Hello tree Lovers of Stillwater! |
Thank you for being interested in improving our urban forest in Stillwater! |
Stillwater has a long heritage of being a community that cares about their trees. In fact, we were one of the first communities to have a tree ordinance in Oklahoma. Horses and cattle being driven through Stillwater in 1901 were not allowed to damage trees along our streets otherwise their owners would risk being fined or jailed. In current times, the Stillwater Tree Board and City Forester work to encourage planting and maintenance of trees in Stillwater and this brochure is meant to be a Stillwater specific planting and maintenance guide. |
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Shading and cooling, beautification, water retention, air quality improvement, and wildlife habitat are only a few benefits that we reap from trees in our urban environment. We tend to take these benefits for granted and don't consciously think about trees and tree health until we are faced with their loss. The only way to ensure a healthy urban forest for the future is for us to take good care of our trees now. We know from past studies that the general state of our urban forest here in Stillwater is in decline. We are losing mature elm trees along our streets at an alarming rate from Dutch Elm Disease, and other trees are also showing serious disease problems, including many of our pine trees with the Pinewood Nematode and with Hypoxylon Canker in our oak trees. All of these diseases have no effective treatments, and they kill many of our mature trees. Preventive maintenance and proper species selection are the only ways to ensure the long term health of our urban trees. This brochure is meant to provide a resource for Stillwater residents to address some of the most commonly seen problems in our urban landscape. We can only improve our urban forest with the efforts of private citizens in removing dead trees that pose disease problems to surrounding healthy trees, in planting new trees and keeping them healthy, and in maintaining our mature trees. |
Thank you again for your efforts in keeping Stillwater green! |
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