Okay, here’s the deal…I love trees. I think they are really cool, and overlooked way too often. So, during this time of quarantine, I wanted to create an activity you can do at home to help you learn about why trees are awesome. Check it out!

The first step of the activity is to identify a tree in your yard or neighborhood. As it states in the activity, you don’t have to identify the tree exactly, but if you want to, I’m here to help. There are a few options; I will list them in order of easiest to hardest:

Option 1) Take a picture of the overall tree, the bark and leaves and email it to me at lara317@ufl.edu

Option 2) See if your tree happens to be one of these common trees found in Pinellas County

• American Sycamore
• Bald Cypress
• Cabbage Palm
• Camphor Tree (invasive)
• Crape Myrtle
• Eastern Red Cedar
• Laurel Oak
• Live Oak
• Longleaf Pine
• Pignut Hickory
• Queen Palm (currently being researched as possible invasive species)
• Red Maple
• Slash Pine
• Southern Magnolia
• Water Oak

Option 3) Watch my recorded webinar on “How To Identify A Tree”. Simply put, identifying trees isn’t easy. The webinar recording is 42 minutes and goes over all the details to consider when identifying a tree, but there’s a catch…you need a tree identification book to then apply your observations to make a conclusion.

I encourage you to try Option 2 or Option 3, but I am here for you if you choose Option 1 😉

Note: The National Tree Benefits Calculator (used in the activity) is not available for all tree species.

Happy Learning!

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