Hello and Happy Spring!
We are so glad to see the snow, hopefully we continue to experience moisture of some form or another throughout the summer.
We are excited to share a link to a short film we are part of:
Peaks to Prairie: A Holistic Regenerative Approach
Good People Tree Service did a large fire mitigation project with the Boulder Watershed Collective, which created a tremendous volume of woodchips. The woodchips were then transported to ranch land in east Boulder open space. The woodchips were inoculated with native saprophytic fungi, allowed to decompose, spread over the degraded soil, and then trampled into the ground by cows to jumpstart soil regeneration.
The film can be accessed here:
Peaks To Prairie: A Holistic Regenerative Approach | PBS
One of our owners, Ivan Clusin, began this process of soil regeneration at his home in Coal Creek Canyon. He had woodchips created from our job sites delivered and dumped in a large berm, he then inoculated the piles with a blend of mycelium from Boulder Mushroom. He is planning to plant this berm with native and fruit bearing trees and shrubs in the coming years.
Employee of the Month: Meet Kaeden Lafone
“I was born and raised here in the mountains. I always wanted to work outside and do something exciting. I accidentally found Good People and am very happy I did. I plan to turn this into a long career.”
Kaeden Lafone has worked for Good People Tree Service since the beginning of 2024. Starting working for us soon out of highschool, Kaeden is a gem of his generation. He is hardworking, intelligent, capable and an asset to our team. He has been wowing customers and coworkers alike on forestry projects. We are so proud of how much he has grown and continues to do so.
Project Spotlight: Evergreen, Colorado
Sitting exposed atop a ridge at 9,700 feet, this property is quite literally located in the center of a wind river. There’s nothing but air between it and the nearly 14-thousand-foot mountains in the James Peak Wilderness Area. 100+ mph winds are not uncommon on the property. After multiple storms of hurricane force winds this winter, combined with no moisture in the ground and record setting warmth that prevented the soil from freezing, thousands of trees on the property uprooted and toppled over between December and March. It looked more like a D3 avalanche ripped through large swaths of the forested mountain side than a wind event.
This massive downfall of trees, we estimate 10,000 downed trees, most likely happened in one micro-burst traveling up a lodgepole stand on a north-facing slope. After a month onsite, we cleaned up all the trees that were blocking the perimeter path to provide access and act as a fire break to the property, then we removed all trees near the buildings and the driveways. We processed thousands of trees, and there are thousands more to do. With the use of our specialized equipment, we cleared and mitigated the property removing hundreds of cubic yards of fuels from all zones. We also selectively broadcast chips throughout the forest to recycle the biomass and ensure the soil has enough nutrients to sustain a healthy and functioning ecosystem.
Homeowners Note on Pine Beetle Identification:
Here’s what to look for: Needles that are dying quickly, turning reddish-brown
- Sawdust at the base or in bark crevices “frass”
- Pitch tubes, which are small sap blobs on the bark where the tree tried to push beetles out
