Ash Tree Awareness Week 2014
In 2014, the Vermont Urban and Community Forestry held Ash Tree Awareness Week to provide education and outreach to the public about the Emerald Ash Borer. During the designated week, events were held throughout the state of Vermont to raise awareness of the damaging effects of the Emerald Ash Borer. Events included tree walks in every county that were open to the public, hanging posters on 1500 Ash trees with information about EAB, and teaching citizens of Vermont how to identify EAB. In addition to the events held, there was also media involvement through TV shows, newspaper articles, and an active twitter account associated with Ash Tree Awareness Week.
The events held during Ash Tree Awareness Week worked towards the ultimate conservation goal of trying to detect the Emerald Ash Borer in Vermont as soon as possible to prevent the loss of Ash trees across the state.
STATEWIDE
Citizen Science, Forest Land, Outreach, Walks and Talks
Ash Tree Awareness Week provided a platform to raise awareness about the damaging effects of the Emerald Ash Borer on Ash trees and to educate the public on how to identify the signs of this pest. By educating citizens across Vermont about how to identify EAB, Vermont increased its chances of preventing complete destruction of its Ash trees by detecting EAB early on.
Forestry Parks and Recreation
Vermont Department of Forests, Parks, and Recreation
VELCO
Vermont Woodlands Association
Forest Pest First Detectors
The success of Ash Tree Awareness Week 2014 was largely due to the large number of local volunteers and partnerships that helped organize and carry out the week's events.
The challenges of Ash Tree Awareness Week were largely due to lack of funding. A lack of trained and experienced marketing professionals was also a large challenge due to the week's reliance on public knowledge of its occurrence. Therefore, the skill sets of the volunteers and partners involved were extremely important to the event's marketing and community outreach aspects.
Vermont Community Forestry