The Canopy

California buckeye (Aesculus californica) Photo: Jeff Reimer

This issue focuses on the importance of maintaining our existing tree canopy and planting for the future. I couldn’t have pulled these voices and stories together without the help of my guest co-editor Sairus Patel, PHS board member and a life-long tree enthusiast.
The legendary peepul (Ficus religiosa) and the regal gulmohar (Delonix regia) were some of the first trees I learned. Native and exotic, they rubbed boughs in front of my childhood home in Bombay. In the cool and tranquil Nilgiris, or “blue mountains” in South India where my family vacationed, I skipped along hushed and fragrant pathways under towering blue gums (Eucalyptus globulus), collecting their old-fashioned coat button-like fruit capsules.

I continued my arboreal explorations in California when I moved into a house with a garden. As he trimmed the looming brush cherries (Syzygium australe) off my roof, a friendly arborist from around the corner told me about guided tree walks here in Palo Alto. These monthly walks led by Canopy, a local urban forest non-profit, are a gift to ...