We are offering a free seedling to families to plant together, along with learning activities to do together as you plant and grow your tree.

Please visit this link to request your tree: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/95GR8ZR

Please feel free to share this link. The seedlings will be available for self service pick up outside at our office building after April 28th (The building is closed to the public).

 

Learning Activities to Do

Learning Activities for Planting and Growing a Tree

Project Learning Tree Family Activities

Tree Planting Guides

Arborday.org Guide

Bareroot Tree Planting Guide

Growing Guides – Search for your tree in the Plant Finder Box

 

About Our Trees

Each of these are potential climate adaptation species. See pictures of each tree and more at https://gobotany.nativeplanttrust.org/

White Oak  – (Quercus alba)  This beautiful, large, functional tree is a Maine native that doesn’t grow naturally in Waldo County, but has great potential as a tree for our area, providing high quality lumber and sweet acorns that are excellent food for wildlife. As a yard tree, white oak develops a beautiful round, spreading form and has beautiful oak leaves with rounded lobes. Planting oaks is one of the best ways to support our native butterflies and moths as hundreds of caterpillar species feed on them.

Tulip poplar – (Liriodendron tulipifera) This tree has a very nice form both when young and when older. It is our second largest tree after sycamore, growing to tremendous size in the southern US. As a yard planting, it has a symmetrical, slightly conical form, with unique, large leaves that become yellow in the fall. As it grows taller, it has a very straight, clear bole. It is a good lumber tree, is fast growing, and shows great potential to adapt and thrive in our area. Its beautiful, tulip-like flowers appeal to pollinators, and it produces small, soft seeds which provide wildlife food similar to ash trees, which are likely to die out due to the invasive insect emerald ash borer.

Shagbark hickory – (Carya ovata)   The bark of this tree is unique and ornamental, with gracefully curving, peeling strips. Its leaves and twigs are also attractive, and it produces very tasty, edible nuts that also feed wildlife. Hickory wood is strong, is an excellent fuelwood and also provides forest products. Hickory regenerates well after harvest from stump sprouts. It is not native to our area, but shows potential to be able to grow here and adapt to a variety of conditions. It likes to grow in dry upland sites.

Black walnut  –  (Juglans nigra)  This sturdy tree produces prolific, edible walnuts. Its lumber is highly valued, and it is also used for veneer. Although it is not native to our area, it is successfully grown here and in similar climates. It is an adaptable tree, and like hickory, has potential to provide mast (nuts) food for wildlife, to replace lost chestnut, butternut and beech nut crops.

 

 

Due to Covid-19 pandemic and the need to avoid creating close contact situations for the public, our staff and volunteers, we are cancelling our 2020 Plant Sale. Those who have ordered from us will be contacted and refunds issued promptly. Please contact us on our website if you have any questions. We very much appreciate your support and look forward to providing plants for you next spring.

The University of Maine has a program called the Forest Climate Change Initiative, with an informative email newsletter and website to help the public become informed about the latest developments in climate change research and resources as they relate to Maine forests. The summary publications are a great way to be informed without wading through a lot of literature. One new publication to check out is the  Maine’s Climate Future Update 2020. There are other resources as well, including Keeping Your Woods Healthy Through the Years Ahead: Maine Woodland Owner Handout, which includes a list of organizations with resources for woodland owners.

Another excellent online source for learning about forests and climate adaptation is the Climate Change Response Framework, with many practical learning and planning resources for landowners, including an online workbook that generates adaptive forest management plans.

Waldo County SWCD is available to help you plan for woodlands stewardship and management in these changing times. Contact us for a site visit or for other needs or questions.

Here’s our job description. See our Facebook photo albums and Instagram @waldocountysoilandwater to see interns on the job. A diverse, skill building conservation position for college students, the position offers stipend pay and free housing.

