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UConn Announces – Officially – a Two Year Degree Program in Urban Forestry and Arboriculture

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UConn’s two year degree program in Urban Forestry and Arboriculture has been approved by the University’s Board of Trustees.  As a result, the Ratcliffe Hicks School of Agriculture within the University will now be accepting students who wish to major in this field.  While a two year degree, students who are interested and qualify will have the opportunity to continue on into a four year degree in a related field.  Further details can be found on the official UConn Announcment.  A sample outline of the coursework expected for completion of the degree is on the second page of the outline.

Classes are already underway in the first course required of the major – The Fundamentals of Arboriculture.  This course is being taught by John Kehoe, with 9 students enrolled.  According to John, the course is going along very well, with the students excited, interested and learning things.  John is well-known to CTPA members as a long-time arborist who runs his own tree care business as well as being former Hartford City Forester and a member of UConn’s arboricultural staff.

In addition to announcing the major, UConn is also announcing the spring semester course in Urban Forestry as well as opening the search for an Adjunct Instructor in Urban Forestry.

Please feel to pass this information on.

CTPA is a supporter of this program, through financial contributions and also by providing advice and assistance.  The best way for membership to support this program will be by considering UConn graduates for employment, once we reach that point.

The  Ratcliffe Hicks School of Agriculture is affiliated with the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, which is within the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources at UConn.  Members seeking further information on the program are encouraged to contact the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment at: nre@uconn.edu or 860‐486‐2840.

Remembering Frederick E. Kuhr – CTPA Past President 1978-79

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Frederick E. Kuhr, 81, of Southington, passed away unexpectedly on Monday, August 26, 2019 in Griswold, CT. Frederick was the devoted husband of Elke (Bäuerle) Kuhr for 53 years.

Born on October 12, 1937 in Waterbury, CT to the late Ernst and Dora (Richter) Kuhr, he was a lifelong Southington resident.

After high school, Freddie was drafted and proudly served his country in the U. S. Army. He then earned his degree in Horticulture from UCONN. He established Evergreen Nursery in 1960 with the goal of “beautifying the outdoors” and proudly served the local community for over 50 years. Freddie also enjoyed raising and herding sheep with his family and friends.

He was an active member of the Masonic Friendship Lodge No. 33, the Southington Elks Lodge No. 1669, a Lieutenant Governor for his Kiwanis Club district and a member of the Sphinx Shriner’s. He was a former Bank Director at Southington Savings Bank and a Past President of the German American Society.  Freddie was a proud member and Past President (1978-79) of the Connecticut Tree Protective Associations (CTPA). He also volunteered as a firefighter in Southington for many years. Freddie will be remembered for his contagious laugh, dynamic personality, and unique sense of humor.  He had a generous spirit and always believed in family first.

In addition to his loving wife Elke, he is survived by his son, Eric F. Kuhr of Southington, two daughters, Rebecca Isaacson and her husband Todd of Middletown and Carolyn E. Kielma and her husband Michael of Wolcott and 7 grandchildren: Sarah, Rachel, Ryan, Alexander, Julia, Teddy and Henry. He is also survived by his sister, Heidi Bittner and brother, Walter Kuhr and his wife Roberta, all of Southington along with many nieces and nephews. He was predeceased by his sister Loretta Miron and two brothers-in-law, Michael Bittner and Francis “Shy” Miron.

In lieu of flowers, donations in Freddie’s memory may be made to the Shriners Hospitals for Children, P.O. Box 1525, Ranson, WV 25438 or via lovetotherescue.org

For online condolences, please visit www.plantsvillefuneralhome.com.

Looking for Nominations for the 2020 Annual Meeting Awards

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Allan Fenner, President and Thomas E. Worthley, Arborist Citation Recipient

The Connecticut Tree Protective Association regularly honors individuals who have made significant contributions to arboriculture and to the care and protection of Connecticut’s trees. These awards are given annually and presented at the Annual Meeting. The CTPA Board of Directors is requesting nominees for awards for the upcoming Annual Meeting on January 17, 2019 and encourages you to nominate someone whom you feel deserves special recognition.

Award Categories:

  • Award of Merit– This award is presented to a CTPA member who has shown exemplary professionalism and dedication and made outstanding contributions to the care and protection of Connecticut’s trees.
  • Arborist Citation– This award is presented to a non-member who has shown exemplary dedication to the care and protection of Connecticut’s trees.

