Barts Tree Service is proud to sponsor this amazing comedy series at the Ridgefield Playhouse.
The series starts on September 24 with Janeane Garofalo and wraps up on March 10 with Rob Schneider, with a lot of terrific comedy acts in between.
Tickets are available directly from the Ridgefield Playhouse.
You can see the full line up here.
And don’t forget to keep an eye on our Facebook page – we’ll be giving away free tickets to some of the shows.
We’ll see you there!
Barts Tree Service is a proud sponsor of the upcoming Saluting Branches event September 21st where arborists across the country will be donating a day of services at veterans cemeteries.
Here in Connecticut we will be at the Spring Grove Veterans Cemetery in Darien.
We are deeply appreciative of the brave men and women who serve and have served in our military making it possible for us to have the freedoms we enjoy every day.
As a small token of our appreciation, we will be providing tree care to ensure a safe and beautiful environment for our veterans in their final resting place.
Please consider making a donation, sponsoring or volunteering for this great event. You can find out more here: www.salutingbranches.org
Summer brings with it BBQs, vacations, swimming, boating and enjoying the great outdoors.
But it also means lack of water, storm damage and insect pests that attack our trees. Stressed trees are more susceptible to pests, disease, and winter damage, so now’s the time to protect your trees to keep them as healthy as possible.
Here are the activities we recommend you do during the heat of summer.
We’ve had a lot of reports recently about problems with white pines in southern New England, including here in Connecticut. The pine needles, especially the older inner needles, are turning tan or yellow and then falling off, and the trees are looking generally unhealthy, thin or even dying.
Why Are White Pines Shedding Needles?
The pine in the middle of the photo is showing signs of decline, with many yellowed and missing needles.
Unfortunately, it’s not entirely clear what’s causing the problem.
We have had a fungal condition called needlecast in the area for some time which has had minor effects on conifers but now it appears that there is a new combined force which includes four fungi associated with this new condition, including one that was only discovered in CT last year. Each one of those can cause pine needles to turn yellow and eventually fall off, but not all are always found on declining pines.
Another factor is the weather conditions over the past few years, especially the very dry conditions of 2015. However, we’re seeing signs of needlecast on this year’s needles, which suggests that there are things beyond last year’s weather that are affecting our white pines.
The CT Agricultural Experiment Station has a brief update on white pine decline released through the Plant Disease Information Office.
There’s also a helpful document from the UMass Extension office that includes photos of affected trees.
What Can You Do About It?
That’s not an easy question to answer.
Because the fungi associated with white pine decline may not always be present and a true understanding of the root cause is still developing, a fungicide treatment may not always be effective but can be helpful in protecting new needles.
It’s a good idea to have a professional examination of your pine tree(s) before deciding on treatment.
And because affected trees are more susceptible to stressors, such as dry conditions, be sure to keep your pines adequately watered to ensure vigor (but do not water the branches or needles! its best to utilize a soaker hose).
For more information on pine needlecast problems, see our related article on Evergreen Needlecast: What You Need to Know.
By the time you see obvious signs of infestation in your ash tree, Emerald Ash Borer (EAB) has been there for years and it’s usually too late to save the tree.
EAB was confirmed in the Danbury area last year, putting all local ash trees at risk.
The best thing you can do right away is assess how EAB has or will impact your property. Ask yourself the following questions:
Our licensed Arborists can determine whether or not EAB is present in your ash trees (they’ll climb into your tree because it’s not easy to see Emerald Ash Borers from the ground).
If there are no signs of EAB or only a light infestation (up to 30-40% of the tree), then your ash trees are a candidate for EAB prevention and treatment.
Arborjet TreeAge insecticide is injected directly into the tree – no spraying!
We’ve been treating ash trees for Emerald Ash Borer for years, using highly effective Arborjet tree injections with the industry leading TreeAge insecticide. This product has a 90% efficacy in killing feeding insects and larva and is still effective even if a tree is up to 30%-40% infested with EAB.
TreeAge insecticide has a 2-year residual time frame so Emerald Ash Borer injections are only needed every two years.
And because it’s injected directly into the tree, there’s no spraying involved so you don’t have to worry about air-borne insecticide affecting your family, pets, or neighbors.
So if you have ash trees, give us a call to have Barts Tree Service Licensed Arborists come and assess your ash trees for EAB. And if you’re not sure what kinds of trees you have, we’ll happily take a look and identify them for you.
We have career opportunities for qualified, safety conscious climbers/bucket truck operators.
To be considered, you must be proficient in all tree care principles, pruning techniques, technical rigging and removals.
Experience, certifications, and CT arborist license are a plus.
CDL–A license is required within 3 months of hire.
Paid training and benefits are available.
Background checks and drug test are required prior to hire.
Interested? Click here for our Application form.
On a freezing February day, Barts donated a day of service and equipment to the Aspetuck Land Trust.
Aspetuck Land Trust is a non-profit membership organization whose mission is the preservation and conservation of open space, including farm and forest land, and the natural resources located thereon, primarily in the towns of Easton, Weston, Fairfield and Westport, for the benefit and education of the public.
In 2011, Paul Newman donated a 39-acre parcel of land in Westport some time ago which is called the Newman-Poses Preserve. At one point it had a nice meadow of blueberry bushes but it was being overgrown by swamp white oak and other hardwoods.
So Barts went in (on a -5F day!) and removed all the encroaching hardwoods to restore the meadow back to its original state of blueberry bushes and cedar trees.
Here’s what the Aspetuck Land Trust had to say:
Matt Bartelme, owner of Bart’s Tree Service is a qualified professional who knows trees and his crew is excellent and well trained. Bart’s has done work for Aspetuck Land Trust for years and I would highly recommend them to any homeowner or business. Bart’s also has a heart and has donated services to the Land Trust to improve habitats in our nature preserves.
