BATH — With Arbor Week approaching, the city’s Community Forestry Committee has dedicated its new forestry center.
The Forestry Committee wanted to have a building not only to store tools and materials, but also to provide shelter from the elements for the area’s volunteer forestry groups from Hyde School, Bowdoin College and Morse High School, City Arborist Kyle Rosenberg said April 25 during a tour of the site.
“If we had a bigger project, it would be a place where we could grab something to eat, and keep drinks, and that sort of thing,” Rosenberg explained.
The 252-square-foot building, which replaces a smaller shed on the lot, stands next to a tree nursery the city installed in 2016.
The nursery can hold 100 trees and has room to grow. It includes sycamores, Turkish filberts, basswoods, Kentucky coffeetrees, ginkgos, and red maple.
The elaborate species chosen for the nursery do not appeal to browntail moths, Rosenberg noted.
The trees grown are partly intended for city use; five sycamores planted last year now stand by Bath Middle School’s bicycle pump track. Other trees are sold to private buyers.
“The overall goal was to have inexpensive trees available to plant out in the city,” Rosenberg said.
Funds raised from plant sales at the dedication will go toward forestry projects on the roughly 4-acre, city-owned parcel.
“Our overall goal is to have an arboretum out here, in the long run,” which would tie into the Whiskeag Trail, Rosenberg said. The proximity of the site to Bath’s schools could also provide some educational opportunities, he added.
Fundraising alone paid for the construction of the roughly $11,000 center, which was completed last October. The Forestry Committee chose to wait until this spring for the dedication.
“We figured, well, it’s spring, everyone’s coming back to life,” Rosenberg smiled. “It would be a good time to dedicate something new.”
The timing works well, too, with Mother’s Day, and with Arbor Week, which in Maine runs the third week of each May.
Alex Lear can be reached at 780-9085 or alear@theforecaster.net. Follow him on Twitter: @learics.
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