The Informed Reader, a blog that is part of the Wall Street Journal online, writes about the important role that trees play in urban areas to decrease average temperatures, to decrease pollution, and to absorb water and rainfall that would otherwise have a bigger impact on city drainage systems.

Without trees, cities suffer. Their leaves filter out particulate pollution. The crown of a large tree also intercepts rain water that might otherwise clog cities’ aging drainage systems. In some cases, a tree can ensure that 1,500 gallons of water a year will evaporate before it hits the ground. Finally, tree shade stops asphalt from reflecting the sun’s heat and creating so-called heat islands. According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Atlanta’s temperature is now five to eight degrees higher than the surrounding countryside following decades of development that bulldozed wooded areas.

If you are interested in the topic, don’t miss our comprehensive article about the environmental benefits of trees on the Clean Air Gardening site.

I am a firm believer that trees provide huge benefits to both urban and rural areas. That is why Clean Air Gardening matches donations of up to $10 to the National Arbor Day Foundation on our checkout page. We have been responsible for planting more than 17,000 trees since we began the program about a year ago, and the number is about to go up when we make our latest donation at the end of the month! We also really like the organization, Trees for the Future, and American Forests.

American Forests has this awesome program where you can buy saplings that come from famous trees, so that you can grow a direct descendant of that tree. I bought my dad a sapling from the Austin, Texas Treaty Live Oak, a tree that is around 500 years old. I also bought him a cool Elvis tree too, that comes from one of the trees on the Graceland property in Memphis.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, June 23rd, 2007 at 1:13 pm and is filed under In the News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.