City plans to pull 148 ash trees in parks
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NEW ULM-- Park and Rec Director Joey Schugel revealed that Park and Rec plans to remove 148 of the 166 ash trees in New Ulm's 11 parks and replace them with a variety of trees at the City Council work session Tuesday.
Schugel determined that the selected trees should be removed due to the threat of Emerald Ash Borer. Of the remaining trees, they are looking to treat 11 and 7 are placed in an other category. Schugel explained the three factors they looked at when creating their preliminary plan.
"First off, we look at location," he said. "In our parks, we look for where people gather. [Those] trees are adding value and shade in the park. A lot of our our ash trees in our parks we see are aesthetic, on the boulevards. The entrance to the park may look different with removals there; but those trees aren’t adding more to time spent in gathering places. Next is the condition. Are these trees seeing stress already? Are we seeing signs of the disease? And then size [is the final condition]. We use the DNR guidelines quite closely on if [a tree] could even be treated depending on the size."
For the trees in the other category, Schugel explained they are trees installed to be a makeshift fence for the North Park softball field. The trees successfully prevent balls hit over the fence from hitting nearby houses, but were installed in poor locations and interfere with the field of play. Schugel recommends not treating or removing them for the time being, but instead waiting for the disease to disable the tree and take them down when needed.
While looking at one of the pictures, City Councilman Eric Warmka noticed a tree had already clearly been hit by Emerald Ash Borer. He asked if treatment could help these trees already affected severely.
"When we’re seeing the disease take effect already, [no]," Schugel said. "[The treatment is] not an end all be all solution. It might get you a little extra time but that tree is going to have to come down."
"My understanding after doing a little research is once it gets to one-third of the tree, it’s done," City Councilman Les Schultz chimed in. "You’re not going to bring it back. You might go along but it’s done."
City Engineer Joe Stadheim said there are preliminary plans in place for funding to remove these trees or treat them.
"Our hope is to apply for two different programs, the maximum worth for each is half a million dollars. No local match would be required with this new round of applications. [Mr. Knisley and I] intend to apply for enough funding to take care of our parks and all of our ash trees. Our hope is the one to one replants would be covered."
Andrea Boettger thanked Schugel for the hard work put into this preliminary plan. No action was taken as this was a work session issue.