This was our third year attending the Tree Care Industry Association’s Winter Management Conference, which is a gathering of leading arborists and tree care companies from all over the world in a nice warm Caribbean area in February.
My friends always say I am going on a boondoggle and I’ll admit the first time I went that was my intention.
In reality it’s the most valuable conference I attend.
Where else do you hang out with forward thinking individuals who are pushing the envelope of arboriculture and safety in the industry?
I have a small seven-person company and love being able to network with other like-minded company owners or bounce questions off the larger corporate tree care companies.
And did I mention it’s not -5 F like it is in CT in February….
TCIA does a great job of hosting some awesome speakers who really make you think. Each year I come home with takeaways that make my business stronger, my employees more engaged and, most importantly, make us all safer.
With each year of attending the Winter Management Conference we’ve made more and more friends and really look forward to meeting up with our fellow arborists each and every year. Then when there’s some new uncharted area for the business or a question you can’t answer, you have this awesome network you can hit up anytime as a sounding board.
At this year’s conference, held in Grand Cayman, there was a record setting attendance, which really shows the progression of arboriculture and the industry.
And at this great event Barts Tree Service was given the Professional Communication Award for our website. This is a competitive award based on website design, content and how well it helps the business succeed.
WOW what an honor!!! To realize that we were selected by an industry leading association amongst all of these other companies that I look up to was very humbling.
Sometimes I question if our approach is really working or second-guess how we’re educating our clients. Something like winning this award really invigorates me and my team and gives us a little confirmation that our hard work and efforts around educating consumers in the art and science of arboriculture is really working.
So I’d like to extend a big THANK YOU to our wonderful clients for supporting us in our mission to help people make better and more educated decisions for the care of their trees within the community. You’re the reason we’re in business, the reason we attend the Winter Management Conference, and the reason we won the Professional Communications Award!
This article first appeared in the Danbury NewsTimes.
DANBURY — Four years after it was discovered in Connecticut, an invasive insect that is killing ash trees across the country has been found in Danbury.
A contractor working on Maplewood Drive this week found an ash tree infected with the emerald ash borer, a small, green non-native species of beetle so destructive that it is expected to all but wipe out ash trees in the Northeast in as little as a decade.
City and state officials said Friday this is the first report of an ash borer infestation in the city, but they were not surprised to hear it.
“This is not a new infestation,” said Katherine Dugas, a research assistant with the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, or CAES. “What we’re seeing is confirmation, rather than an expansion.”
The insect showed up in Connecticut in 2012, a decade after its first appearance in Michigan. It is thought to have migrated from Asia.
Because the ash borer has established itself in at least 26 states, officials say, eradication is no longer considered possible. Instead, authorities have focused on slowing or preventing the spread of the insect into new areas by, for example, banning the moving of firewood.
Still, experts say, nearly every ash tree in Connecticut, and probably the entire northeast and eastern Canada, is destined to die.
Matt Bartelme, the contractor who spotted the infested tree near the New York state border this week, said Danbury’s ash trees are probably “doomed.”
“Now that we know that is in our area, all the ash trees are at a high risk of dying unless they’re chemically treated,” he said.
Other towns already affected include Newtown, New Milford, Sherman, Southbury and Bridgewater.
“It’s been around us,” Bartelme said. “It was just a matter of time until it got here.”
Gale Ridge, a CAES assistant agricultural scientist, said any trees within a 15-mile radius could be considered in danger.
Female ash borers lay their eggs under the bark of ash trees. When the eggs hatch, the larvae feed on the inner layers of the tree bark, cutting off the tree’s circulatory system. Nutrients then can’t reach the top of the tree, Bartelme said, so the crown and the top branches eventually die.
Trees tend to die within two to three years after becoming infested, but some last as long as eight years.
Other signs of infestation include D-shaped holes on the bark, horizontal tracks on the inner surface of the bark and unusual numbers of holes drilled by woodpeckers, for which ash borers are a favorite food.
Bartelme, who owns Barts Tree Service, said one of the best treatments is an insecticide known by the brand name Tree-äge, which is injected into the tree.
Another way of monitoring the spread of the ash borer is by noting the presence of a stingless wasp known as the smokey winged beetle bandit, which preys on the borer, Ridge said.
“We have research going on that is very promising to bring the population down,” she said.
Chris Martin, head of the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection’s forestry division, said the insect could be active for up to five years before anyone notices.
“It’s very probable that the population has just grown and only now people are starting to notice that their ash trees are dying,” Martin said.
Infected trees should not be used as firewood because any larva or eggs underneath the bark could survive in cut wood long enough to find living hosts.
noliveira@newstimes.com, 203-731-3411, @olivnelson
This article first appeared in the Danbury NewsTimes.
Despite the continuing snow and cold weather, spring is here – at least in theory. Before you know it we will all be out enjoying our landscapes, gardening, playing with the kids and barbecuing.
So, with all this in mind, it’s time to make sure your landscape is safe after all that winter has thrown at us. With all the heavy snowfall, ice, bitter cold and winds from this record setting winter there are many hazardous situations that can result from winter tree damage.
We always tell clients to look up and assess your trees before the leaves come in so you can see potential hazards.
A dangerous hanging branch, otherwise known as a “widowmaker”.
Things to look for include:
For more details, as well as pictures of what to look for, visit our page on Identifying Hazardous Trees.
We find that homeowners don’t usually see a good portion of these potential hazards, even when they’re looking for them.
So here at Barts Tree Service we always offers a free risk assessment of your yard from a certified arborist. These trained professionals can point out any of these hazardous situations, describe the associated risks and explain all possible remedies to mitigate those risks.
Call us today at 203-240-1302 to set up your appointment.