Annual Treebute festival blossoms in Windermere

By Zak Kerr
| 7:27 a.m. January 15, 2015

West Orange Times & Observer
News

WINDERMERE — Windermere will celebrate its designation as a Tree City USA at the 11th annual Windermere Treebute Arbor Day Festival, which will take place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 17, at 512 Main Street.

The public is also welcome to a pre-festival Arbor Day Ceremony and Tree Planting at 10 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 15, coordinated by the Windermere Tree Board and the Windermere Garden Club. This event features a mayoral proclamation, a police color guard, public tree care education by arborists, refreshments, children singing tree tunes and planting the Arbor Day tree.

Sponsors of the festival include the Windermere Tree Board, Tree Climbing Concepts Training Team Inc. and Windermere Garden Club, and proceeds support Windermere’s Urban Forestry program.

“Windermere Treebute Arbor Day Festival proceeds support Windermere’s Urban Forestry program with purchases of hundreds of trees each year for planting by Windermere Tree Board volunteers and local residents,” said Theresa Schretzmann-Myers, chairwoman of the Windermere Tree Board. “For those who have mature trees, understory and flowering trees are offered, such as redbud, fringe trees, flatwoods plum, Simpson’s stopper and dogwood.”

This free festival allows children to climb high on local trees, supervised by certified arborists with safety equipment.

Other activities and presences include selling and planting trees, an “Ask the Arborist” booth, Smokey Bear, “Enchanted Walk-Abouts” that explore nature, an international tree-climbing contest, live music, arts and crafts, food trucks and a master gardener plant clinic.

Plants and seeds producing fruits, such as blueberries, mulberries, loquats, citrus, apples, peaches, pears and plums, will be available. Native Floridian trees for adoption and sale include elms, magnolias, live oaks, red oaks, turkey oaks, loblolly bays, red bays, cypresses, red maples, longleaf pines, cedars, blackgums, pignut hickories, tabebuias and Simpson’s stoppers. Windermere residents can adopt one tree per household, and discounted trees will be available.

The Down Brothers Band will provide live music, and educators will advise residents on which trees are best for their yards and where, horticulture and pest control.

“Geezers in Treezers” will feature American, Canadian and British certified arborists 40 and older in five tree-climbing competitions that highlight advanced tree arboriculture skills and emergency rescue techniques.

From 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday, Jan. 16, the Windermere Tree Board will have TCCTT on hand for a tree-safety training seminar. Arborists, firefighters, first responders, EMTs and tree workers will be among those trained in extractions, single-line safety ropes and various tree emergencies. For more information about the training, contact Danae Jackson, (407) 509-4805 or [email protected].