Jonathan Dionne, a Master of Forest Conservation student at the Daniels Faculty, is spending the summer interning with the Long Branch Neighbourhood Association as a tree stewardship program lead. Jonathan has been involved in advancing the neighbourhood association's partnership with Neighbourwoods, a community tree stewardship program developed by associate professor Danijela Puric-Mladenovic and lecturer Andy Kenney. He recently wrote an op-ed about his work for Toronto.com.

Jonathan writes:

The City of Toronto has been planting new trees to raise the average canopy cover of Toronto from 27 per cent to 40 per cent. Planting trees in your own yard helps contribute to this goal; however, most canopy coverage comes from older trees. These older trees have massive canopies that filter pollutants from the air and soil as well as reduce storm water run-off and provide shading and cooling for the community.

Unfortunately, once the tree is planted, the resources aren’t always available to look after them for the remainder of their lives. This is why we need your help as tree stewards.

Read the full article on Toronto.com