New trees replace those lost in Mpls. tornado

Tornado memorial tree
Minneapolis City Council member Don Samuels (left) and Mayor R.T. Rybak plant a Black Hills Spruce in Janet Carstens' yard on Tuesday, May 22, 2012. Carstens' husband, Rob MacIntyre, died last year as he helped a neighbor clear away tornado damage. Behind the tree (left to right), state Sen. Linda Higgins, council member Diane Hofstede and Rep. Bobby Joe Champion help get the tree in place. The group was on hand to remember MacIntyre and Floyd David Whitfield, who was killed by a falling tree limb.
MPR Photo/Brandt Williams

Efforts are continuing in north Minneapolis to replace thousands of trees downed in a tornado in May 2011.

The St. Louis Park-based Tree Trust is planting nearly 70 trees in the area this weekend. The varieties include River Birch, Greenspire Linden, Thornless Hawthorne and Royal Raindrops Crabapple.

Kim Lawler of Tree Trust says the group has planted about 700 donated trees in north Minneapolis since last fall, and most are doing well.

"Obviously, it's been a really tough summer with the drought," Lawler said. "And so when we distributed them in the spring, we did encourage people to ensure they were getting that 1 inch of water per week on those weeks where we were not getting rain. And as we've been up in the neighborhoods, it looks like that's probably been happening. I know people were really happy to get the trees, so I think that they've been really taking good care of them thus far."

Lawler says people can still sign up for an October planting of 180 donated trees, adding that the Tree Trust will continue planting until a fund runs out.

"The fund is actually the Rob MacIntyre fund," Lawler said. "And Mr. MacIntyre was a gentleman who unfortunately lost his life while helping to clean up the devastation of the tornado. So far we've had some really nice contributions into that fund, including one from an anonymous family in the Twin Cities area who made a very large gift to that fund, which is really what's helping to make a lot of this work possible."

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