CEDARBURG, Wis. — Wisconsin has seen a long stretch of dry weather, which is a bit unusual during the spring.
This caused many Wisconsin communities to experience drought conditions throughout the past two months.
The parks and forestry department with the City of Cedarburg has been keeping busy due to the dry conditions. The city’s forester, Kevin Westphal, said it's extremely usual to have it be this dry this early on in the year.
“In the 19 years that I’ve been the forester with the City of Cedarburg, we have never had to water our trees this early in the year,” Westphal said.
Westphal said they started watering in May, when they usually start in early July. This early start has left them with a lot of extra work. The city is responsible for over 8,000 trees.
The parks and forestry department is only made up of two to three people.
“We’re not able to do other things that we normally would be doing right n,.” Westphal said. “Normally this time of year, we are doing service request pruning. We also treat our ash trees for emerald ash borer. We had to delay the start of that treatment,”
This year, the City of Cedarburg planted 433 new trees, which Westphal said have had a rough start to the year. They need extra attention and his biggest concern is keeping them alive.
Westphal said mature trees also need water. Homeowners can keep the trees in their yards happy with this dry weather by watering them.
“One of the best ways to water a mature tree is to take your garden hose and remove the nose from it so it’s open. Set the flow rate so it’s just a trickle coming out of it,” Westphal said.
He said this will help keep the trees' roots hydrated.