As all of us watch tree after tree on our streets receive the red dot of death, residents on one street in Wolseley have found a way to fight the loss of their elms. In June, 2023, neighbours on Newman Street raised enough money to inoculate the seven treasured elms on their street against Dutch Elm Disease in a procedure that protects the trees for three years.
This year, they saw the dreaded red dots appear nearby on Wolseley Avenue. But, 50 yards away, their majestic old elm at 482 Newman escaped the death sentence.
Debra Jean Moore lives across the street from that big elm. She lost her big elm four years ago, plus other nearby trees. She remembers the sense of despair as neighbours saw the entire nature of the street change. Then, at the block’s 2022 summer party, an idea came up that might save the trees.
One neighbour, Evan Finkler, further up the block, had become aware of an inoculation process that provides elm trees with three years of protection from Dutch Elm Disease. He and his neighbours investigated and found an arborist company that has done the procedure on trees throughout Winnipeg on private property.
Although the price tag was steep –$4,000 to save seven trees– they banded together. Moore explained that the block has a history of organizing events: block parties, neighbourhood clean-ups, tree-banding, etc. That history means that neighbours know one another. Moore has been a block captain for Neighbourhood Watch and has maintained an e-mail list of neighbours for years.

“Our neighbours on Newman are great people,” explained Finkler, “And it was great the way we came together.” Thirty homes donated varying amounts (a little under $100 each) and the business at the end of the block –where two of the trees provide shade for their employee’s picnic table – contributed $1,500 for their two trees.
In June 2023, neighbours watched as the arborists inoculated their trees. “It’s almost impossible to put into words how much it means to still have these trees,” says Finkler.
He’s right – words can’t describe it. But a simple Google streetscape comparison can. The streetscape view of part of the street in 2015 shows eight big trees, branches interlaced and providing deep shade. The 2024 view shows only two big trees, a variety of young trees, and a street of scorching sun.
Perhaps the saving of those seven trees provides a middle way between the shaded streetscape of mature trees and the streetscape of young saplings bare to the sun.
“Mature trees provide many benefits that younger trees can’t provide,” says Finkler. “A simple thing like shade immensely affects quality of life. Maybe enough mature trees can be preserved so a neighbourhood can adjust. Plant new species to give diversity, but save enough of the old to allow the gradual growth of the new.”

Streetscape shows the same part of Newman Street (2015, top photo, 2024, bottom).

Finkler believes that a lot of trees that are now considered doomed could be saved if more people worked together like the neighbours on Newman did. “Any street could organize a grassroots campaign, and the business community has a lot to benefit as well,” he said. “We were able to do this without any government funding. I think that government involvement would help a lot.”
Moore believes that government could help a lot, but feels current policies just accept the loss of the canopy and concentrate on replanting a wider diversity of trees. That policy means it will be 20 years before trees once again interlace their branches above Newman Street.
It’s true, as the old saying goes, that the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago.
But maybe, in 20 years, there’ll be a new saying that praises the vision of today’s civic leaders:
“The best time to save a tree is 20 years ago.”
And that “20 years ago” is now.