Arbor Day
Friday, April 28th
In Illinois, the last Friday of April is Arbor Day; a special day set aside to plant, nurture, and honor trees. Trees are extremely important to our communities and conservation. Without trees people, animals and other plants would not survive. Trees make our environment livable by providing shade, cleaning the air, filtering the water, storing carbon, providing homes, food and much more. To help celebrate, our Arborist Ed Pfaff and a group of volunteers have calculated the dollar value for the benefits of different varieties of trees. The information is written on tree tags that have been attached to trees throughout the village. This information shows how useful the trees are, as well as how beautiful. As you travel throughout our community look for the tree tags. Take a moment to stop, admire the beauty, see what type of tree it is, and what benefits it provides. We think you will be surprised.
Fun Facts:
"The net cooling effect of a young, healthy tree is equivalent to ten room-size air conditioners operating 20 hours a day."—U.S. Department of Agriculture
"If you plant a tree today on the west side of your home, in 5 years your energy bills should be 3% less. In 15 years, the savings will be nearly 12%." —Dr. E. Greg McPherson, Center for Urban Forest Research
"One acre of forest absorbs six tons of carbon dioxide and puts out four tons of oxygen. This is enough to meet the annual needs of 18 people."—U.S. Department of Agriculture
"In laboratory research, visual exposure to settings with trees has produced significant recovery from stress within five minutes, as indicated by changes in blood pressure and muscle tension."—Dr. Roger S. Ulrich Texas A&M University
Pictured here is one of our volunteers, Samantha Marecek as she ties a tree tag on to one of our trees.