Trees are amazing and provide many benefits:  

1. Improve the Environment

Planting a tree is one of the easiest ways to improve the environment and beautify your surroundings.  Plants filter pollutants, absorb carbon dioxide, release oxygen  and help fight soil erosion.  Planting a tree or two will also help reduce your carbon footprint.

2. Reduce Energy Costs

Trees provide shade from the hot summer sun to help keep your home cooler. When positioned properly, trees can help cut energy costs all year.  A healthy tree cools the air in spring and summer.  During the winter, they can block harsh blowing winds and provide insulation.

3. Home to Wildlife

Trees provide homes for wildlife, giving birds and squirrels places to rest, nest and escape predators.   Plant a few trees to help attract wildlife to your yard.  Many also offer valuable food sources, such as pollen, nectar, fruits and nuts.

4. Nature’s Beauty

Trees are beautiful.  From colorful flowers in the spring, to lush green leaves in the summer and vibrant hues in the fall, trees provide an ever-changing landscape.

Trees can help define a space, create a little privacy and offer a shady retreat.  To select the right tree for your home, it’s a good idea to know where it will be planted, and what you want to accomplish.

Tree varieties that grow tall and provide shade include:

• Maple
• Birch
• Blackgum
• Sweetgum
• Tulip Tree
• Oak
• Willow
• Ginkgo
• Bald Cypress/Dawn Redwood
• Katsura

Consider a flowering tree with colorful seasonal blooms to make a statement.  Some popular varieties include:

• Redbud, an unusual tree with beautiful late spring flowers.
  –Ruby Falls is a weeping variety with pink flowers and shiny purple leaves.
  –Rising Sun has orange and yellow leaves with lavender flowers.
  –Appalachian Red has a darker red leaves and pink flowers.
• Franklinia — named after Benjamin Franklin and native to U.S. soil —  is a rare specimen.  This tree has delicate white flowers that bloom in the fall, with green leaves in the spring that turn red in the fall
• Flowering Cherry, Flowering Plum, Flowering Peach and Flowering Pear – in spite of their name, they do not fruit cherries, plums, peaches of pears, but they do produce beautiful flowers in the spring time.

Along with apple, plum, pears, cherries, peaches, nectarines, and apricots, English Gardens has specialty plants that will make your mouth water, including:

• Plumcot – is a very flavorful and juicy fruit that’s 50% plum and 50% apricot.
• Columnar apples are great if you don’t have much room to grow an apple tree.  These varieties grow very narrow and upright with short branches that will mature 8 to 10 feet tall, but less than two feet wide.  Apples need two or more varieties for cross pollination.

Visit English Gardens to find the perfect tree to celebrate these important holidays!