10 Reasons to Plant Trees Around Your Home

Although it’s easy to take them for granted, trees do much more for us than we realize!

 

It’s difficult, if not impossible, to imagine a world without trees. Although we sometimes take them for granted, they do more for us than we often realize. Besides providing beauty, trees do many things to moderate our climate, stabilize the soil, and make a better home for us, our neighbors, and the wildlife. Here are a few benefits of having trees in your landscape! 

 

Trees Make Places Beautiful

Trees bring blossoms in the spring, leafy boughs in the summer, and colorful canopies in the fall. The light through the canopies gives a warm glow to our days throughout the growing season. In winter, we admire their furrowed bark and sturdy stature, and inhale the evergreen fragrance of balsam, pine, or spruce. In our state, which was once covered in forests, we have so many species we can replant and enjoy in our home landscape. 

 

Sit Spots and Gathering Places 

Lofty trees in our landscapes and parks are the places where we sit, gather, read, ponder, and have picnics. They’re places to be creative, to draw, to write, to enjoy the outdoors, and for children to climb and play under. Without them, we’re exposed to the bright sun and afternoon heat. But under their shady boughs, we have a natural nook where we can enjoy the outdoors in comfort. 

 

Bird and Wildlife Habitat 

Although we tend to think they live in the sky, most birds actually live in trees. It’s where they nest, seek shelter in the winter, feed on berries, nuts, and insects, and seek protection from predators. Even a dozen bird feeders in a treeless landscape won’t attract many birds. But as soon as you have one tree, you have a habitat for birds, squirrels, insects, pollinators, and other wildlife. Expanding wildlife habitat is like giving a gift to the natural world, and in exchange, we get to enjoy bird songs right in our backyard!   

 

Trees Moderate Your Home Climate 

Even when we’re inside, trees still benefit our environment. In the summer, their shade and transpiration cool down our houses, and can save us upwards of 30% on the air conditioning bill. In the winter, the shelter of trees blocks cold winds, keeping the warmth in our homes, and reducing our heating costs by 25-50%. Acting together, trees also reduce the urban heat island effect of the city, protecting us against extreme heat and making our gardens more resilient against droughts. 

 

Trees Beautify Our Neighborhoods 

Besides benefiting the climate of our neighborhood, trees also beautify our streetscapes. Underneath a boulevard of trees, an ordinary road becomes a magical landscape. The most livable and sought-after neighborhoods almost always have lots of mature trees. They boost the price of property, and the presence of trees along a road is even known to reduce speeding and traffic incidents. When you plant trees in your landscape, you enhance the neighborhood for your neighbors as well as yourself. 

 

Trees Stabilize the Land Against Flooding 

A slope without trees is more exposed to erosion and landslides from heavy rain and flooding. With a tree, the roots hold the soil in place, and allow the water to percolate into the ground. In this way, they make our landscapes more resilient against storms. Trees also help protect our waterways by allowing the soil to absorb chemical runoff before it drains into any bodies of water. 

 

Trees Reduce Stress 

Besides enhancing our physical health, trees also boost creativity, reduce stress, and improve mental well-being overall. In one study, children with a view of trees outside the window scored better on tests than those without. We’ve all felt the boost of creativity of being in a forest. If we can’t live in a forest all the time, at least we can plant more trees in our landscapes to bring a piece of—well, peace—into our daily lives.

 

Trees Give Us Food 

Besides providing bird habitat, trees also provide food for us in the form of berries, fruit, and nuts. In Pennsylvania, we’re lucky we can grow many kinds of trees for food, including hickory, butternuts, walnuts, hazelnuts, apples, plums, cherries, persimmons, peaches, pawpaws, and others. Plant one seed, and in a few years, you will have more fruit than you know what to do with!  

 

Trees Enhance Air Quality 

Trees are the lungs of the earth and the lungs of our neighborhoods too. They inhale the pollution that we emit and, in exchange, give us fresh oxygen to breathe. Planting trees doesn’t give us a license to pollute, as trees can’t keep pace with our rate of pollution, but nevertheless, they make a noticeable difference in our air quality.

 

Trees Improve With Age   

Unlike other things, trees actually get better with age. They grow taller, stronger, more productive, and more beautiful. Over time, they become landmarks for future generations. Eventually, they might gain heritage status. And if we take care of them, they’ll become special places of inspiration and magic like the ancient trees that we were lucky to inherit from older generations. 

 

What Trees Are Best for Landscaping? 

Many trees are suitable for landscaping. It all depends on the mature size you want, the kind of tree you like, and any purposes that you hope to achieve by planting it. In Pennsylvania, we can grow many kinds of trees, including birch, elm, pine, maple, oak, chestnut, ash, willow, walnut, and others.

It’s so easy to take trees for granted as we go about our daily lives. It’s perhaps only when our favorite childhood trees are cut down that we realize we’ve lost something irretrievable. But if we care for our trees well, and plant new ones in our landscape as the older ones get old, we can ensure that we and future generations will always have trees to live under.   

 

If you’d like advice on choosing the next tree for your landscape, feel free to visit our garden center in Glenside, Pennsylvania!