If you know of someone that is deserving of either of these awards, please print out the nomination form and email (info@ctpa.org) or fax (203)793-7924 to the CTPA office.

The deadline for nominations is Monday, December 2, 2019.

English and Spanish EHAP Workshops

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Do you understand all that you need to in order to work safely around electricity and power lines?

Electrical Hazard Awareness training is a must for everyone involved in tree care. Simply put, it is a Basic Matter of Safety. If you work with trees, you will encounter electricity. Electricity can be very dangerous.

This EHAP workshop is offered by CTPA to help prepare individuals for the electrical hazards they face in their everyday jobs.

Attendees will learn about the electrical distribution system, the hardware used in that system, the types of electrical hazards a tree care worker is likely to face and how to be prepared when you are encountering electricity on the job.

Cost of the Workshop

In order to help make this workshop affordable for all who wish to attend, CTPA has subsidized the costs.

Total cost for each attendee is $135 for members and $155 for non-members.

All attendees will receive the TCIA’s Electrical Hazard Awareness workbook – a $135 value. Attendees may request this workbook in English or Spanish.

This price includes lunch and the EHAP Workbook and Manual.

CEUs

CEU’s will be available for CT, ISA and CTSP.

About the Workshops (English and Spanish)

These workshops will make attendees aware of the hazards all tree care workers face when they work around energized electrical conductors. This awareness is an essential part of basic tree care safety. It is recommended that all people who work in tree care take an EHAP course.

The ENGLISH one day workshop, at the Berlin Campus on November 14, 2019, will be led by Emmett Shutts, Cheshire, CT. Emmett is an approved TCIA EHAP instructor and the New England regional trainer with Davey Tree. Mr. Shutts will make use of the EHAP Workbook and Manual published by the Tree Care Industry Association. All attendees will receive this publication. Training will also be provided on the equipment that makes up the electrical distribution system. Knowing what each piece is and what it does is an important part of being safe around electrical conductors.
To ensure your reservation, please register by November 1st for the English EHAP taking place at the Berlin Eversource campus.

OR

The SPANISH one day workshop, at the South Norwalk Library on December 5, 2019, will be led by Leo Roldan, Certified Arborist, Certified Tree Worker Specialist, Certified Aerial Lift Specialist, Certified Treecare Safety Professional and TCIA EHAP instructor. Mr. Roldan will make use of the SPANISH EHAP Workbook and Manual published by the Tree Care Industry Association. All attendees will receive this publication. Training will also be provided on the equipment that makes up the electrical distribution system. Knowing what each piece is and what it does is an important part of being safe around electrical conductors.

To ensure your reservation, please register by November 21st for the Spanish EHAP taking place at the South Norwalk Library.
OR

Individuals who complete the exercises in the workbook, who receive certification in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) methods and who also can demonstrate a basic level of skill in aerial rescue techniques are eligible to be certified as line clearance arborists. CTPA will not be providing this additional training or testing. Companies are responsible for the EHAP certification of their employees. However, guidance on achieving certification will be offered by CTPA to participants, both during and following the workshop.

CTPA encourages all companies engaged in tree care to have an EHAP program in place for all of their employees.

Registration

If you are in tree care and have not taken an Electrical Hazard Awareness course before, you really should consider attending this one. These workshops fill quickly so please register early!

Centennial Tree Planting is Underway!

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The Centennial Tree Planting to commemorate the Anniversary of the Connecticut Arborist Law is underway!  The trees have all been delivered to the designated sites around the state with the plaques to accompany them.

Several of the trees have already been picked up and we know of at least one tree planting that has taken place in Franklin.  Thank you David Gustafson for being the first to plant a white oak on September 11, 2019 at the Veterans Park  in Franklin along with Franklin First Selectman, Charlie Grant.

There are 23 towns that do not have volunteers.  If you are interested in helping in any of the following town, please call the office at 203.484.2512.  Andover, Ashford, Colchester, Colebrook, Columbia, Goshen, Hartland, Lisbon, Marlborough, Montville, Plainfield, Plainville, Plymouth, Preston, Salem, Scotland, Sterling, Thomaston, Union, Voluntown, Willington, Windsor Locks, Wolcott.

