Manual - TreeHub

How to organise a Tree Hub?

More Trees Now rescues excess or unwanted saplings for a second chance elsewhere. On harvest days, these saplings and shrubs are scooped out and budled Sometimes these are collected directly by people who want to plant, but often this is logistically impossible and a Tree Hub collects the trees.

The season runs from 1 November to 1 March, with an extension to 15 March if the trees are not all used up. During this period, the trees are dormant so you can safely move them.

Tree hubs are step 2 in the More Trees Now roadmap and thus fulfil a crucial role as the central places where seedlings harvested in the region are temporarily stored and redistributed. So great that you want to help make a Tree Hub a reality!

The More Trees Now Method

Tree Hub Manual

Manual - Tree Hub

The basics - How to make a Tree Hub

In a Tree Hub, trees and shrubs from different harvest days come together. There they are temporarily stored, until the trees and shrubs go to the planting sites in a mix of species. After all, a mix is best for biodiversity. Tree hubs come in different shapes and sizes. From pieces of a farmer’s yard and gullies on the edge of a nature reserve to lively exchange sites, community centres and backyards.

WHAT IS A SUITABLE PLACE?

1. What is feasible for me? What available land is in my network? What kind of land do I have myself? You can start a small hub in your backyard, at the neighbourhood vegetable gardening association, at a (befriended) farmer’s house or with Environmental Education Centres. All you need is a few m2 for the first trench!

2. Where are the people I want to hand out to? Do you want to look for large planting projects with estates, farmers and food forests or do you mainly want to distribute to people in urban areas? Choose a location that is easy to reach for those people.

3. Is the location easily accessible? This is not necessary, but nice plus! Can a car with a trailer get there easily? Could a truck get there? Creating flow on your site is desirable. You achieve this by constructing a roundabout, for example, with a clear entrance and exit.

4. As a bonus, you can check whether there are other facilities at the site, such as a shelter, a toilet or water supply. These are fine additions, but certainly not necessary to start a Tree Hub!

HOW MUCH SPACE DO YOU NEED?

In 10 square metres, you can already store hundreds of tree saplings and in 100 square metres, this can go up to tens of thousands of trees. The trenches you dig should be a little more than a spade wide (about 25/30 cm) and a spade and a half deep (35/40 cm). That way, most root types will fit in.

HOW MANY PEOPLE SHOULD YOU RUN A TREE HUB WITH?

It depends on the size of the hub. Volunteers with a small hub in the backyard run it themselves. If your treehub is a bit bigger, a group of five volunteers should run a Tree Hub. Experience shows that there are always a few people available then. Should you need additional volunteers, you can put out a call in the Tree Planner. You could also consider cooperating with an existing volunteer group attached to, for instance, a community garden. 

WHAT GEAR DO YOU NEED TO RUN A TREE HUB?

To manage a hub, you need the following materials:

  • Spades
  • Wheelbarrow
  • Rope
  • Labels
  • Black waterproof markers
  • Information material (in this manual)
  • Possibly a trailer
  • The tree planner tool (sign up!)
  • Tree hub sign (optional)

These are largely the same items as the ones you need to harvest, so these are often shared with the harvest groups who come to bring saplings to the Tree Hub. You can also dress up the hub nicely with a flag and/or sign. 

REGISTER YOUR TREE HUB

Of course, we will help you master all the skills for a Tree Hub. You will do this together with volunteers and the organisation. Get connected, visit a Tree Hub and let’s learn from each others experience. 

Once you have picked your spot, dug the trenches and gathered your club, the party can begin!

IN OR OUT OF TOWN

You can deliberately choose a hub in town: they tend to be smaller, but closer to planters in urban areas. Then consider the local petting zoo, allotment association, or contact the municipality! They may have temporary fallow land. Or consult with the municipal green space manager for a strip of land near a park.

You can also deliberately choose a hub outside the city – there you will have more space and be able to spread out well to planting locations that want big stuff. Here, a farmer can be useful, either an agricultural or residential farm with a reasonable piece of land left. Estates may also be open to this project.

