Moorpark Plants Trees to Celebrate Arbor Day

After helping plant a tree along Spring Road Friday, 8-year-old Joshua Reyes planned to take a similar tree home from the city's Arbor Day celebration and plant it in his backyard.

For the sixth year in a row, the Arbor Day Foundation and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection have named Moorpark a Tree City, USA. It's the second year in a row that the city was also given a Growth Award. A banner for the city was given to the mayor by Capt. Thomas Shoots of the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

"Not only are you guys meeting the qualifications, but you're going above and beyond," he said while praising the city and it's commitment to growing trees here.

To earn the Tree City designation, a city must have a tree board or department, a treecare ordinance, a community forrestry program with an annual budget of at least $2 per capita and an Arbor Day observance and prooclamation.

This year's observation took place at Veterans Memorial Park, where Mayor Janice Parvin and Allen Walter, who serves as the landscape and parks superintendent for the city, addressed a small crowd before participants helped to plant two arbutus marina trees, commonly called strawberry trees due to thier urn-shaped reddish flowers, along Spring Road.

Olivia Shaw Davila, 9, and her brother, Nicholas, 7, helped Parvin plant one of the trees along Spring Road.

"Now, when you drive by and see it, you'll know you're a part of the city," Parvin told the siblings. "It's your tree."

Reyes was helped with the second tree by Councilmember Roseann Mikos.

As it does annually, after the ceremony, the city then gave away free trees for residents to take home and plant.

These particular trees were given to the city by Toll Brothers as part of mitigation requirements negotiated when the company built houses in the city. It had to provide the city with trees to make up for the ones it would have to remove in order to develop the area, Councilmember Mikos and Walter explained after the event.

The strawberry trees are relatively young, according to Walter, who explained they've only been available in U.S. nurseries since 1983. The tree can grow up to 50 feet or so. This evergreen needs well-drained soil and likes sunlight.

The city has some trees still available for residents who want them. Call Walter at 805-517-6360 to make arrangements.