The town Shade Tree Program is a partnership between Camden Garden Club, the town of Camden, and Camden residents. It was established primarily to replace trees lost to age, infestation, disease and weather and its origins can be traced to 1937 when the Garden Club voted to plant a tree on the Knowlton Street school ground. Since then, the Club’s archives have documented at least 1,460 trees planted by Camden Garden Club programs. The town’s “aggressive effort to plant successive generations of shade trees along its highways and byways” earned Camden the designation of Tree City USA from the National Arbor Day Foundation in 1997.

On October 15, Camden Garden Club President Debra Stokes, Tree Program Chair Ruth Ellison, and Club members Karen Cease and Priscilla Granston met with Camden’s Assistant Town Manager Janice Esancy to celebrate the recent planting of two Sugar Maples at the Children’s House Montessori School on Elm Street.

Sugar Maples have a dense crown of leaves which turn various shades of gold to scarlet in fall. Three to five-lobed leaves appear after the greenish yellow flowers of spring. The trees were supplied by Plants Unlimited and planted by Ames Landscape & Earthwork Services, Inc. and should provide shade for generations of students in the years ahead.

Camden Garden Club is a member of the Garden Club Federation of Maine and National Garden Clubs, Inc. For more information about the club and its activities visit the club’s website www.camdengardenclub.org or contact camdengardenclub100@gmail.com .