Position Description:

We are hiring for an internship position which will be focused on land stewardship and assessment for farms, forests, and parks. The activities include biological monitoring and conservation-oriented land management work in varied landscapes. Tasks include planting native plants, invasives control and assessment, ecological restoration site improvement and sustainable farming with new agricultural technologies. Hemp agriculture training is also featured. The intern will use GPS and GIS mapping technology to characterize and mark invasive plant populations and to do other GIS tasks. Other responsibilities can include writing reports, posts and articles on our findings and inputting and organizing scientific data. The intern will work under the direction of the Knox-Lincoln Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) based in Rockport, and Waldo County SWCD based in Belfast, and will also work with several other area environmental organizations and agricultural producers. This internship will provide development of a broad skill set applicable to many environmental science careers. Two positions are available for an 10 week commitment (May 25 to July 31), and there are additional opportunities for shorter term or project work. Students may apply by sending a letter of interest and a resume to Rebecca@knox-lincoln.org. Please do not apply on Facebook. The internship is unpaid, but includes stipend payments for a significant portion of the work, and free housing in a private modern cabin (with electricity, internet, hot water) if needed.

As many of you know, Maine’s forests are facing an onslaught of changes that threaten to change or degrade the diversity and productivity of our forests. Our forests have lost millions of mature elms and chestnuts, and are poised to lose most of their ash trees. Red spruce, balsam fir, birches and hemlock are all likely to face steep declines during this century. Oaks are at risk due to pathogens such as Oak Wilt and Sudden Oak Death. Beech trees, which provided important wildlife food along with chestnuts, are now a shadow of their former selves due to disease. You may have noticed that I’ve mentioned many of Maine’s major trees here. The simple truth is that our forests as we know them are likely to disappear. As conservation minded citizens, we will need to act to shepherd our forested lands into a very different future. Waldo county is 84% forested, and forests and trees are an important part of people’s lives and livelihoods here.

Our District has  been at the forefront  of developing soil and water conservation district leadership in forest resource conservation. Waldo SWCD has decided to make our work about addressing the degradation of forests and helping our residents find ways to steward forests during this challenging period. Our Forests for Our Future resource protection theme has encompassed stewardship workshops, high school educational programs and conservation technical assistance. We have also partnered with the Maine Forest Service to provide outreach and to monitor for invasive forest insect pests.

In the coming years, we will be spearheading adaptive forestry in Coastal Maine. Beginning with research plantings in 2019 and moving on to a broad program of citizen involvement in forest restoration plantings and scientific research. In 2019, we developed a citizen science tool for reporting on tree conditions called Report a Tree (on the Anecdata.org platform). This spring, Report a Tree will go into statewide use for reporting on the health of adaptive tree species (native and non-native trees that have the potential to thrive here) and for reporting on forest pests and disease.

Perhaps most exciting of all is the opportunity for Midcoast residents and schools to join us in planting selected adaptive tree species for the purposes of research and to begin the process of reforesting our land. Several area schools will plant and study seedlings as a part of this project, and anyone is welcome to participate. Selected species will be available as seedlings and saplings during plant sales this spring in Waldo and Knox-Lincoln Soil and Water Conservation Districts. Check out our adaptive seedlings here. The “adaptive” trees selected are based on their wildlife and ecosystem value,  to supplement or replace trees that may not be able to provide wildlife food and habitat due to invasives and disease, such as ash trees. The trees are also species that have been shown to be highly adaptable to drought, various soil moisture levels and temperature regimes and  thus have potential to provide lumber or other forest products in different climate conditions.

Some Adaptive Tree Species

White oak:  Lives in southern Maine, provides lumber and high quality acorns for wildlife

Bur oak:  Rare but lives in our area, with potential to be highly adaptable to a variety of conditions

Black walnut: High value as lumber and veneer, adaptable, provides wildlife food

Tulip poplar: Grows fast, provides lumber, produces soft seeds like ash trees, supports pollinators

Shagbark hickory:  Provides high quality nuts, wood products, fuelwood, potential to be highly adaptable to a variety of conditions

Pawpaw:  Understory tree that produces edible fruits