Kris Dulmer is an arborist in Milton. And he’s on a mission to protect black ash trees.
The black ash is the rarest of Vermont’s native ashes, and it’s the most threatened by the emerald ash borer (the invasive beetle that kills ash trees).
Throughout the course of his work, Dulmer keeps a lookout for healthy black ash trees. When he finds one, he volunteers to inject it with a dose of insecticide. The treatment keeps the tree protected against the emerald ash borer for two years. But the insecticide is expensive, and Dulmer often covers the cost himself.
For Dulmer, treating these trees is a labor of love. He grew up with black ash trees, and he doesn’t want to see them disappear.
This interview was produced for the ear. We highly recommend listening to the audio. We’ve also provided a transcript, which has been edited for length and clarity.
Maeve Fairfax: Did you have to get permission from anyone to treat this site?
Kris Dulmer: I’m the town tree warden, and I said it was OK to treat these trees.
Maeve Fairfax: Awesome.
Kris Dulmer: I’ve had discussions with the town about treating trees, so it’s not totally out of the blue.
I’m Kris Dulmer, and I have a business treating ash trees. I’m an arborist by trade, so I love all things to do with trees. I grew up really liking black ash, probably just cause it’s this rare, quirky little tree that pops up every once in a while when you’re least expecting it.
And where I grew up in Chester, Vermont, just out behind my parents house, there was a really nice little swamp. And part of that swamp had some really large, beautiful black ash. Sadly, I went back there last year and they were all dead.
The thing about black ash is that, once it’s infested, it typically will struggle for a year, maybe two, and then it’s dead. They’re basically gonna be extinct in the future. So that’s kind of why I’ve started a little pet project, trying to preserve some black ash swamps.
Currently, my little black ash project is just me out there fighting the good fight. And hopefully in the future I’ll be able to expand it, and come up with a couple of revenue sources to do so. If we could expand the number of people going out and treating trees, I could envision getting 20, 30 sites just here in Chittenden County. And it wouldn’t be a huge effort to treat them all. But doing it by myself would be pretty hard.
Time is running out, I can’t stress that enough. Like I said, the black ash stand that I grew up knowing in Chester, Vermont, is now gone. And that’s it, and it’s not coming back. And over the next few years here in Chittenden County, that’s how it’s gonna be. So I think we can do some good work, over the next two, three years, in saving the black ash.
This story comes from a collaboration between Vermont Public and the Community News Service, a University of Vermont journalism internship. Production support by Kelsey Tolchin-Kupferer.