Keep checking the CTPA website for more pictures of tree plantings around the state.  We will put them on the Centennial Tree Planting Picture  page as they come to the office.

Thank you to all that have volunteered!  Taking on planting a tree in each town in the state of Connecticut would not have happened without your generosity of your time and resources.

CTPA Scholarship Application Now Being Accepted for 2020

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CTPA is seeking applicants for the 2020 Arborist Scholarship.  This $2,000 scholarship is being offered to undergraduate students who are residents of Connecticut studying urban forestry or arboriculture.  Students do not need to be attending college in Connecticut.

The Association plans to offer two scholarships this year.  The due date for applications is December 1, 2019.  The name(s) of the 2020 award winner(s) will be announced at the 2020  Annual Meeting.

Please click on the button to print out the application forms

This is the 19th year in which CTPA has offered this scholarship, with 30 scholarships awarded since 2001.

If anyone has any questions, please contact the CTPA office (203-484-2512 or info@ctpa.org).

The Fundamentals of Arboriculture at UConn

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Students perusing the course catalogue at UConn this fall might notice a new course within the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment.  The Fundamentals of Arboriculture will be taught at the Storrs Campus, meeting twice a week for lecture and with a 3 hour lab on Tuesday afternoons.  The instructor is John Kehoe.  John is a long-time member of CTPA who admits that he is thrilled at the opportunity to teach this class.

John Kehoe leading a tree walk.

John Kehoe, leading a tree walk in East Hampton. Photo used courtesy of the Hartford Courant.

The CTPA is assisting UConn in the establishment of a 2 year degree program in Arboriculture and Urban Forestry.  As described in a previous post (see CTPA and UConn Announce Plans for a New Degree Program), this course in Arboriculture is being added as an elective this fall and a second course, on Urban and Community Forestry, will be added in the spring semester.  There may also be a practical Winter Session course on tree care skills.  Then, if all goes well, the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources will initiate the degree program in the fall of 2020, with all of the above courses required for the Associates Degree.

CTPA’s contributions are two-fold.  The Association is underwriting the costs of hiring the instructor or instructors for each of the two semester courses.  The Association and its members are also being asked to provide industry support of the sort that will help build a successful program.  That includes encouraging students to take these courses,  providing helpful feedback to the university faculty and administration as the program builds, and, perhaps most importantly, being open to hiring worthy candidates who graduate from the program.  All of this, obviously, will need to play out over the course of time as the program establishes itself.

Meanwhile, the consensus is that John Kehoe is an excellent choice to get the classroom part of the program started.  John is a second generation arborist who obtained his Connecticut license back in 1975.  He has seen a lot of industry growth and change over those years.  As he has grown in experience, he has also grown in knowledge and insight.  He has seen tree care from the perspective of a private, commercial tree care company, as the former acting City Forester in the City of Hartford and, now, in his current position, as part of the tree care staff of UConn.  Among his educational activities, John is widely known for his encyclopedic knowledge of tree species and horticultural varieties.  He has lectured, led numerous tours and participated in workshops for a variety of audiences.  As a teacher, he is conversational in his style, confident and very capable of bringing his wide range of experiences to life.  He will do well in front of a classroom.

CTPA should be proud of its role in helping to make this happen.  The CTPA Committee, chaired by board member Carter Peck, remains active and in touch with UConn as this program continues to develop and grow.

Left to right, are Carter Peck, CTPA Board Member, Allan Fenner, current CTPA President, Jason Vokoun, Professor and Head of the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, Robert Fahey, Assistant
Professor in Applied Forest Ecology, Thomas Worthley, Associate Extension Professor in Forest Management, and Sandra Bushmich, Associate Dean and Director of the Ratcliffe Hicks School of Agriculture.

Mark Bays and the Oklahoma City Survivor Tree

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At the CTPA Summer Meeting, Mark Bays, Urban Forestry Coordinator with the State of Oklahoma gave a stirring talk on the story of the Oklahoma City Survivor Tree.  For those who missed it, the Survivor Tree is an American elm that managed to survive the domestic terrorism attack of April 19, 1995 – the Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 innocent people as it destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.  It has been Mark’s responsibility since shortly after the bombing to look after this tree, which is now incorporated as a key feature in the Oklahoma City National Memorial, designed and built to remember those lost and to help the rest of us to continue to move forward.

