For Immediate Release
September 29, 2009

Expert shares secrets to growing healthy trees in California landscape

Edward Gilman has been fascinated with trees since he was a boy watching a maple tree grow in the front yard of his New Jersey home.

Gilman, a professor in Environmental Horticulture at University of Florida, Gainesville, has turned that early fascination into an avocation. He has written six books on trees and landscape plants and more than 55 scientific articles on tree care.

In addition to teaching and writing, he conducts seminars throughout the United States and Canada including one coming up Sept. 22 in Riverside, sponsored by UCR Extension.

The seminar “Retaining and Sustaining Trees in Urban and Suburban Landscapes” will run from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. with registration beginning at 7:30 a.m. in the UCR Extension Center, 1200 University Ave., Riverside.

Gilman will begin by talking about how trees grow and how roots develop.

“We will be focusing on what propagators and nursery people can do to make trees better for the buyer,” Gilman said.

Then, he will address what the arborist and horticulturist can do to keep a tree healthy once it is established.

One of the biggest problems for tree specialists in California is the tendency for roots to circle in the container while the tree is still at the nursery. Circling roots makes the trees less stable and threaten to strangle the trunk. Gilman said steps can be taken at planting and 10 to 15 years after to make the roots straighter and stronger.

Gilman also has found that pruning trees to develop one trunk instead of several trunks makes them last longer and they are cheaper to grow.

The class is geared toward anyone who plants and cultivates trees including tree maintenance workers, municipal and school district employees, landscape architects, and arborists who care for trees in the long term.

Fee for the seminar is $179 and includes continental breakfast, lunch, materials and parking.

For details and to register visit www.extension.ucr.edu or call 951-827-4105.