About the Tree Library

Canopy arborists and City of Palo Alto arborists joined forces to create a tree selection tool customized to our area

Many tree lists and selection tools are available on the web, but none address the specific needs of residents and professionals of our local region.

A team of Canopy and City of Palo Alto arborists have worked for many months to create an easy-to-use tool that encapsulates their more than 150 years of professional arboriculture and urban forestry experience. This is a unique and invaluable tool that will help residents and professionals understand trees better and select species for successful plantings with confidence.

Tree Library Team

Dave Muffly, Independent Arborist, Founder of Oaktopia, Member of the Canopy Board of Directors, Board Certified Master Arborist, Certified Tree Risk Assessor, Tree Selection Specialist

Roy C. Leggitt, III, Founder and Owner, Tree Management Experts, Member of the Canopy Board of Directors, Consulting Arborist, Certified Arborist, Certified Tree Risk Assessor

Stephen Scott, Project Manager for the City of Palo Alto Public Works Dept. Tree Section
Certified Arborist; Agricultural Pest Control Adviser License through the State of California, Department of Pesticide Regulation

Gino Segna, City of Palo Alto Alto Public Works Dept. Urban Forestry Section Project Manager

With help from:

David Dockter, Certified Arborist, City of Palo Alto Planning Arborist

Michael Hawkins, Canopy Program Director

Eric Krebs, Certified Arborist, City of Palo Alto Managing Arborist

Sharon Kelly, Certified Arborist, Former Canopy Program Director

Volunteers Database Architect:

Pierre Martineau, Martineau & Associates

Cal Fire Funding

Partial funding for the Canopy Tree Library and other interactive sections of the website was provided by a grant from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection Urban and Community Forestry Program.

About the Tree Library Photos

It is Canopy’s goal to provide high quality illustrations for all species listed in the Tree Library. As a first step, in the spring and summer of 2011, professional and volunteer photographers created sets of photos to illustrate half the species currently listed in the Canopy Tree Library. For most of them these include shots of the whole tree, and close-ups of leaves, branches, and bark. In keeping with the local relevance of the Library, these photos were all taken in Palo Alto.

Canopy’s plan is to continue acquiring local photos to expand the collection in depth (number of species) and breadth (flowers, fruit, seeds, fall foliage variations, etc.), and offer new functionalities using the metadata collected for each photo, geo-referencing in particular.

Tree Library Photos Team

Susan Ellis, Former Canopy Chair, conceived and managed the project. She created routes for photographers and and handled the majority of the ‘back office’ tasks of collecting, processing, labelling, screening and selecting among more than 5,000 photos.

Marina Forte, Professional Photographer

Sairus Patel, Volunteer Photographer, Former Canopy Board Member

Lorenz Sonneman, Volunteer Photographer, college student

California ReLeaf Funding

Funding for the Canopy Tree Library Photography project was provided by California ReLeaf and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection with funds from the Safe Drinking Water, Water Quality and Supply, Flood Control, River and Coastal Protection Bond Act of 2006.

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“Most people today are making the wrong decisions about trees because they don’t have the right information”

~Chris A. Cowles
Senior Urban Forester
The Care of Trees, Baltimore

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