Bringing the Forest to the City, One Tree at a Time
Branch Out Burlington! promotes a vision of a city graced by a variety of beautiful and healthy trees, and a citizenry actively involved with the perpetual expansion and preservation of our urban forest.
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The 2020-21 pandemic has proven to be one of the greatest challenges in the 24 year history of our organization. We had to cancel all our established events, including the annual tree planting, monthly weeding bees at the nursery, the popular tree walk and winter seminar, and even the infamous Awesome Tree Contest and awards ceremony. Instead we hosted an art contest for young people with the Young Writers Project (https://youngwritersproject.org/).
This turned out to be one of YWP’s most successful contests. A Celebration of Trees received over 166 entries! The entries were any writing or visual art form with the focus on one tree, fiction or nonfiction, real or imaginary. Emphasis was on creativity and passion.
The contest wrapped up Feb. 28, and now the judging begins! The team of judges will now get down to work reviewing all of the entries and make hard decisions about who wins the prizes. Actually everyone who entered is a winner because they got to think about trees, a foundation of our natural community. Winners will be announced on Earth Day, April 22. Stay tuned! Thanks to all who entered.
Branch Out Burlington! is launching a newsletter to remain connected with our volunteers during these challenging times. We hope to prepare a newsletter monthly over the winter, and perhaps less often in the growing season. Our goal is to let you know what BOB! is doing and keep you informed about local and national tree related matters. Our first newsletter came out in November 2020 and since then we have published several more – read them here. . . Newsletters
BOB by the Numbers 2020349 affordable trees were sold to Vermonters
250 young seedlings were planted in the Community Tree Nursery
100 trees from the nursery were planted along Burlington’s streets
64 trees were donated to local non-profits, schools and individuals in need
$5000 was donated to local non-profits
Watch video by V.J. Comai, Burlington City Arborist, on the city’s approach to EAB , prepared for the Annual Arborday Foundation conference.
EAB reaches Chittenden CountyAs of Friday, October 23rd: There have been new detections of EAB in VT: one in Richmond, VT, the first confirmed detection in Chittenden County and another detection in Shaftsbury VT, expanding the infested area in Bennington County. The mapped area in Vermont to which “Slow-the-Spread” recommendations apply now extends to include the towns listed below in the following Confirmed Infested Area and High Risk Area. Confirmed Infested Areas are within […]
BOB donates generously after annual Tree SaleThis year’s tree sale was especially challenging navigating through new guidelines in place from the COVID-19 pandemic. Many trees were delivered to individuals, the pick up date was changed and the pick up hours were extended to allow for social distancing guidelines. In spite of all the challenges, the BOB Tree Sale was a great […]
After a little over one year of construction and ten years of planning, Burlington’s City Hall Park is finally open! The festive opening weekend on October 16-17, 2020 was full of music, tours, splash dances . . . Read more . . .
As of October 30, we completed all of our fall planting, 113 trees. 70 bare root trees from Schichtel’s and the remainder from the BOB nursery. Read more . . .
We say goodbye to one of our long time Board Members, Barbara Mines, as we present her with the Gold Leaf Award for her service. Barbara served on the BOB! board as scribe from 1996-2020. She always loved nature and animals and it was important to her to give back to causes she cares about. Because of her love of animals, in 2012 she began volunteering with Green Mountain Animal Defenders, an animal protection organization, and is now on the board. She spends lots of time with her cats. We’ll miss you Barbara!
For the near future, our meetings will take place virtually over Zoom. Our next meeting is March 9, 2021 at 6:00 pm. For more information contact Margaret Skinner at margaret.skinner@uvm.edu
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Did you know that you can also contribute to Branch Out Burlington! while shopping at Amazon? Simply go to smile.amazon.com and in the Amazon Smile drop down list choose Branch Out Burlington! as your charity. A percentage of your purchase will go to Branch Out Burlington! with no extra cost to you.