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Contact the office
541-632-3683 or [email protected]
Eugene-Springfield Volunteer Roles
As a leader in one of our most important volunteer roles, you will help teach our volunteers how to plant trees and work together as a team. Not only is being a crew leader a great way to meet people and develop valuable leadership skills, but you get to learn more about our community’s urban forest. You will learn about proper planting techniques, safety protocols, and how to lead a team of volunteers on planting day. You will also receive a coveted Tree Team t-shirt! During our planting season, we ask that each crew leader commit to guiding small groups of planters at 2 or more planting events. Check out our calendar for upcoming trainings!
Tree Planters: We organize tree planting events on Saturday mornings from November through April. It’s a great way to get outside, learn how to plant trees, meet people, fulfill service learning requirements and help make our community greener and healthier, together! Friends of Trees hosts two planting programs: greenspace and neighborhood trees. Our greenspace program (GS) plants climate adaptive and native species of trees and shrubs in large open green spaces. Our neighborhood trees program plants trees throughout the neighborhoods of Eugene and Springfield by carpool or bike teams.
Bike Planters: At each of our neighborhood planting events we host 1 to 3 bike planting teams. Bicycle crews transport all of the trees, tools and people to each planting site during these neighborhood planting events. Keep an eye out for plantings with our partners at PeaceHealth Rides where any volunteer can join a bike team with a bikeshare bike for free!
Nearly every neighborhood planting crew needs truck driver support. Volunteer truck drivers bring their vehicles to a planting event and help us get trees, tools, or mulch from house to house on planting day. Whether you want to volunteer at your neighborhood planting event, or you are free to join us over multiple weekends, we’d love to have your support!
Summer inspectors are always one of our most popular volunteers roles. Why? These trained volunteers learn how to assess the health of newly planted street and yard trees and give homeowners watering and mulching tips. Each inspector checks on their assigned trees twice during the summer. Plus, you get to stroll around Eugene & Springfield’s beautiful neighborhoods in the summer sun at your own leisure. Not a bad way to do good work!
During the late summer and early fall, staff lead small teams of volunteers to prune and care for young street trees at community events. Each event includes demonstrations on proper pruning techniques and safety protocols. See our Events Calendar for stewardship event dates!
About the Eugene-Springfield office
In September 2011, the Eugene Tree Foundation (founded in 1997) joined forces with Friends of Trees to become the Friends of Trees Eugene Metro office! Serving the Eugene-Springfield metro area, Friends of Trees has partnered with thousands of volunteers to plant 10,000+ trees and native shrubs over the years. This work has never been more important: In Eugene there has actually been a decrease in tree canopy, at a time when we need trees more than ever. Friends of Trees is planting trees to increase our community’s tree canopy—but that’s not all! We’re proactively working to improve our local programs and our impact:
- We focus heavily on tree selection for climate change, choosing species that can withstand more extreme conditions.
- We’ve brought together the public and municipal managers numerous times to discuss tree selection—right tree, right place.
- We’re testing a wide variety of trees for climate resilience, including working with a local nursery on growing some of these species right here.
- We’re working with the cities of Eugene and Springfield to update their approved street tree lists to allow tree species we think will be more climate-resilient.
