City Arborist Shawn Dickerson is down in the dirt, teaching attendees how to plant a sapling near the big pavilion at Tepe Park.
The root ball with black soil is dropped into a shallow hole.
“When you plant these and fill the holes back in, you'll have to shake the dirt off all these,” he said. “Try to save as much dirt as possible.”
They’ll plant several trees — redbuds, persimmons and a Ginko, to complement the variety of existing species including Oak and Walnut.
This is the first planting of the season — slightly earlier than they prefer. Dickerson said an urban tree canopy offers many benefits.
“They provide you know shading shade for our properties, which cool our houses and reduce our energy costs,” he said. “They cool the overall climate of the city. They clean our air. They keep stormwater out of our sewers, which taxpayers have to pay for.”
Currently the urban tree canopy only covers about 24-percent of the city which is slightly down from 2011. While the 2024 Urban Tree Canopy Assessment reports that 51-percent of the city could be covered in the tree canopy, Dickerson said between 30 and 40 percent is possible in reality, because so much of the city is private land.
There are several much larger tree plantings planned for the fall. This includes Locust Hill Cemetery on November 7. This is funded by a grant sought by Wesselman Woods, with members of the Evansville Forest Alliance.
There’s also a planting at Howell Park on November 14, funded by the Evansville Solid Waste District. Both events will plant about 110 trees.
But at the end of the day Saturday, 10 new trees were planted at Tepe Park, complete with protective fencing.
This neighborhood was targeted specifically by the Evansville Forest Alliance, because non-profit organization Community One has a base and network of neighbors in Tepe Park. Tree planting is a key outcome for developing the Tepe Park neighborhood.
Tepe Park resident and Development Director Eric Tillman said neighborhood residents appreciate this effort to improve the canopy.
“The neighbors are excited about this happening and coming to our neighborhood. We have plenty of gardeners and tree enthusiasts that are appreciative of this opportunity.”
Indiana University's Environmental Resilience Institute (ERI) provided all equipment and trees.
Intern Beatrice Burton is with the ERI and working on her master’s degree. She said maintaining older existing trees is also important for the tree canopy.
“So they start to break limbs, and so those older growth trees that have been here for a while are super important to the canopy because they have a much wider canopy than the smaller ones. So just maintaining those bigger trees that have been here for a while is super important.”
Burton is working on an Urban Forest Master Plan for the city.
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