Speaking for the trees

 

Location: James Street

Date photo taken: 5 September 2021

For those of you not familiar with Dr. Seuss, this is the Lorax, an environmental spokesthing from the 1971 book of the same name. In that story, the Lorax spoke up to protect the trees. On a walk in Long Branch this weekend this Lorax, along with a multitude of more generic but informative lawn signs, alerted me to a similar battle currently going on in this west end neighbourhood. Residents are campaigning to save the Black Barn Maple which is under threat due to a development proposal. At 160 years old, this maple is one of the oldest surviving trees in this part of the city and it is still healthy and going strong. Residents hope to keep it that way but so far the City has not moved to protect the tree. I personally hope they will, or that the builder will get creative and find a way to work around the maple. Heritage trees can be a powerful symbol and any mature urban tree is a valuable asset. 

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." 

Lilacs

Location: Riverside neighbourhood

Date photo taken: 24 May 2021

During COVID and especially during the most recent lockdown, my walks have been more about the need to get out and move and less about exploration. Covering the same local streets over and over again, things get pretty familiar. Thankfully, the city is now in bloom. These days I find myself taking pictures of flowers more often than murals. A huge thank you to all of the gardeners out there who plant and tend these beauties! Lately I've been pretty much walking from lilac bush to lilac bush, pausing to inhale deeply at each one. While I have a standard route designed to provide maximum lilac exposure, I deviated on the weekend and discovered this gorgeous specimen. I looked it up and it's called a Sensation lilac. I'd say that's pretty apt. Some other things I learned are that lilacs are not native to Canada - they're from Eastern Europe and Asia originally - and are in fact related to olive trees. They can live to over 100 and come in shades of purple, pink, white and yellow.

Treegators

Location: all over

Date photo taken: 9 July 2019

As I've mentioned in a previous post, the City of Toronto is working to expand the number of trees in our city. As part of this, they regularly plant new trees. Like all youngsters, new trees can be quite fragile and conditions during their first few years can have a big impact on how well they settle in and grow. In particular, adequate water is needed to help their roots establish themselves. That's where these neat green bags come in. Called Treegators, they allow for a long, slow release of water to the roots of the tree. This saves both time and water. The double-walled bag is filled in minutes allowing city staff to move on to other tasks, and the slow release over many hours, through small holes in the bottom of the bags, reduces water loss due to run-off and evaporation. The City zips them around all newly planted street trees.

Toronto Trees

Location: Allan Gardens, Gerrard close to Sherbourne
Date photo taken: 18 August 2015

There are several areas in the city where it is possible to visit some truly spectacular trees. In honour of Earth Day, here is a personal favourite. Allan Gardens, along with being home to a beautiful conservatory, also houses over 300 trees. Not bad for a modestly sized urban park.

The City of Toronto has embraced its urban forest and is attempting to grow its tree canopy. Permits are required to remove trees, even, in some cases, on private property, and in the decade between 2008 and 2018, the city invested over $600 million in maintaining and growing its urban forest. City estimates put the overall canopy at approximately 30 percent. Treepedia, a project by MIT's Senseable City Lab, uses a different metric. Rather than measuring the tree cover from above, they take a pedestrian view to measure how many trees can be perceived on city streets. They call their score the Green View Index. By this metric, Toronto scores 19.5%. The lower number likely reflects the relatively large percentage of Toronto trees that grow in parks, ravines and backyards. For comparison, New York has a score of 13.5% and Montreal scores 25.5%.

Owl and Raccoon

Location: East end of Carlton Street

Date photo taken: 30 January 2018

What happens when a tree dies in the city? While dead trees provide homes for birds and animals, when they are located along the street or in a park, they also represent a significant safety risk. For this reason, the city's Parks, Forestry and Recreation division will come and remove it. When an oak tree on the edge of Riverdale Park West died several years ago however someone came up with a twist on the idea. While the majority of the tree was removed, the bottom portion of the trunk was left intact. Jim Menken, a chainsaw artist, then worked his magic. Drawing inspiration from the shape and quirks of the tree, he populated the stump with some local wildlife. Apparently the original tree was so diseased it was hollow inside, so another stump had to be brought in from the city's wood lot, but it all worked out in the end.

