Cypress organizes arborists to clean veterans’ cemetery

A collection of arborists waited on a September morning, getting ready for a day of labor. While the tasks ahead may have been ordinary, the mission was not. They were banding together to work for those who served their nation.

On Sept. 18 Saluting Branches held its first National Day of Service at the Delaware Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Millsboro. Saluting Branches: Arborists United for Veteran Remembrance, a nonprofit organization, began its annual event in 2015. They partnered with the national Department of Veterans Affairs and district agronomists, to bring tree care professionals together to help clean up veterans cemeteries all over the country.

Since its inception, Saluting Branches has cleaned more than 45 cemeteries in 31 states, a number that grows each year. Officials said they have donated more than $3.4 million in labor and services, from pruning to tree mapping.

Joe Shoup, event sponsor and certified arborist at Cypress Tree Care, brought the event together. He learned about the program through social media and recognized a good opportunity to help the only veteran’s cemetery in Sussex County. He nominated the cemetery to Saluting Branches and began to contact other companies.

Cypress Tree Care, Complete Tree Care, Tri-State Tree Service and the City of Rehoboth all agreed on the collaboration, competing companies working together to help. Shoup spoke of the event with pride. “It’s a way to give back. A day of service to those who served,” he said.

Cemetery administrator Greg Bee was ecstatic with the project. Some trees were over 20 years old and were losing sizable limbs, presenting a danger to visitors, and the cemetery workforce of three, none of them arborists, is unable to do the necessary work. So when Shoup proposed the project, Bee said, he was only too happy to agree.