The 63rd annual Arbor Day Celebration, promoting the value of trees to residents, will take place Friday at OJ Watson Park in south Wichita.
City Arborist Gary Farris says trees are a great way to promote air quality and help the environment. According to Farris, tree planting by the city varies each year depending on funding.
“We've planted as few as a couple of hundred, and we’ve planted this year, just over 1700,” he says.
Farris says the City of Wichita lost thousands of trees in the droughts of 2011, 2012 and 2013.
“It’s going to take a lot of years of tree planting to recover that loss, and it’s going to take a lot of years of tree growth to recover that canopy," Farris says. "It's important for us to promote tree planting so that we can recover the ability of our natural environment to filter out pollutants.”
The Arbor Day event will include demonstrations on how to properly plant trees and other educational activities.
