Packers Plant Trees To Parry Pests

Hundreds of trees are being planted in Brown County, due to a Green Bay Packers pledge to plant a tree for every first down made last season.

The “First Down for Trees” program began three years ago. Since then the Packers have paid for roughly 2,000 trees. The team works with the Wisconsin Public Service Corporation (WPS), and now, Green Bay Packaging to buy the trees.

Greg Kirchmayer is an arborist with WPS. Twenty trees were planted last week on the utility’s grounds – the same place where the emerald ash borer was first discovered in northeastern Wisconsin last year. Kirchmayer says 30 trees had to be cut down.

Last week’s plantings included a wide variety of trees.

“We have Kentucky poppy trees, we have callery pears, we have elms, we have burr oaks, to name a few. And as you can see they’re not ‘Charlie Brown’ trees either. They’re very tall trees – they’re ten foot tall trees we put in.”

The idea is to diversify, so if an insect like the ash borer or a disease comes into the area not all trees will be affected.

Kirchmayer says “First Down for Trees” is part of the Packers’ “Green Team” initiative.

“One of the things they wanted to do was zero out their carbon footprint for the away games – for the jet flights on the away games.”

The trees will be planted around Brown County. They are purchased from local nurseries.