Extension workshops to learn proper pruning of trees and train to become a First Detector of Invasive Pests (April 27).

More information at www.arborday.org/celebrate/.