Agriculture
La Crosse celebrates Tree City status on Arbor Day
Several yearly celebrations had to be cancelled in 2020 because of the pandemic, including La Crosse’s annual tree planting ceremony for Arbor Day. But this year, Arbor Day is back, with kids and grownups gathering at the city’s Badger Hickey Park on Friday morning to plant a linden tree near the playground.
Northside council member Andrea Richmond read a proclamation from the mayor’s office, celebrating La Crosse’s status as a Tree City, USA.
The 7-year-old greenspire linden was grown at a nursery in Green Bay.
The La Crosse park department has conducted an Arbor Day ceremony at the end of April for more than 30 years.
The children who helped dig a hole for the tree and spread wood chips were students from First Lutheran Elementary School.
Chips placed around the tree have been recycled from ash trees that the city had to remove because of destruction from the emerald ash borer.