tree with signage about national tree week

Get to know Redbridge Council’s Arboricultural and Horticultural Team for National Tree Week 2023

Published: 29 November 2023

Redbridge is one of London’s greenest boroughs, and it takes a lot of behind the scenes work to ensure our trees and greenery stay healthy and looking great.

Did you know Redbridge Council is responsible for maintaining 40,000 trees and 128 hectares of woodland in the borough? It’s a big job and takes specialist teams from the Council and Vision Redbridge Culture and Leisure to maintain it all.

This week is National Tree Week – the UK’s largest annual tree celebration, and the perfect opportunity to get to know more about the Arboricultural and Horticultural teams who look after the trees in the borough.

The team is made up of specially trained staff, who are responsible for the maintenance of the council’s 21,000 trees on the streets, and 19,000 trees in parks, schools, housing and welfare sites. They also maintain grass verges and shrubs on streets, and assist with maintaining council woodland.

In Redbridge there are 615 species of trees, with Cherry, and Maple being the most common. When deciding types for planting, the team select species that help boost ecological diversity – including native species to help keep the ecological connection to the area. They also select trees that grow to different heights to ensure the right tree is planted in the right place.

Trees bring important environmental and health benefits to the borough, including helping clean up the air we breathe, provide shade and create natural habitats for wildlife, which is why it’s important to look after our green urban landscape.

To ensure the trees stay healthy and cared for the team carry out annual inspections of all street trees to recommend work to maintain them – and once every three years to recommend pruning work.

Inspections on the remaining council trees in parks, schools, housing, welfare sites and woodlands are carried out on a three-year rotation, and this includes a check on our oldest trees in the borough -  Sweet Chestnuts on George Green and Christchurch Green in Wanstead. They are over 200 years old!

Trees aren’t usually ever cut down in Redbridge, unless they are dead or decayed, in which case the team will remove it and ensure a replacement tree is planted between November and March.

There is also about 160,000 square metres – equivalent to 22 football pitches – of highway grass cut eight times a year by the team, along with 50,000 square metres of highway grass cut once or twice a year as part of the Grow Zone project to create wild flower meadows in the borough to improve biodiversity.

Highway shrub beds – covering an area equivalent to seven football pitches – are also pruned up to twice a year, depending on the obstruction they may pose to pedestrians and vehicles.

Where weeds grow up in footpaths, kerb edges and shrub beds on the street, the team carry out a spot treatment with herbicide to control growth up to five times a year, as required.

There are also many council-led community projects you will find the team involved with as they work closely with the Council’s Neighbourhood Engagement Team. These have included:

Local people can also get involved in looking after newly planted trees on their street by unofficially adopting them. New trees are planted in the borough between November and March, with a blue label attached asking for help with watering in the summer months when they may need an extra drink. For more information go to: https://www.redbridge.gov.uk/our-streets/adopt-and-water-a-tree/

For more information on tree management and maintenance in the borough go to www.redbridge.gov.uk/our-streets/council-trees/

For more information about the maintenance of grass and shrubs in the borough go to: www.redbridge.gov.uk/our-streets/grass-weeds-and-shrubs/

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