EASTON, Pa. — Rob Christopher says he will never be as good as nature at creating a forest.
But that doesn’t mean Christopher won’t try his hardest.
- Easton's mico-forest has flourished since it was created in 2019
- The forest works to educate and inspire
- The micro-forest's creator, Rob Christopher, has opened up his own land for a memorial tree project
“Three years ago, everything was tiny compared to this,” Christopher, the city arborist and conservation manager, said during a recent walk through the city’s micro-forest — a project started in 2019.
"I tried to come up with a whole assortment of native plants, from shrub level, to understory tree, to mid-level tree, to canopy trees and sort of arrange them in a planting way that I'm trying to mimic nature. I'll never be as good as nature.
“That's what I tried to do here to just show people what starts to grow in and then all the different phases that's gonna go through.”
Created through a $35,000 grant from the Arbor Day Foundation, the city’s micro-forest has had time to flourish, changing the landscape at 1900 Wood Ave. from a grassy lawn to a young forest.
It's open to the public, and Christopher hopes it serves as an educational tool and to inspire residents to create their own micro-forests.
"They're competing for light and stuff. But they're all working so that the group as a whole is going to be successful."Rob Christopher, Easton's arborist and conservation manager
“I always try to look at nature as the default on how humans need to be acting,” Christopher said. “Because whatever is going on in nature is how we're supposed to be, and we go completely against nature. The trees — they're cooperating; it's not that there's competition.
“They're competing for light and stuff. But they're all working so that the group as a whole is going to be successful.”
What is a micro-forest?
Also called pocket forests, mini forests or tiny forests, micro-forests are relatively new to the U.S. landscape — so much so that Christopher didn’t know there were others.
While there isn't data available on the number of micro-forests that have been created, Easton isn’t alone — there have also been efforts in Maryland and Los Angeles.
“I had no idea it was even a thing,” Christopher said. “I came on it by accident.”
Many are based on the work of Japanese botanist and ecologist Akira Miyawaki, who pioneered the style of forest creation in Japan known as the “Miyawaki Method,” which focuses on randomized planting of small saplings of various indigenous shrubs and trees.
“This multilayered, dense planting approach creates a thick forest with a faster growth rate, improved carbon sequestration and superior levels of biodiversity compared to conventional tree planting,” according to La Micro Forests.
“After approximately two years of weeding and watering to set the forest up for success, the forest becomes self-managing, surviving on natural rainfall and successfully resisting weed invasion due to the dense shade and natural smothering leaf litter it produces.”
Easton's can be compared to the Miyawaki-inspired micro-forests, Christopher said. The Miyawaki method generally use areas near creeks and rivers to plan, while the city transformed a lawn.
Easton’s micro-forest is about 75 feet by 160 feet, Christopher said. It’s filled with native species or shrubs, flowers and trees.
“The purpose is really to have like a living outdoor educational classroom to teach everybody how this works — and they all work together — what it provides, long term benefits, diversity,” Christopher said.
“I could be saying the same thing about people, and you wouldn't know the difference.
“I tell people, ‘It's not about just the trees and plants.’ You have to be able to interact with the community, different cultures, teach people about conservation, and the fact that you got to look at everything in nature as an example of how we should be acting.
"And if you're going against that flow, you're on an unhealthy path.”
‘Education and teaching and ceremony’
In addition to Christopher’s work in the city, he also works in conservation and community for PAZA, Tree of Life, a nonprofit and Native American support organization dedicated to the empowerment of Indigenous people.
“We thought if we could kind of bring that into the world today, with all the stuff that's going on, and all the confusion, maybe going back to like our roots, and back to basics, would be a beautiful way to start to bring some unity,” said Maria Ragonese, PAZA’s director of operations and project management.
“We see it as being a place where we can bring education and teaching and ceremony.”
As part of that effort, organizers have launched a Memorial Tree Sponsorship Program, using Christopher’s land in Williams Township. At Crow Tree Sanctuary, as it is called, residents are able to buy a lifetime tree sponsorship for $100 to memorialize a loved one who has died.
"We can just see the effect that this has on people, especially if you don't have a place to go, and everybody sometimes you just need to be someplace.”Maria Ragonese, PAZA, Tree of Life, director of operations and project management
“We've already done this, like Rob did it for me,” Ragonese said. “I had a big loss in 2001. And then we did it just recently for a friend.
"We can just see the effect that this has on people, especially if you don't have a place to go, and everybody sometimes you just need to be someplace.”
Trees on Christopher’s property are nurtured, he said.
“As compared to somebody just planting a tree in a park and there's really nobody to take care of it. I’m here, watching them all the time," he said. "Part of this would be sending them photos periodically.”
Because the sanctuary is on Christopher’s private land, visiting the trees would be by appointment-only. However, he plans to keep up correspondence with participants.
“I always look at animals as messengers and things," he said. "So if I see something, I'm like, ‘Hey, I just noticed this kind of bird hanging out.’
"And I would just send them little things to let them know that your relatives are sort of giving you a message.”
For more information, visit pazatree.org.