For every goal the Penguins score at home, the Pittsburgh area gets a new tree
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Fourth-grader K.K. Cunningham had never planted a tree before Thursday.
But the 9-year-old Hazelwood boy was a natural, grabbing a shovel, pivoting and plunging it into soil outside Pittsburgh Mifflin Elementary on what was a gray November morning in the city’s Lincoln Place neighborhood.
By the time K.K.’s in eighth grade, he said the tree would tower over a nearby fence.
“It’s going to grow with me,” he said.
A total of 53 fourth- and eighth-graders gathered Thursday morning to plant seven, new Eastern red cedar trees as part of a program involving a national tree-care company, the local nonprofit Tree Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Penguins.
For the second year in a row, the Kent, Ohio-based Davey Tree Expert Company is planting a tree in Allegheny County for each goal scored by the Pittsburgh Penguins at PPG Paints Arena this season, said Sandra L. Reid, the tree company’s vice president of corporate communications and strategic planning.
The group is just wrapping up efforts to plant 142 trees in Allegheny County based on the Penguins’ scoring output at home last season.
“It was natural to partner with the Pens,” said Reid, who was born in Pittsburgh and has worked for Davey for 37 years. “This is one of the ways we can spread information and awareness about trees and also give back to the community.”
The Eastern red cedar, a type of evergreen tree, was a great choice to plant on the sloping hill near Pittsburgh Mifflin Elementary, where about a dozen towering black locust trees were recently felled, said Jake Milofsky, director of tree care and reforestation for the Lawrenceville-based Tree Pittsburgh.
At full maturity, an Eastern red cedar can grow to 30 feet tall and as big as 10 to 15 feet wide, Milofsky said. In addition to being well acclimated to anticipated climate changes, the trees are a great habitat for birds. The Eastern red cedar, first observed in Virginia in the 1500s, also is native to at least 37 U.S. states.
Davey provided the funding to buy the trees and donated labor, Milofsky said.
He joked about watching the Penguins on TV this season.
“I get a little stressed,” he laughed. “Sidney Crosby comes and scores a goal and I’m like, ‘Oh! Another one!’”
Davey and Tree Pittsburgh plan to plant 15 more trees as part of the agreement with the Pittsburgh Penguins next week at a school in the city’s Friendship neighborhood, Milofsky said.
Pittsburgh Mifflin Principal Amy Carricato got the student crowd worked up Thursday morning as they grabbed safety glasses and green T-shirts. Nearby, a group of Davey staffers worked in fluorescent-yellow safety vests. Penguins mascot Iceburgh and Oakley, a character representing Tree Pittsburgh, hammed it up for parents videotaping the planting on their cellphones.
Fourth-grader Easton Harrison smiled widely as he dug a deep hole into which Davey volunteers were set to plant a tree. He said he couldn’t quite put his feelings about the moment into words, but was excited to plant his first tree.
Fellow fourth-grader E’Saun Pettus said he looked forward to looking out of the school’s windows to see a row of evergreen trees he helped to plant.
“It’s nice to help the community,” said E’Saun, 9, of Hazelwood.