"'We have just been running a Tree Hub near Nijmegen for a year now and it is a vibrant place for anyone with a green heart. My tip for other hubs? Don't make the gullies too close together and leave paths between them. Much easier with digging in and out!"'
Els
Tree Hub Malden
Become part of the circular green network with help from the Tree Planner! This makes inventory and event management very easy, and quickly connects you with volunteers and greeners in your area!
💡

Tree hub in the treeplanner

If you are marked in the Tree Planner as a Tree Hub, you are a storage and distribution point for tree saplings. As a Tree Hub, you can create one or more events, for which volunteers and planting locations can register each time. Every Wednesday evening at 18:00, the Tree Planner automatically sends an overview of all events to the volunteers and planting locations in your area. 

manual - treehub

Getting started: How do you run a Tree Hub?

When you run a Tree Hub, four activities are central: supplying seedlings, ensiling seedlings, keeping track of where seedlings go, and distributing the seedlings. We go through it step by step.

Picking up the Saplings

The Tree Hub receives or collects the harvest. Sometimes the hub itself is also the harvesting location.

Seedlings are harvested on harvest days at harvest sites. Harvest supervisors can be contacted if they need to place of their harvest. 

It is nice to have short lines of communication with harvest supervisors and harvest groups in your area. The regional coordinators can help you with this. Often, the core group running the Tree Hub overlaps with the core group organising harvest days in the neighbourhood. This makes it easy to coordinate who picks up the trees where and when to bring them to the Tree Hub.

On a harvest day, the trees and shrubs are usually sorted, bundled and labelled on the spot. Check this in advance with the harvest supervisor. Sometimes this may not have been done. Are you willing to bundle and sort yourself and is this occasionally necessary? You can read more about bundling and sorting below.

HUB COMBINE WITH HARVESTING OR NOT?

Would you also like to (help) harvest? Then see if you can find a harvesting location close to your Tree Hub. Sometimes these locations are the same: for example, a Tree Hub on an estate where harvesting also takes place. Several Tree Hubs build up a regular volunteer group that simultaneously forms the harvesting group in that neighbourhood. They learn from each other and share harvest days and hub tasks. Read more in the manual Harvest day.

HOW DO THE SEEDLINGS LOOK?

Seedlings are young trees and shrubs that are excessive or undesirable in their current location. For example, they are too close to a footpath. Seedlings are between 50 and 150 centimetres tall. With volunteers, we scoop them out. Afterwards, they are immediately collected or taken to a Tree Hub. And that Tree Hub is you!

TIPS FOR SAFE TRANSPORTATION OF TREES

A small number of seedlings might fit in the pannier, cargo bike or boot of the car. But often, also to keep your car clean, these are transported in a trailer. You stack the bunches of trees like roof tiles, occasionally turning the trunk direction. You start with the roots towards the car side, and if that hill becomes very disproportionate, you stack with the roots towards the opposite side. That way, most bunches will fit in the cart.

The most important thing in transporting the seedlings is to protect the roots. The more hair roots (fine roots, as thin as hairs! They often look white) the better the tree will do. Rubbing or rubbing on the roots can cause the (hair) roots to be damaged. Gently pushing/kicking can be done, but be really careful. When in doubt, don’t do it!

Protect the roots from sun and wind to prevent them from drying out. This can be done with a tarpaulin, cloth, leaves or with old towels and jute bags that can also be wetted if necessary.

Heeling in the saplings

To keep seedlings well, you can temporarily put them in water or heel  them in: then cover the hair roots with soil.

"'It is useful if you reserve certain gullies for certain species. Species like alder, birch and willow are harvested a lot, so you can already anticipate that. For the rest, you can wait for the first few harvests and space them a bit further apart for each species. That saves searching later!"'
Margot
Tree Hub Maarssen

Sorting

Sorting trees requires species knowledge. We cover this in detail on our course days for Tree Hubs and harvest supervisors. We have also developed a winter bud chart.

Handy!

Use the Bud chart to recognise seedlings.
🧐

HEALTHY TREES

Keep an eye out for strong discolouration of the bark, or barren tops and leaves. This could mean that the seedling is no longer as healthy. In that case, do not propagate it.  Read more about tree diseases.

When the trees arrive at the tree hub, it is nice to have a group of at least three people ready to heel in the trees with the driver. If you get trees in and they have not yet been sorted, bundled and labelled, we recommend having five or more volunteers ready.

  • Dig a trench
  • Make bunches of seedlings
  • Place the bunches of seedlings as close together as possible in the trench. This way you can store more seedlings and the roots remain protected
  • Scoop loose soil over the roots until all hair roots are covered, to prevent the roots from drying out
  • Place a label with the name of the seedling next to the ensiled seedlings

Plants and shrubs can stay heeld in for months. They need to be given away before winter ends!

