Trees Winnipeg gears up for planting season

When I’m not researching local history, I am busy at my day job as the executive director of Trees Winnipeg.

Trees Winnipeg was created in 1992 as the Coalition to Save the Elms, a non-profit charitable organization focused on protecting the city’s troubled elm population. The name and mandate changed in the early 2000s to help promote, preserve and replenish our entire urban forest.

The planning is well underway for our 2026 programming, despite the snow on the ground.

Our longest-running program is our annual Arbor Day celebration, held every spring in a city park. This year, our 25th anniversary event will take place in Bruce Park on June 6, and will feature a community tree planting.

This year also marks the 10th anniversary of our ReLeaf program, whereby we sell trees from local tree farms to property owners at below-retail prices. Since 2016, we have distributed 8,120 trees through ReLeaf, and we will have both a spring and fall sale this year.

In 2022, we launched the Inner-City School Tree Program to help reforest schoolyards in older neighbourhoods that had relied heavily on long-gone elms to provide shade for their playgrounds and sports fields. Since then, we have planted 148 trees at 30 schools. Another 137 trees have been planted at three schools as part of larger community events in partnership with other organisations.

Aside from purchasing the trees and planting them with students, the ICSTP also covers the cost of weekly waterings and health checks for at least two years to help ensure their long-term survival.

The 2026 school program will begin this spring with the planting of 21 trees at Tec Voc High School to help celebrate its 75th anniversary. We’re in the process of identifying funding sources to also plant at St. John’s High School and at least three elementary schools by the end of October.

Other programs set to return in 2026 include our summer-evening park walks, co-hosted by a local historian and an arborist, as well as our tree-care workshops.

To find the latest details about Trees Winnipeg’s programming, follow us on social media or sign up for our monthly newsletter through our website at treeswinnipeg.org.

Winnipeg’s urban forest is a shadow of what it was when our organization began in 1992, as we continue to lose thousands of trees every year to new development, disease, and old age. To reverse this decline, there is only so much organizations like ours, and even the City of Winnipeg, can do. It’s a problem that requires everyone to play a role.

Many of us can influence where trees are planted – as residential or commercial property owners, or as members of condo boards, places of worship and parent-teacher councils. These are all wonderful places to plant trees and just need someone to be the spark.

To quote an often-used adage in the tree business: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.”