{"id":277639,"date":"2026-04-20T23:59:29","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T23:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/277639\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T23:59:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T23:59:29","slug":"throwing-shade-why-not-plant-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/277639\/","title":{"rendered":"Throwing shade? Why not plant it"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story will be featured in our SacramenKnow newsletter.\u00a0Sign up to get updates about what\u2019s happening in the region<\/a>\u00a0in your inbox every Tuesday and Thursday.<\/p>\n

Summer is just around the corner, and in Sacramento, that means an inevitable endless quest for shade begins. For the Sacramento Tree Foundation, it\u2019s more of a mission than a quest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since 1990, the group, in partnership with SMUD, has offered up to 10 free shade trees to all SMUD customers<\/a>. The program doles out more than 13,000 trees in 5-gallon buckets to residents every year, according to Stephanie Robinson, interim director of programs at the Tree Foundation.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce summertime hits and that heat just sets in and you feel it radiating off the asphalt and everything, people really reach out a lot more to get shade trees,\u201d Robinson said, standing in a row of tree saplings in the foundation\u2019s nursery. \u201cYou can feel the difference. Even now in the nursery with the tiny trees, you can feel the difference between the shade and the sun.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to a city report<\/a>, 19% of the city is shaded by trees and the goal is to increase that to 35% in the next 20 years.<\/p>\n

The program offers dozens of tree species, including Chinese pistache<\/a>, insense cedar<\/a>, yellow bird magnolia<\/a>, London plane<\/a> and blue oak<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTypically people like things with flowers, those tend to be popular in the spring, but then in fall people want fall colors,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s actually a pretty good selection, which is ideal, because the more diverse our urban forest, the more resilient it is to pests and diseases and climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n

The species the foundation provides are resilient and the maintenance is pretty minimal aside from a couple pruning sessions during the first five years, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Trees are delivered to homes and residents are given instructions for how to plant the trees<\/a>. During the first three years, watering is particularly crucial. Robinson recommends watering two to three times per week in the summer and dry periods.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAs long as you give it adequate water, keep grass and weeds away, and apply wood chips, those are the ingredients to make your tree grow faster,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

With that recipe, the foundation\u2019s free trees can start providing decent shade within five years, and at 10 years, provide a nice canopy, Robinson said.<\/p>\n

Barriers to tree planting<\/p>\n

Teri Duarte is with the CommuniTree Committee in Hollywood Park. The group formed in 2018 to expand the tree canopy in the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

The committee works to convince property owners to plant free trees from the Tree Foundation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only way to expand tree canopy in our neighborhood is private property,\u201d Duarte said. \u201cThere really isn\u2019t public property.\u201d<\/p>\n

The committee provides tree-planting volunteers for residents who aren\u2019t able to plant the trees in their front yards themselves.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a big planting day in the fall,\u201d she said. \u201cWe go throughout the neighborhood planting the trees that have been accepted.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It might be anywhere from six to 28 trees planted in the fall, depending on how many residents agree to participate, Duarte said, adding the group has planted about 190 trees total in Hollywood Park.<\/p>\n

One issue Duarte has found with the free trees is people often think that they don\u2019t need to do any maintenance after the first couple years. But residents still need to pay attention.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasingly, with climate change and periods of drought, not watering the trees in the summer causes them to go into decline,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Every spring, the committee goes out and checks on all the trees that have been planted. They leave information cards for residents with checklists of what their tree might need.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe it needs to be watered more, maybe they need to put a mulch donut ring around it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is our hope that this encourages and informs people on how to maintain their tree.\u201d<\/p>\n

A big reason for all this effort: health. Trees act as air filters, taking out particulate matter from car emissions, Duarte said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople who live in neighborhoods with a lot of tree canopy just have overall better health,\u201d she said. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of benefits and people don\u2019t realize it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Areas of need<\/p>\n

United Latinos<\/a>, a local nonprofit that fosters civic engagement, has teamed up with the Tree Foundation with the goal of planting 1,000 trees in South Sacramento in a year. The project launched in October with funding from the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District.<\/p>\n

\u201cSouth Sacramento is very much lacking that canopy and urban heat and extreme heat events are something that happen in this area and this region,\u201d said Edwin Cortez, Operations Manager for United Latinos.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot of need in underserved communities in South Sacramento and his organization is doing outreach to get more people involved, he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis provides more trees, more shade, but ultimately provides a huge benefit for the community,\u201d Cortez said. \u201cIt also allows them as individuals to make a difference by pledging for a tree or getting a tree on their property.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cortez\u2019s organization has been helping build the community movement in South Sacramento. This month they held an Earth Day event and a tree planting with the Sacramento Jobs Corps, where more than 70 youth got involved in planting and maintaining trees.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This story will be featured in our SacramenKnow newsletter.\u00a0Sign up to get updates about what\u2019s happening in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277640,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[701,702,121,123,122,119851],"class_list":["post-277639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-capital-public-radio","tag-cpr","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news","tag-throwing-shade-why-not-plant-it"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}