Publicizing TREE Fund research findings

The TREE Fund’s mission is to support scientific discovery and dissemination of new knowledge in the fields of arboriculture and urban forestry. In 2015 we elevated our focus on the latter part of this charge – dissemination – by producing new Lunch and Learn webinars that showcase TREE Fund research. These webinars, hosted by Utah State University Forestry Extension, attracted large audiences and were very well-received, so you can expect to see more of them in 2016!

TREE Fund research was also disseminated in presentations across the globe last year – from John Goodfellow explaining his vegetation maintenance expense tradeoffs model at the ISA Conference in Orlando, Florida, to Dr. Alessio Fini discussing his work on the interaction between trees, soil and pavement at the Congress of the International Association of Horticultural Producers in Stresa, Italy, and much more.

Results from several TREE Fund studies were published in peer-reviewed journals in 2015 as well, and these are listed below. You can read more about projects funded by the TREE Fund and continue to keep up with the latest research results in the Grant Archive section of this website.

TREE Fund Work Published in 2015

Bassuk, Nina. “Strategies for Successful Urban Tree Growth in Wet and Dry Sites.“ YouTube. YouTube, 28 Sept. 2015. Web. 02 Feb. 2016.
This video is from a September 23 webinar by Dr. Bassuk on strategies for growing urban trees on wet and dry sites. The video covers soil modification, as well as plant selection (with corresponding resources).

Gilman, Edward F. “Pruning Acer rubrum at Planting Impacts Structure and Growth After Three Growing Seasons.” Arboriculture & Urban Forestry 41.1 (2015).
Gilman found that pruning red maple at planting did not affect the tree height growth after three growing seasons, but there was an 8% (5 mm.) slower trunk diameter growth. He concluded that there appeared to be no downsides to pruning the largest branches at planting. The pruning shifted the largest branches to higher in the crown, providing better clearance. According to Gilman, this should reduce debris requiring disposal compared to trees not pruned at planting.

Hauer, Richard. “Emerald Cash Borer: It Will Cost You Money-Ways to Manage the Ash Cash Flow.“ YouTube. YouTube, 28 April 2015. Web. 04 Feb. 2016.
This video is from an April 28 webinar by Dr. Hauer on the economics of managing an EAB invasion. The video introduces a model that can be used to determine the costs and benefits of varying EAB management strategies.

Koeser, Andrew K., et al. “Factors driving professional and public urban tree risk perception.“ Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 14.4 (2015): 968-974.
Researchers found that defect severity was the most important factor when non-professionals, professionals, and advanced professionals were asked to give a risk rating. Advanced professionals also gave greater weight to the lack of a target in range of a tree in the event of failure and lowered their risk ratings accordingly. For both professional groups, higher risk ratings were assigned to lower-income neighborhoods (as opposed to moderate-income and high-income neighborhoods), perhaps because professionals knew the lower-income clients would not be able to absorb the cost of failure as well as moderate-income or high-income clients. Koeser, et al, concluded that more research is needed to provide guidelines for gauging the severity of tree defects and that educational and training effort should continue to stress the importance of risk assessment factors beyond likelihood of failure.

Koeser, Andrew, et al. “Impacts of Wire Basket Retention and Removal on Planting Time, Root-Ball Condition, and Early Growth of Acer platanoides and Gleditsia triacanthos var. inermis.“ Arboriculture & Urban Forestry 41.1 (2015).
Researchers conducted this study to find out if partial or complete wire basket and burlap removal affects early transplant survival, growth, and stability of honeylocust (Gleditsia triacanthos var. inermis) and Norway maple (Acer platanoides). They found no mortality among the study trees after one year as a result of the treatments. Honeylocust showed no difference with chlorophyll fluorescence for all the treatments. The Norway maple did show a difference with the partial removal having the lowest fluorescence. This study will continue with chlorophyll and growth measurements for two more growing seasons and finish with a examination for root system defects and for differences in root strength.

Miller, Jordan, Justin Morgenroth, and Christopher Gomez. “3D modelling of individual trees using a handheld camera: Accuracy of height, diameter and volume estimates.“ Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 14.4 (2015): 932-940.
This research tests the potential to use a low-cost hand-held camera alongside structure-from-motion with multi-view stereo-photogrammetry (SfM-MVS) to accurately measure trees, which would provide a simple and cheap alternative to remote sensing technology. Researchers found that the SfM-MVS was very accurate, particularly when measuring tree height, and that it is capable of reconstructing 3D point cloud models with high spatial accuracy.

Reiland, Mark, et al. “The effect of cables and leaves on the dynamic properties of red oak (Quercus rubra) with co-dominant stems.“ Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 14.4 (2015): 844-850.
Researchers found that leaves have a greater effect on the frequency and damping ratio of red oaks with co-dominant stems than adding steel support cables. While cabling increased the natural frequency of red oaks, the change only occurred when the trees were leafless, and cabling did not affect damping ratio. Future research is needed to account for other factors, such as cabling multiple branches in a single tree and the combined effects of cabling and pruning.