BTF News

The Second Saturday Tree Care Day was held at Robert Semple Elementary School, where students and neighbors helped plant trees around the playfied on the Semple campus back in 2013.  On October 12, volunteers found the trees growing well.  21 trees were mulched.  Mulching helps reduce weeds and retain soil moisture.  A Tree Care Day will be planned this winter to prune, after the deciduous trees loose their leaves.  Below are before/after pictures for one of the Incense cedars that was mulche

Yesterday a group of six volunteers completed pruning of the coast live oaks planted at Benicia High along Military West by the Benicia Tree Foundation in 2012.  Late summer is the best time to prune Coast live oaks (Quercus agrifolia) because they go dormant at that time to survive California's hot dry season.  Click here for some expert guidance on pruning California oaks prepared by the University of California Cooperative E

Plans are proceeding with the Park Solano tree planting project.  Volunteers are requested to arrive at the park at 9:00 AM, which is located at the intersection of Hastings Drive and Solano Drive.  The morning's activities will start with welcoming comments from Supervisor Monica Brown and Mayor Elizabeth Patterson.  This will be followed with a demonstration by staff from the City Parks and Community Services Department on how to plant a tree.  After receiving this instruction, tree planting can begin.   A tree-related scavenger hunt is planned after the tree

Six volunteers helped out at Benicia High School for Benicia Tree Foundation's 2nd Saturday Tree Care Day in September.  Twenty-five trees throughout the campus that were planted in the last two years were watered, weeded and/or mulched. 

Save the Date, Saturday, October 19, for a tree planting project at Park Solano, a two-acre neighborhood park located at the corner of Solano Drive and Hastings Drive, across from the firestation in Southampton.  We need volunteers to help rejuvenate this 30-year old park with new trees.  Since April of this year, Benicia Tree Foundation has been working with a donor (who is paying for the trees) and City staff to identify locations and species for 13 new trees, consistent wtih the Master Plan adopted by the City for this park in 1997.

The schedule for Tree Care Days slows down in the summer for the Benicia Tree Foundation.  Tasks are limited to watering trees that are still in their establishment period.

In June we had Tree Care Day at Mary Farmar and Benicia High.  The campuses are adjacent to each other and each had trees that were planted last winter and needed watering.  At Benicia High were were watering acorns that sprouted last winter.  We planted at 18 locations and 16 spouted with Coast live oak saplings.

The Benicia Tree Foundation offers the Benicia Tree Keeper Program to Benicia property owners seeking advice on their tree planting projects.  Valero community relations staff approached the Benicia Tree Foundation this summer for advice on how to incorporate trees in landscaping projects at two of their properties in the Benicia Industrial Park.

Benicia Spring Arbor Day for 2019 was held in conjuction with Earth Day on April 27, 2019.  Nearly 30 volunteers assembled at Community Park to hear welcoming comments from Supervisor Monica Brown and Mayor Elizabeth Patterson.  After receiving planting instructions from staff of the city's Parks and  Community Services Department, volunteers spread out along Rose Drive to plant ten Deodara cedars (Cedar deodaras).  Volunteers also picked up nearly 30 pounds of trash in Community Park. 

On April 29, a group of Benicia High Students, Cub Scouts, and other Benicia residents, with the assistance from staff of the City's Parks and  Community Services Department, planted nine Ginkgo biloba (Maidenhair trees) on Rose Drive east of Panorama Drive.

Benicia Tree Foundation sponsored Tree Care Days at Joe Henderson Elementary School on March 30 and April 6.  These tree care days included weeding and pruning trees that were planted by students at the school in 2012. 

The trees had grown to the point where structural pruning was needed.  Trees that grow to be large are more structurally sound and cost-effective to maintain when trained with a central dominant leader that extends into the crown.  Side branches should be staggered along the leader and trunk rather than clustered together.