Richmond Tree Team

Tree Inventory Volunteers Needed This Summer - Richmond Neighborhood, SE Portland

Do you love our neighborhood’s trees? Our growing tree canopy is one of the many things that make Richmond a great place to live, work, and play. But after 20 years of tree plantings—the first organized community planting was in 1993!!—we still have a lot to learn about the composition, condition, and spatial distribution of our trees.

Richmond and nine other Portland neighborhoods were selected to partner with the Urban Forestry Division of Portland Parks & Recreation to complete a neighborhood-wide street tree inventory this summer. Richmond residents will then use the inventory information to develop a Neighborhood Tree Plan. This plan will set our neighborhood’s goals, such as preserving existing trees, diversifying species, and increasing canopy, and provide guidance for future neighborhood tree stewards.

Over four separate inventory days (Saturdays: July 20^th, August 17^th, & September 7^th and Thursday August 8^th), teams of community volunteers will walk the neighborhood, from Hawthorne south to Powell, between SE 29^th and SE 50^th/52^nd, mapping the location, and determining the species, size, and health of every last one of our street trees. Volunteers will also identify where ailing trees might be replaced, and where new trees could be planted in the future. Believe it or not, no one has collected this information before now!

Learn more about the project and register to volunteer online at: http://www.portlandoregon.gov/parks/treeinventory

All are welcome to volunteer, including community groups, and no experience with trees is necessary. Neighborhood leaders and Portland Parks staff will provide training and guidance on inventory days. Dozens of tree trunk measurers, clipboard holders, note takers, tree i.d. guide readers, and friendly neighbor chatterers will be needed each day!

Team Leaders and arborists are also needed. Team Leaders attend a training (either June 13^th or 15^th) to learn basic tree identification and inventory methods and then volunteer to help on two or more inventory days. Arborists or other tree experts (horticulturalists, landscape designers, botanists, or other tree nerds) are needed to assist with identification. Register for the Team Leader training at the link above; contact Ryan if you are an arborist and want to help.

This time of rapid neighborhood change is an opportunity for renewal and reconnection, a time for us to remember why we love living here. We hope you will join us in creating a green legacy.

Questions? Contact our neighborhood inventory organizers:

Dianna Choi, deevoj@yahoo.com / 917-202-9848

Ryan Durocher, ryandurocher@hotmail.com / 971-285-7245