'Thirsty' trees need help from residents, says Vancouver Park Board

The City of Vancouver and the Vancouver Park Board are asking residents to help keep alive younger trees in the city that may be suffering in the extended hot and dry conditions this summer.

"We're appealing to the public to give us a hand if they don't mind," said Howard Normann, the director of parks for the City of Vancouver.

"If they see a tree in front of their home that needs a drink ...maybe spend a few minutes and use their hose and give it a bit of a soaking."

Leaves on trees turn brown and drop off as a defence mechanism by the plant to conserve water.

Ifresidents are unable to directly water trees, they can report trees in distress by using the VanConnect app or by calling 311.

There are six watering trucks currently being double-shifted to get out to trees in distress.

Normann says around 4,000 special water bags have been attached to trees to help give long drinks. That's double the number from last year.

"The bags arerefilled every two days," said Normann.

Vancouver has been in a tree-planting blitz as it tries to increase the city's canopy cover the area covered by tree leaf canopies from 18 to 22 per cent.

Tree math

• Vancouver park trees: 350,000.
• Vancouver city trees: 150,000.
• Number of new trees to be planted by2020: 150,000.
• New street trees planted each year: 1,500 to 2,500.
• New park trees planted each year: 7,000.

Normann says, trees planted in the past four years are most susceptible to drought.

"[Newly planted trees] drink a lot of water. At least for the first three years, so those are the ones we're on top of right now," said Normann.

Still, he said if Vancouver faces consecutive dry summers, mature trees could soon be suffering too.

"At this point we've been very fortunate that trees tend to be doing OK, the big ones, but if this is an ongoing thing for several years it could be more problematic for us."

Vancouver has had zero rain in August so far. In July, only 1.8 millimetres fellaccording to Environment Canada.