Allan Fenner and Mark Bays with the Oklahoma Survivor Tree Offspring in Hartford.  The tree is in a temporary location until the State Office Building rehabilitation is completed.

Interestingly, CTPA’s current President, Allan Fenner, has a connection with the Oklahoma City Survivor Tree.  Back in the early 2000’s, an offspring of the tree in Oklahoma was donated to the State of Connecticut.  This Survivor Tree offspring was planted on the lawn of the State Office Building in Hartford.  It was growing there until about two years ago, when it needed to be moved to allow for State Office Building to be extensively renovated.  Allan, a consulting arborist with Sav-A-Tree, was given the assignment of overseeing the transplanting of the Hartford tree and its ongoing recovery and growth.

On the Friday following the meeting, Allan greeted Mark at the offspring of the tree that Mark has come to know so well.  The Hartford tree is thriving, as can be seen in the photos of the tree.  Mark was pleased to see how an Oklahoma native had taken root in the Nutmeg State.

Mark was also very happy to have been able to let the folks at the CTPA Summer Meeting know about the original Survivor Tree.  Mark has asked that CTPA share the following two links.  The first is to the video that was shown at the end of the second of his talks – for various reasons, it did not get played at the end of the first talk.  The second is a link to where people can get a Survivor Tree of their, with some of that money going back to the Oklahoma City National Memorial.

Here is the link for the Survivor Tree Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8A-ICA3YE3I

This is the link to the Survivor Tree offspring offer:

https://sequoiatrees.com/survivor-tree-american-elm-medium-tree-seedling.html

Drop Zone Safety – Presentation at the CTPA Summer Meeting

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Steve Fassbender of Lewis Tree Service delivered two riveting talks on Drop Zone Safety at the July 18 CTPA Summer Meeting.  These talks are part of CTPA’s ongoing effort to promote safety in tree care.  Steve’s message was particularly effective as so much of it came from his personal experience and his desire to help people avoid future accidents.  It also presented attendees with an innovative approach towards preventing a particular type of accident – that which can occur when large pieces of wood are being dropped by someone aloft in the tree and a ground worker unwittingly enters into the drop zone beneath this worker aloft.

Tree workers being struck by cut limbs is the most common cause of fatalities in the tree care industry, responsible for 39% of all deaths.  Over the past decade, Lewis Tree has taken the lead in establishing the first drop zone safety policy.   Lewis’s work has set the standard for the industry and the company has contributed to the language that is now part of the ANSI Z133 Safety Standard.  An article published in the CTPA Summer Newsletter, authored by Steve Fassbender and Doug Pistawka (of Eversource), outlines the history of the drop zone safety concept.  Individuals wishing to know more about safe practices regarding the drop zone, including how to establish a drop zone on the job site, are encouraged to read this article.

It has also been reported that more and more vendors, including CTPA Allied Members, are now selling the distinctively colored drop zone safety cones that are recommended for use in designating the perimeter of the drop zone.

2019 Summer Meeting – Come Spend the Day!!

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Summer Meeting 2018

The CTPA Summer Meeting is July 18, 2019 and there is a great lineup of speakers, food all day and plenty of exhibitors to visit!!

You will have the opportunity to earn CT Arborist (3D) – 5.0 CEU’s, (3A) -2.5 CEU’s, CT Forest Practitioners – 2.0 CEU’s,  Advanced Certified Tree Wardens – 5.0 CEU’s, ISA – 5.0 CEU’s  and TCIA CTSP – 1.25 CEU’s.

Tree Infection and Wood Decay Following Storm Injury – Kevin Smith, USDA Forest Service

The Legacy of the Oklahoma City Survivor Tree – Mark Bays, Oklahoma State Urban Forestry Coordinator

Drop Zone Origination and Development.  Does Everyone Need One and Why – Stephen Fassbender, Lewis Tree Service

Arboriculture Below Ground – Aaron Dickinson, Arborcology

On-Line Registration

PDF Registrations
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 (pdf)

 

Contact CTPA

MAILING ADDRESS: P.O. Box 1946, Wallingford CT 06492
PHYSICAL ADDRESS: 60 Church Street (Rte 68), Suite 3A, Wallingford , CT 06492
PHONE: 203-484-2512
EMAIL: info@ctpa.org

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