Note: Over the past several years, due in large part to the emerald ash borer, the City has had to remove a lot of trees. Traditionally, these have been chipped and then disposed of. While researching this blog, I read about someone who thought this was a waste and did something about it. Sid Gendron now operates a sawmill that takes urban wood and turns it into wood products that local businesses can use. Read more about Sawmill Sid in this National Post article.

Zoo Woods

Location: St. George south of Harbord

Date photo taken: 6 May 2016

Walking along St. George Street, thru the heart of the University of Toronto's downtown campus, you pass this small, wild looking patch of green. This is Zoo Woods, a project undertaken in 1994 by the Zoology Landscape Committee to recreate the Beech-Maple forest environment that once predominated in this part of southern Ontario. Many of the plants here were rescued from the Altona Forest, a remnant of the beech-maple forest within the GTA which was cleared in 1994 to build a subdivision. With increased interest in fostering native species and increasing biodiversity within urban areas, learning spaces like this one can play an important role. To see what the space looked like prior to the project, or to download a map of the woods, check out the Zoo Woods webpage.

Magnolias

Location: Eastbourne Crescent
Date photo taken: 6 May 2016

This time of year there's a lot of chatter about cherry blossoms and with good reason - when they're in full bloom they are spectacular. Unfortunately, the High Park Cherry Blossom Watch is reporting that this year there won't be a peak bloom in their collection of trees. In the absence of cherries then, I present the magnolia. The deciduous variety looks particularly lovely when it blooms in the spring because there aren't yet any leaves to block your view of the flowers. There are many varieties of magnolia but most range in colour from white to deep pink, although I was very happy to come across a yellow variety on a walk this week. Like cherry blossoms they only flower for a limited time. Once the flowers are gone, leaves take their place and then these trees become wonderful providers of shade.

Autumn Foliage - Leventhal Mural

Location: Side of railway overpass, Macpherson Ave. west of Avenue Rd.
Date photo taken: 25 September 2013
Image 6 in the Mural Series

These beautiful fall trees are part of a much larger mural by Ian Leventhal located on the side of a railway overpass along Macpherson Avenue. After the surface was tagged several times, the neighbourhood took action. Local artist Celia Squires did some touch ups and the fixing of the mural became a community affair and point of pride.

Inoculation

Location: The Esplanade
Date photo taken: 20 June 2013

Back in January, this blog featured the green tree tags that mark healthy ash tree specimens around the city. Recently the tagged trees along the Esplanade received treatment via these small injectors to help them stave off infestation by Emerald Ash Borers, an invasive and highly destructive insect. Once the trees had been treated, their bark was marked by a bright green painted dot.

High Park Cherry Blossoms

 

Location: High Park

Date photo taken: 6 May 2013

High Park is home to a magnificent collection of cherry trees which bloom in late April or early May depending on the weather. In Japan, where these trees are from, there is a tradition of viewing or  picnicking under the cherry trees when they are in bloom and the pastime is taking hold here in Toronto - even early on a Monday afternoon there were large crowds.

To see more pictures and learn more about High Park's trees, check out the Cherry Blossom article on Hogspot.

Tree Tags

Location: Queen's Park
Date photo taken: 11 December 2013

Many trees around the city are now sporting small metal tags, just above eye level. Some of those tags are painted green. They mark ash trees that are healthy enough to be good candidates for inoculation by a product called TreeAzin™. TreeAzin™ helps protect ash trees against the ravages of the Emerald Ash Borer, an invasive insect species that has taken up residence in Toronto and threatens to wipe out the city’s population of ash trees by 2017. That’s about 860,000 trees. It’s too expensive to treat every tree, especially since it has to be repeated every two years, so the city is prioritizing high value trees. If you’re a home owner and have an ash tree on your property, take note: if it succumbs to the bug, and most experts expect that most untreated trees in the city will, you will be financially responsible for having the dead tree removed. For more information, visit the City of Toronto’s page on Emerald Ash Borers.