Urban Forestry

Parowan is a “Tree City USA.” Tree City USA is a program of the Arbor Day Foundation. To qualify for such a designation, a community must have a Tree Department, a Tree Care Ordinance, an Urban Forestry Budget of at least $2/capita, and an Arbor Day celebration. Here, the Tree Department is called the Parowan City Shade Tree Commission. The Commission meets once a month to discuss policy, budgeting, and long range planning, among other things. A friend of mine is the Chairman of the Commission and he invited me to attend a recent meeting.

As you might guess, the discussions of policy and planning were a little less than stimulating for some of the guests of the commission, but when they got around to discussing Parowan’s tree inventory, my ears perked up. Using volunteer labor, the Tree Commission has collected data on more than 4000 tree “locations” under the city’s jurisdiction. This includes existing live trees, existing dead trees and/or stumps, and places where trees could/should be planted. This may not seem like a large data collection effort for many cities or towns around the country, but for a town the size of Parowan, these kind of numbers mean more trees than people.

According to a summary of the inventory data there are nearly 50 different tree species growing on city property today. Of course, not all of these are “desirable” from an urban forestry perspective. Street tree desirability is based on a number of factors including longevity, strength, and size—urban foresters do not like trees that tend to die young and/or blow over. Unfortunately, approximately 17% of the existing live trees in Parowan are undesirable. These include Siberian elms, cottonwoods, and box elders. The latter two species are native to southern Utah and can be beautiful components of their natural environments, but the box elder especially tends to have weak wood and a poor form, not the best characteristics for street trees.

On the other hand, the Parowan data shows that the city owns nearly 60 American elm trees. This was a surprise to me because American elm trees are rare in American cities today. A very popular street tree beginning almost two centuries ago, the American elm population was decimated by Dutch elm disease starting in the 1930s. Bruce Carley, at his website, Saving the American Elm estimates that nearly 100 million American elms have succumbed to Dutch elm disease over the past few decades. So many have died, in fact, that I have stopped looking for them when I travel because I don’t expect to see them.

The funny thing about all this is that we have both a Siberian elm and an American elm in front of The Homestead. I didn’t recognize the American elm until my friend on the Tree Commission pointed it out. One of these trees is “undesirable,” and the other is a rare American treasure, but I love them both. Admittedly the American elm is more beautiful with its black branches and spectacular fall foliage, but both trees provide valuable shade, free compost for the garden, and a home for nesting birds. And, given that the city’s budget for removing “undesirable” but healthy trees is practically nil, I think we will be able to enjoy both of these trees for a long time. In fact, I won’t be disappointed if both of them are still standing long after my time.