How we maintain trees

Tree planting program

Growing our urban forest

We have two tree planting initiatives to support the management of over 55,000 trees and 520 species in our parks, streets and community facilities.

• Street tree planting program: an annual program to plant trees on nature strips.
• Tree renewal program: part of our continuous tree monitoring program, we identify and manage unhealthy trees.

Street tree planting program

Our annual street tree planting program plants trees on nature strips and parks across Stonnington. This improves the tree canopy coverage, encourages biodiversity and cools our residential streets and retail precincts.

Limited space is a major challenge to growing large trees in highly urbanised environments. But with clever design and engineering solutions, we continue to increase the number of street trees.

Tree renewal program

Many of the trees we maintain are classed as mature or, in some cases over-mature.

While most trees are in good health, trees nearing the end of their lives may have reduced environmental and aesthetic benefits.

We continually monitor trees to identify unhealthy trees and proactively manage them by mulching, treating for pests and diseases, deep watering and adding additional nutrients.

Unfortunately, removal is sometimes the only option in some cases and is only done as a last resort.

For the health and wellbeing of our trees and to continue to increase tree canopy cover, our focus is to:

• plant and establish young trees
• maintain semi-mature trees
• retain and protect healthy mature trees
• remove trees at the end of their useful life.

Tree selection

The trees are planted between April and September each year. Planting at this time of year gives trees the best chance of success, as it's more difficult to establish a tree in hotter months.

We’re committed to building a diverse and resilient urban forest with a wide range of tree species in our streets, parks, gardens and open spaces. We choose tree species based on:

• native and exotic species diversity (to meet our diversity targets of 30 per cent of any one family, no more than 20 per cent of any one genus and no more than 10 per cent of any one species)
• canopy over time, taking into consideration the presence of power lines
• maximum benefits to the community and environment
• suitability for current and future climatic conditions
• suitability for the location and its infrastructure
• trees not having a poor structure when they mature
• uniformity with trees planted on the same street, enhancing the character of the area.

Submit a tree planting request

If you’d like a particular tree to be planted, or to replace a sick, dead or dying tree, submit a request and we’ll include it in our decision-making.

Submit a tree planting request

Tree maintenance program

We operate a year-round tree pruning program to help keep our trees healthy and away from power lines, street signs, vehicles and pedestrians.

View the Stonnington Electric Line Clearance Management Plan(PDF, 2MB).

Find out when the trees on your streets will be pruned next using our pruning schedule.

How we keep you informed

We're committed to keeping our community up to date on the planning, planting, removal and management of trees. Keep an eye our website and other communication channels for the latest information.

Residents watering street trees

Hot and dry weather can impact the health and viability of our beautiful street trees.

Giving your local street tree an occasional bucket of water goes a long way to helping these beautiful community assets survive and thrive during the hot summer months.

Be sure to first assess the soil moisture around the tree. If the area is dry, gently use a garden fork to aerate the soil and apply enough water to moisten the soil to around 30 cm to 40 cm deep.