Resistant to disease, they should live hundreds of years
The Philipstown Garden Club, in an effort to reintroduce American Elms to Philipstown, on May 11 planted one on the Haldane campus in Cold Spring and one at Garrison School with the assistance of kindergarteners who added mulch and water.
Dutch Elm disease has had a devastating effect on elms, but a cultivar known as the Princeton Elm developed by a nurseryman in Princeton, New Jersey, in the 1920s is immune, explained Christopher Radko, a provisional member of the Garden Club. Some of the elms planted in Princeton have so far survived nearly 100 years. They are winter hardy to minus 44 degrees, grow as high as 100 feet tall and can live several hundred years.
“What’s so cool is that these two trees will become the kindergartners’ own trees, and they will grow together,” said Radko, who contributed funds to purchase the trees. “When these kids become adults, they can return to visit with their own kids to see the elm tree they helped to plant.”
Members of the Philipstown Garden Club earlier visited each school on Arbor Day (April 28) to tell the students about the elms and present a lesson on the significance of trees as providers of timber, shelter, food, shade, oxygen and beauty.
Besides Radko, Garden Club volunteers who worked on project include Susan Choi, Mishara Canino, Deb MacLeod, Pam Euler Halling, Barbara Price, Pamela Doan, Jeanne Clemente and Cathy Duke. The advisors were JoAnne Brown and Elise LaRocco.
The two 500-pound trees were purchased at Rosedale Nurseries in Hawthorne, which provided a discount, and transported by Tony Bardes of Habitat Revival Company to the schools at no charge.
At Garrison School, Dick Timmons and Brian Butting dug the hole for the tree, while at Haldane that duty was taken care of by Michael Twardy and Tony Stronconi.
Tony Bardes delivers the first of the two elms to the Garrison School (photo provided)
The American elm is unloaded at the Garrison School (photo provided)
The elm is placed into the hole at the Garrison School by Brian Butting (left) and Dick Timmons (photo provided)
Tony Bardes positions the elm at the Garrison School (photo provided)
Students at Garrison School with their new American elm (photo provided)
Students at the Garrison School with their new American elm (photo provided)
Christopher Radko (background) and other members of the Garden Club with Garrison teachers and kindergarteners (photo provided)
The watering bucket generated much excitement. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Haldane teachers Silvia LeMon, Ashley Cretara, Katie Wilde, Jean Candali, building and grounds team Mike Twardy and Tony Stonconi, and members of Philipstown Garden Club with Haldane kindergartners. (Photo provided)
Haldane kindergarteners sing an show that trees need to sleep in order to grow. The new elm is behind them. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Mac Hendrix, left, thinks the coolest thing about taking care of the new tree will be watering it and giving it mulch. Gavin Lyons King is into giving it fresh dirt. When they graduate, Mac expects the tree to be "taller than Haldane school." Gavin thinks "it will be 100 feet high!" (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Cue: water and dirt action! (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Haldane tree whisperers (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Circle round the tree... Principal Harrington at back, Christopher Radko at far right, garden club members, parents, educators. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Christopher Radko of Philipstown Garden Club talking to the kids about the history of elm trees in America (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Haldane kids made leaves the morning of the tree planting, to help welcome it to the upper campus (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Haldane kindergarteners demonstrate how the tree will grow. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Principal Brent Harrington and kindergarteners celebrate Haldane's new tree. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Kindergarteners jostle around the Princeton elm to give it water and love, which they committed as a class to do until graduation day, when some kids guessed it will be 100 feet tall. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Philipstown Garden Club member Susan Choi brought her young daughter to Haldane to participate in the tree ceremony. (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
Some kids went immediately to the new tree as they rushed up the hill; others were more into rolling down the hill, until kindergarten teachers Ashley Cretara and Silvia LeMon harkened them to the ceremony (Photo by Anita Peltonen)