What does a Tree Hub do?

“Heeling in” the cuttings

It is most convenient to put cuttings and slugs in the water with the bottom. That way, you don’t have to dig in slugs and cuttings. In fact, slithers of willows and poplars are (at least) 2 metres long. This can sometimes be difficult to keep standing and your pits or trenches have to be dug very deep. This is heavy. Cuttings (about 50 cm) often go better.

By putting the cuttings and slugs in the water with their undersides, they can already start to produce roots! These can stay in the water all winter without going mouldy. With the exception of freezing weather: it is not useful to have lettuces and cuttings in the water when the water can freeze. Then the best option is to put them in anyway.

Cuttings can be put in water to keep them fresh. In water or when stuck in the ground, they will start making roots.

FINDING VOLUNTEERS THROUGH THE TREE PLANNER

Should you need more volunteers one day, you can create an event in the Tree Planner. This event is called ‘General Tasks’. Any volunteer in the Tree Planner can respond to this event and thus sign up for work such as trench digging, grading, bundling and ensiling. Created events are circulated every Wednesday at 6pm in a 25-kilometre radius around your location. Create the event on time and write a catchy text with it!

EVENTS ALSO ACCESSIBLE TO HELPERS OUTSIDE THE TREE PLANNER

You can also share an event outside the tree planner. For example, on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, X/Twitter, WhatsApp or via an email. That way, anyone outside the tree planner can also participate in an event.

Keeping track of your stock of trees

In the Tree Planner, you can track exactly how many of which types of trees have been harvested.

HOW MANY TREES OF WHAT SPECIES DO YOU HAVE IN YOUR TREE HUB?

As soon as you receive trees and shrubs for pitting, register them in the Tree Planner. That way, you have an overview of the stock and planting locations also see what is available.

Both the location of origin and destination can enter a group of trees. The harvest supervisor, and therefore often manager of the harvest location in the Tree Planner, can also insert the harvest with your hub as the destination. You will then see this in your transaction overview. You can then correct any errors. You can do this on your computer in your dashboard, but also on the spot in the More Trees Now app / together with the harvest supervisor when delivering and heeling in the trees.

Tips and tricks

Keep track of what goes in and what goes out at each harvest and give-away event. This will keep your stock most up-to-date! If you have to update it afterwards, it’s a lot more work and hassle.

You can find more information about registering at point 4 ‘Handing out trees’. 

Sorting

Sorting trees requires species knowledge, something we cover in detail on course days for hubs and harvest supervisors. Check your region‘s calendar for all course days. We have also developed a handy button map.

Handy!

Use the Button map to recognise seedlings.
🔎

Getting to know tree species is also good for advising planting locations. Want to know more about the trees in your hub? Then take a look at this “Tree Finder”. This filter tool lets you see what soil types and functions which trees have.

INDIGENOUS OR EXOTIC?

More Trees Now applies the rule: we hand out at least 90% native. If you have a non-native tree, it may only be distributed to a food forest or backyard where it can serve an ecological function. After all, there are already many non-native trees there and so they can do little harm. Note: if it is a non-native and invasive tree, make it a dead hedge. A branch belt is a hedge of branches laid sideways; dead, the roots are not in the ground. In this, small animals can make a home and take refuge. Some invasive species are so persistent that it’s best to shred their seedlings so they don’t sneak from the dead hedge to the soil to take root anyway. Think American bird cherry or Japanese knotweed.

Organise a tree give-away

Organise a tree give-away day and make it a green party!

Planting advise

Want to give advice to planting sites about the trees you will be giving out? Then take a look at the Treefinder: for each tree, you can see what soil types and functions it is best for.

More trees now App

Always the latest events on your celluar phone! 

NATIVE / NON-NATIVE

Make sure that if you give out non-native tree saplings, they are given a safe place: such as in backyards or a food forest. Native trees are best for biodiversity. Read here about native trees in the UK and here about non-native trees. Read here about native trees in Ireland and here about non-native trees in Ireland. 

Organise a Give-Away Day

When you create an event in the tree planner at your Tree Hub location, you can choose ‘Distribution Day’ under ‘type of event’. Both volunteers and people who want to collect trees, both inside and outside the Tree Planner, can register for this. Volunteers general, and people who want to collect trees choose a time slot. Time slots are automatically created of half an hour from your start to end time, which you set yourself. You also choose the maximum number of people you want per time slot.

