August 2021 Hole Notes Magazine

The Benefits of Having a Long-Term Tree Management Plan for Your Course

By Renee Crawford and Julie Gann, Rainbow Treecare Trees provide tremendous value and are utilized in many ways to enhance the design and beauty of a golf course. They are an integral part of a course’s visual interest, whether creating separation between fairways, providing a backdrop to greens, or privacy to adjacent properties. In addition to aesthetics, trees are accompanied by numerous environmental benefits and give courses character that connects them with their surroundings.

When the right trees are in the right places on a golf course, they add value to the golfers’ overall satisfaction. The sudden loss of one (or many) trees can have a negative impact on both your maintenance budget and course aesthetics. Conversely, having the wrong trees, having trees in the wrong location, or even having too many trees can become a management nightmare for decades.

With all of this to consider, it’s not surprising that tree management is both a sensitive subject and a significant maintenance cost at any golf course. Having a thorough tree inventory and tree management plan will create a long-term strategy to improve the health of your high-value trees and help you determine the best way to address any trees that need to be removed. Additionally, a tree management plan can help avoid unexpected costs due to disease, invasive pests, and poor planting issues.

Do you have a tree inventory?

The first step in developing a tree management plan is creating a comprehensive tree inventory. This inventory includes identifying everything you need to know about your trees, such as identifying the exact species, PagePage 50 4