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Delivery of Mulch <br /> Shortly before Planting Day, the mulch of coarse hardwood chips should be <br /> delivered to the site. The easiest way is to have one of the City's tree <br /> crews dump a full truckload of chips at a central location. A full load is <br /> enough to mulch twenty trees. This approach is most suitable where the trees <br /> are to be planted in a relatively small area. <br /> In neighborhoods where the planting sites are more dispersed, City staff may <br /> occasionally be able to use a front -end loader to load chips from the main <br /> chip pile onto a one -ton dumptruck, then unload a small pile of chips (a third <br /> of a cubic yard per planting area) at each planting site in advance of <br /> Planting Day. Or an entire load may be dumped at a central location, from <br /> which it must then be moved by privately -owned pickup trucks on Planting Day. <br /> ON PLANTING DAY <br /> Be sure that all vehicles are moved away from the day's planting sites before <br /> planting begins, and kept away for the duration of the planting. <br /> Before Planting Begins <br /> At 8 am, Planting Team leaders and their pick -up trucks meet the NeighborWoods <br /> Coordinator (or other City staff) at the holding bed to organize trees and <br /> tools, before heading to the meeting place just before 9 o'clock. Trees to be <br /> planted need to be gently pulled from the holding bed, then sorted and tagged <br /> (the common name of each tree is written with wax pencil on a paper tag, which <br /> is then attached to a lower branch of the tree). To prevent confusion during <br /> planting, it is also very helpful for the NeighborWoods Coordinator or someone <br /> else familiar with young trees to mark the trunks with a spot of white spray <br /> paint to indicate to the planters exactly where the final soil -line should be <br /> once the tree is in the ground. <br /> Planting Team leaders then receive a map (if they haven't already) of what <br /> trees they will be planting and where, before proceeding to the meeting place <br /> for opening remarks by the Project Leader at 9 o'clock. Remarks are sometimes <br /> accompanied by a demonstration planting, so volunteers and neighbors get a <br /> good reminder of standard planting technique before heading off to plant. <br /> Planting and Staking <br /> Planting includes positioning the tree in the hole (and enlarging the latter, <br /> if necessary), staking and tying, backfilling the hole, mulching the planting <br /> site, then watering the tree in and cleaning up the site before moving on to <br /> the next site. (See Appendix A for planting details.) <br /> Most new trees do not require staking, as they are quite capable of holding <br /> themselves upright, and the absence of stakes encourages the development of a <br /> strong trunk. But in order to help reduce the threat of vandalism to young <br /> trees growing in the public right -of -way, staking is generally encouraged for <br /> 10 <br />