PREPARE YOUR TREE HUB FOR A SMOOTH DISTRIBUTION DAY

Distribution days are often a big party. To make these days run as smoothly as possible, we have some handy tips!

  • Make a proper lay-out for the site. What is the entrance? What is the exit? Mark this well with, for example, flags, pawns or pavement chalk. See if you can make a roundabout to avoid traffic chaos on the site.
  • Heel out some of each type of seedling in advance. Place the seedlings in different compartments. At these compartments, place a sign with the name of the seedling and possibly a short explanation. Cover the roots of the seedlings with moist cloths.
  • Set up a few ‘tree-posts’. At these tree posts, people who come to collect trees can have a QR code scanned. Two volunteers per post is sufficient. One volunteer scans the code and the other volunteer grabs the right seedlings.
  • Make volunteers visible! You can do this by putting a More Trees Now vest on everyone working in the Tree Hub or by all dressing in the same colour.

WHAT DOES A DISTRIBUTION DAY LOOK LIKE?

Time Schedule of an average give-away

09.00-09.10
Volunteers arrive. Go over the schedule together and divide everyone up into groups.Set up the proper lay-out of the site.
09.45-10.00
The volunteer groups each take up a post. One could receive the people requesting trees, scan their QR code and register the trees they want. THe next person can get the trees and put give it to them. The third group could heel out the trees.
10.00-12.00
Let's start giving away some trees! When you create a give-away event in the Tree Planner, you automatically have 30 min time slots people can sign up to. You choose the maximum amount of people that can come per time slot. When people sign up they put in a request for a particular number of trees. When people requeset a large amount, you can pre-arrange a package for them. This way helping smaller and bigger planting location do not differ too much in time.This is up to you.
12.00-12.30
Close some timeslots in advance to create a break. Change up the tasks, have lunch or some tea, depending on how long your event is and what the volunteers want.
12.30-14.00
Next round of timeslots. You can choose yourself how long your event this, this could also be the end.
14.00-14.30
Time to bring the day to an end. Heel in the saplings that have not been picked up, tidy up the sit, thank your volunteers. You can choose to call the people who did sign up and haven't showed, maybe they are late and you can leave some trees for them at an agreed upon place. You may also choose to count what you have left to double check the registration. Dont forget to thank your volunteers!

manual - treehub

Communication for your give-away!

To give as many trees a new home as possible, it is important to create a buzz and invite people to your give-away event! You can do this with social media, group apps and the Tree Planner. Local media can also help make your event a success.

Treeplanner

Everything starts in the Tree Planner… Create your event in the Tree Planner and all participants in the systems within a 25 km radius of your location will be automatically notified on the following Wednesday evening at 18:00. 

Social media and groups-Apps

Of each event you create, you get a public link. This is a sign-up link for people within and outside of the Treeplanner system. They sign up to a particular time slot to pick up trees, or to help. You can share it via your social media channels and group apps. We have also created several designs for you that you can easily customise and use yourself.

Also consider creating your own social media account for your Tree Hub. If volunteers can follow your story, you create more engagement. Some Tree Hubs have emerged and grown this way: they are also plant shelters, and community gardens, a green space where the neighbourhood gathers.

FLYERS, SIGNS, FLAGS

Create a fun flyer or request your own Tree Hub sign using the Canva designs in the link, and dress up your hub nicely!

photo & video

Don’t forget to take catchy photos of your harvest, your harvest day, and your distribution day! There are plenty of fun videos you can make. If they are for social media, make them no longer than 1 minute. Do you have something playful to show and want to share? There are plenty of great programmes online that you can use to put together a fun video, but we would also like to get you started. Mail info@moretreesnow.eco with your material!

Local media

We have created a standard press release that you can fill in with your own time, date and details. You can send that to the local newspaper, radio and television. Often, local media have a calendar where they can include your harvest and distribution day. These are at the communication toolkit!

"'It helps enormously to send along a nice photo of your Tree Hub! And what also works well is follow-up calls: try to get hold of an editor. Tell the person you are going to give away hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands of trees for free in the neighbourhood and why you are doing it. It's a fun and good story that most editors are happy to help tell!"'
Martijn
Press officer Urgenda