Written by Robin Hastings, Master of Urban Forestry Leadership student.
For an arborist, there aren’t many better places to work than an arboretum. I jumped at the chance to join the team at the Malcolm Knapp Research Forest (MKRF) Arboretum. It was an ideal opportunity to incorporate some of the lessons from the Masters of Urban Forestry Leadership (MUFL) course into the underway arboretum redevelopment project. I and fellow UBC Faculty of Forestry student Lucila Gonzalez were both fortunate to be given summer intern positions at MKRF thanks to a Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund (TLEF) grant.
The arboretum at MKRF is a 3.4 ha site, mostly planted in the 1960s with a large number of coniferous trees. Over the intervening years, understory vegetation has grown up, creating a unique ‘forest’ style arboretum. While this creates an interesting dynamic between natural and managed, it was felt that some updating was required to showcase the arboretum in its best light and prepare for future redevelopment at the site.
The work fell into two broad categories. The first was revamping the arboretum with some new signage and trail systems. This included creating an ArcGIS Story map, to highlight the tree collections. Second was creating a design process that incorporates student feedback into a larger redevelopment of the arboretum, and the new MKRF Welcome Centre. The goal is to showcase cutting-edge urban forest practices, elevating the arboretum as an educational resource for UBC students and the wider community.
Funding from the TLEF allowed us to go to Chicago as part of a research trip. Here we visited some world-class arboretums and botanic gardens, speaking to staff and observing what makes interesting and engaging content. This informed our work at MKRF and inspired us to design elements for a world-class teaching arboretum. It was interesting to see how the work being done in various locations around Canada and the US fits within the broader principles of urban forestry management that I had been studying in the MUFL program.
Increasing the public awareness of the arboretum and improving its education capacity underpinned our work. The ArcGIS Story map component is a publicly available interactive tool that people can use to learn more about specific tree species in the arboretum. It allows users to locate the living specimens within the arboretum, and links to QR codes on the tree labels. The MKRF Arboretum Story map is now live and can be accessed here.
One of the biggest lessons that I learned from my time at MUFL was that community buy-in is vital to building a sustainable and resilient urban forest program. Incorporating student feedback into the MKRF redevelopment was therefore a key component. We created a blueprint for a design charette workshop that could be delivered to UBC students so that they could have a voice in the process. Although due to the timing of the internship, we were not able to facilitate this workshop for students, we did have a group of staff and faculty attend our ‘beta’ testing event.
“We used a drone to help identify trees using their cones. These were inaccessible from the ground and so we needed a way to take pictures from the top of this 30m tall noble fir (Abies procera).“
Both MUFL and the experience gained from working at the MKRF Arboretum have helped to open the door for the next steps in my career.
I am excited to take those lessons forward with me and to see how the MKRF redevelopment projects progress. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to practically apply the knowledge gained in MUFL while working at MKRF.
I am sure that I won’t be the only one and that a strong, fruitful partnership will provide benefits to students, the community and the environment for many more years.
Learn more about the TLEF and the ongoing work at Malcom Knapp Research Forest including the ongoing renewal project to allow MKRF to sustain itself as a natural education hub for generations to come!