New to the NCUFC Board of Directors in 2021, Maria Tranguch is the owner and principal consultant of Legacy Land Consulting in Asheville, NC. An ISA Certified Arborist and Tree Risk Assessment Qualified Arborist, Maria helps people manage their land and trees, performs tree care, and teaches other women how to climb through the Women's Tree Climbing Workshop. Through her work, she has the unique opportunity to apply multiple skillsets, while continuing to learn in the process

As a NCUFC member, Maria enjoys the breadth of the educational programs that our orqanization offers. She elaborates, "The importance of educating and connecting folks in the field cannot be understated in this industry and in particular in this time of a drastically changing climate."

The 12th Annual Great NC Tree Conference was a tremendous success! Over 150 attendees participated in the indoor and outdoor education workshops over two days, focusing on the arboricultural aspects of maintaining healthy trees, as well as the relationship between our urban forests and human health. The keynote address, presented by Dr. Vivek Shandas of Portland State University, can be viewed on demand via our YouTube channel here: Green Space Planning in Historically Disinvested Urban Neighborhoods: Pitfalls, promises, and the path ahead.

We'd like to thank the corporate sponsors whose support made our conference possible. Sponsors included Arborguard Tree Specialists, Bartlett Tree Experts, Duke Energy, NC Forest Service, Davey Resource Group, Tree Movers, Inc., Worthington Farms, ISA Southern Chapter, SunRock Soil Systems, Tree Diaper, Plank Road Forestry, and Jericho Farms. Exhibitors in attendance included Rainbow Tree Care Scientific, Stihl, and Vermeer.

Many thanks to all who attended! We hope to see you all at the 13th Annual Great NC Tree Conference in 2022.

The NC Urban Forest Council includes a silent auction at The Great NC Tree Conference each year, with all proceeds benefitting the NC Legacy Tree Fund. Thanks to the generous donation of auction items, and the many conference attendees placing competitive bids, the 2021 silent auction raised over $900! These funds will all go towards funding tree planting projects throughout NC in the coming years. Thanks again to all who participated.

To learn more about the NC Legacy Tree Fund Grant Program, and the projects it has supported over the years, visit our website HERE.

Trees in the urban environment have been an object of interest for planners for many years. The American Planning Association has recently republished an article from its “PAS Reports” archives about street trees, which dates from 1968. That article notes that there are ordinances to preserve and plant trees in cities that date back to the 1850’s. The article discusses the aesthetic and environmental reasons for saving and planting trees, including heat mitigation, carbon sequestration and stormwater mitigation. It discusses some of the challenges of urban tree planting and preservation that planners and landscape architects were dealing with in 1968: conflicts between utilities and tree roots and tree crowns; appropriate species for the conditions in the urban environments; avoiding damage to trees during construction; planting in constrained areas. These things haven’t changed much in the last 50 years. And yet some things have changed. The article notes that they found only 4 municipalities in the US with ordinances for tree preservation on private property. Today there are many municipalities across the country with tree preservation ordinances. That’s good news. But even as communities become more aware of the benefits of trees and the need to include them in planning, the urban environment has gotten even more difficult for trees, with problems that planners in the 1960’s probably never foresaw. READ MORE HERE...

Trees provide considerable stormwater volume and pollution control through rainfall interception and intensity reduction, stormwater infiltration and uptake, and nutrient load reduction. This document focuses on the effects of trees on urban stormwater runoff, provides some helpful urban forest management strategies to maximize stormwater benefits, and demonstrates several examples around the United States where the stormwater benefits of urban trees are credited for reducing stormwater volume and pollutant loading. This U.S. Forest Service document serves as a resource manual for natural resource professionals to help implement natural solutions for stormwater management, and create credit systems for urban trees and forests. LINK TO THE FULL STUDY