Wausau committee weighs EAB removals, planting shortfalls and street-construction impacts on canopy

WAUSAU — The Wausau Parks and Recreation Committee on Tuesday reviewed the city’s emerald ash borer management plan, recent tree removals and injections, a three-year planting grant and how street reconstruction projects are affecting the urban canopy.

City Forester John Kehan told the committee the department has tracked 1,695 ash trees removed since about late 2019 and currently inventories about 3,317 ash trees in the city. “So we've taken down 1,695 ash trees that we've tracked since roughly late 2019,” Kehan said. He said the city has been removing roughly 800–900 trees a year and is injecting fewer ash trees as removals rise; injection counts cited in the meeting were 873 in 2022, 948 in 2023 and 742 in the most recent year.

Kehan said the city aims to follow a 12- to 15-year removal-and-replacement timeframe and is aiming for the shorter 12-year schedule to give flexibility if removals must be delayed. He described the city’s planting program and a recent grant award: contractor Legacy Trees will plant 415 trees under a bid the city accepted, with 180 planted in spring and the remainder planned for the fall. “We plant 415 trees. So they actually came back really well…