Restoring the Urban/Suburban forests

Trees are tools to utilize in our efforts to combat climate change threats. Trees shade out heat islands, reduce habitat loss and support livable conditions. We can team up with trees to support our homes in the future. We can start today! A New Year 2026 resolution to improve urban forests takes a first step towards a shadier, cooler future. Certainly every tree planted has an impact. In my town, the urban forest has been thinned and depleted, creating some real heat islands. Many of us gardeners acknowledge the changing weather and have been concerned about what we witness. We embrace the planting of trees this year, and more trees next year! And the years after that…

Tree planting is low-hanging fruit in facing the challenge of climate changes. Trees shade the earth and build up the soil. Trees shelter the life beneath the canopy. Trees pump water. New trees help rebuild the urban forest by closing holes in the canopy. New trees help sequester carbon and start to make up the lost ground from removal of  old and giant trees. New trees help rebuild our drainage habitats and provide diversity to urban forests. Old trees need to be cared for and allowed to live as long as possible. Older trees sequestor more carbon than young trees.

There is a local project in my town planned to create "tree guilds" on residential sites. So, what is a tree guild? Like in the natural forest, a tree guild is an independent "community" of plants that is largely self-regulating and self-supporting. Guilds are designed using natural patterns to require minimal maintenance once established. A guild requires planning at its inception and the work to get it planted and established. As the guild matures, less and less effort is needed. Guilds produce shade and perfect habitat for birds, butterflies, other insects and wildlife in a layered pattern. Guilds model natural forest ecology, taking advantage of nature's collective intelligence inherent in all natural systems. Basic guilds would include the main tree, a supportive understory that includes smaller trees, shrub plants, plants for pollinators and beneficial insects, low growing ground covers and soil-cultivating dynamic accumulator plants. Healthy forests have mycelium protection through the work of fungi. Gardeners can provide this protection through use of a mycelium drench, using proper maintenance techniques and using wood mulch. Not every guild would have all these layered elements, but we should utilize as many as possible.  

To explain further, here is an example: Utilizing a native oak, like bur oak, or even a scrub oak as the primary tree element, a native guild could include native silver buffaloberry that fixes nitrogen, chokecherry as a native species forage and pollinator support, creeping Oregon grape holly as a medicinal, evergreen ground cover, and even strawberry as ground cover.  Pollinator attracting plants for a Colorado guild are many. Some well known natives are cleome bee plant, plains coreopsis, goldenrod, sulphur flower, wallflower, blue flax, penstemons, yarrow, asters and gaillardia. These are just a few of the  many options. Native species are superior pollination plants as they serve the whole of the pollinator insects in our area and local honey bees.

Forests are life. Globally forests are home to up to ninety percent of all this world’s terrestrial biodiversity. Forests hold knowledge from our ancestors; how they cared for their forests and hold the wilder relatives of many agricultural crops. Mimicking the forest in a tree guild helps to form a similar complex and mutually beneficial relationship between the plants and the organisms in our urban and suburban settings. Such connections work to benefit naturally harmonious communities. Have we humans forgotten that we are part of the web of life itself? It is common knowledge that we indeed do depend on the natural ecosystem to sustain our own life. I believe many have disconnected from the natural world, and don’t quite grasp this basic environmental knowledge. We want the planet to be healthy and whole. We need to rebuild the urban and suburban forests. Planting a tree guild "family" will definitely help. Doing what we can is as important as our connections to where we live and honing the ability to let nature be our guide.