Casey Trees Plants Trees for Georgetown

These past few days, the Casey Trees planting crew has been hard at work. As the tree planting season wanes, our staff replanted street trees in Georgetown.

Tree planting in action.

The planting locations, selected by the Urban Forestry Administration and Trees for Georgetown, include tree boxes that are empty or have dead trees or stumps, as well as stretches of sidewalk that can accommodate new tree boxes. On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday this week, we planted 33 trees (London plane, Chinese elm, river birch, sweetgum and purple robe black locust) in our first of two major plantings. A second planting of 21 oaks will take place in March.

Our partner Trees for Georgetown donated a portion of its fundraising efforts to offset our tree purchase and labor costs for this project, as well as providing custom-made, wrought iron protective fences for the newly planted tree boxes. Casey Trees will be taking care of watering with the High School Summer Crew this summer and pruning will take place following the second year. We are excited to be part of the effort to re-tree Georgetown, and we are looking forward to planting more in the spring!

This Tuesday, newly planted London plane trees joined the Georgetown streetscape west of Wisconsin Avenue.

TREES FOR GEORGETOWN. LITERALLY!

Casey Trees and Trees for Georgetown are partnering to plant 47 new residential street trees in Georgetown. Planting is currently underway and will conclude at the end of the December.

Planting locations include street tree boxes that are empty or those that have dead trees or stumps and stretches of sidewalk that can accommodate new tree boxes. The District Urban Forestry Administration (UFA) is removing any dead trees and stumps, taking existing tree boxes down to sidewalk level and coordinating the cutting of two new tree boxes.


Casey Trees will amend the soil, plant the trees, hang tree care instruction tags and return to water them twice during the summer and to prune them following the second year. Trees that fail during their first year will be replaced the following planting season.

Trees for Georgetown, an all volunteer committee under the auspices of the Citizens Association of Georgetown (CAG), dedicated to the planting, care and maintenance of residential street trees in the village of Georgetown raises funds through its spring fundraising event and personal solicitations to purchase and plant trees for its residential streets each year. Donations are accepted year round. Trees for Georgetown has donated a portion of these proceeds to Casey Trees to help offset tree purchase and labor costs associated with the beatification project.

In addition to sponsoring new trees for the village, Trees for Georgetown has underwritten custom-made wrought iron fences for each newly planted tree box to shield trees from vehicle doors, yard maintenance equipment and foot traffic.

In the spring, Trees for Georgetown Chair, Betsy Emes, will launch a neighborhood watering campaign emphasizing 25 to Stay Alive – 25 gallons of water (1.5” of rainfall) per tree per week in times of little or no rainfall. Neighbors are encouraged to use irrigation bags, provided free of charge by Casey Trees, to ensure their trees receive the proper amount of water.

“One of the most effective ways a resident can improve the social, ecological, and economic value of a neighborhood is to help ensure that new trees thrive,” said Emes. “In the first two years especially, these new trees need attention to get established. We ask that residents share that responsibility, and in the end we will all benefit from a beautiful tree canopy across Georgetown”.

Eight species of trees will be planted in Georgetown including Nuttel oak, Swamp white oak, Parrotia persica, Sweetgum, London plane, Chinese elm, Zelkova, and Shumard oak.

Photo - Casey Trees field crew in action in Georgetown