The tornado destroyed 700 city-owned trees and that figure does not include the privately-owned trees.

“We’re dedicated to re-growing Marshalltown, re-planting Marshalltown,” said Marshalltown Trees Forever member and former city parks and recreation director Terry Gray.

It was in that spirit that State Farm sponsored an Arbor Day Foundation grant to pay for 150 trees to be given away to Marshalltown residents who wanted to re-plant. The local Trees Forever chapter is providing demonstrations and programming to coordinate the effort.

“When you grow a tree, it’s amazing what that does to the building around it and when you drive down State Street, or you drive down West Main Street, you can look … we need the trees,” said local State Farm agent Phyllis Mazour. “A property owner can come and pick them up. They have to fill out a form because they do want to know what trees have been planted.”

T-R PHOTO BY ADAM SODDERS
Young trees find new homes at Saturday’s giveaway. Another such event is scheduled for Tuesday evening at the Marshalltown Public Library.

Among the tree varieties available at Saturday’s giveaway were white oak, linden, hazelnut, chinquapin oak, hackberry, American plum and serviceberry.

One Marshalltown resident who came to Saturday’s tree giveaway was Fred Bayer of West Main Street.

“We lost one, a big linden, on the west side of our house,” he said. “You look up and down these streets in Marshalltown and it just, a lot of trees need to be replaced.”

Bayer said the tree he lost was probably 30 years old and is missed dearly.

“It was beautiful. It went up over the top of our house almost and it shaded the west side of our house,” he said.

Bayer was one of more than 30 residents at the Marshalltown Public Library for a program by Trees Forever going over tree care and planting. The group headed out to the library’s prairie area for a tree planting demonstration and then walked to the Emerson parking lot across Boone Street to pick up a young tree of their own.

Once loaded into vehicles, the trees were taken to be planted at those residents’ homes. The growth rate of the tree varieties differs, but most can expect a rate of 1 to 2 feet per year.

There are still plenty of trees to give away and a second event is scheduled for 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Marshalltown Public Library. The trees will again be given away at the Emerson parking lot across Boone Street from the library.

For more information, visit https://www.marshalltown.org/events/tree-workshop-and-free-trees-2/