A Winter Message from Executive Director Deb Pella Keen As we begin 2026, we extend a warm Happy New Year to our Maple Leaves Forever community. We closed 2025 with the sad loss of our founder, Ken Jewett, at the age of 95. We are deeply grateful for the many kind notes, shared memories, and donations received in his honour.… READ MORE »Happy New Year- Moving forward with Maple Leaves Forever
A Family Rooted in Trees, Tradition, and Three Generations When Paul Richardson talks about trees, he does it the way some people talk about family—warmly, proudly, and with a lifetime of stories tucked into the spaces between sentences. That makes sense. For Paul, family and forestry have always grown together. Pineneedle Farms is officially a third-generation enterprise—a legacy that began… READ MORE »Nursery Spotlight: Pineneedle Farms Inc.
Maple Leaves Forever team members Deb Pella Keen (Executive Director) and Mary Bella (Marketing Manager) attended the 2026 LO Congress last week! It was a great opportunity to connect with some of our nursery partners in person, and learn about their successes and challenges over the past year. We were also pleased to see Trees for Life, an organization of… READ MORE »2026 Landscape Ontario Congress: January 6 – 8, 2026
September 23, 1930 – November 26, 2025
With heavy hearts, the team at Maple Leaves Forever mourns the passing of our Founder, Ken Jewett, who died on November 26, 2025, at the age of 95. Ken leaves an extraordinary legacy of maple-lined roadsides across Ontario. He will be deeply missed by his loving family and by all of us at Maple Leaves Forever.
A Fall Message from Maple Leaves Forever Executive Director, Deb Pella Keen Fall is when our native Canadian Maple truly shines, putting on a spectacular display of colour. However, the warm, dry summer—and ongoing drought conditions in some areas—may have stressed certain trees, potentially affecting the timing and intensity of the colour change. Currently, Muskoka is reporting about 30–40% colour… READ MORE »An Autumn of Many Milestones
Deb Pella Keen, Executive Director of Maple Leaves Forever had the honour of attending the celebration of Somerville Nurseries’ 75 years on September 12, 2025 in Everett, Ontario. Over 350 family, employees, business partners, planting agencies, vendors, and neighbours attended the event at the Somerville headquarters near Everett, Ontario. Fred Somerville, President of Somerville Nurseries and one of the sons of… READ MORE »Somerville Nurseries Celebrates 75 Years
A Summer Message from Deb Pella Keen, MLF Executive Director Our spring newsletter was delivered to your inbox while a major ice storm was being experienced across south-central Ontario and into Quebec. The March 29-30 ice storm had accumulations of up to 30 mm and was immediately followed by northwest winds gusting to 50 km/hr, which also helped contribute to the damage… READ MORE »Post-Ice Storm Tree Care & Ontario Evirothon: Summer Update from Deb Pella Keen
By Kaylen Foley, M.Sc. For many landowners and foresters, sugar maple (Acer saccharum) is more than just a tree, it’s a cultural symbol, a keystone species, and an anchor of forest health in Ontario. But decades of acid rain, poor soil recovery, and nutrient loss have left many sugar maple stands stressed and struggling. Trees on thin, base-poor soils are… READ MORE »Wood Ash for Maples: Turning a Household By-Product into Forest Restoration
Maple Leaves Forever is proud to sponsor Ontario Envirothon, an annual initiative that provides students with hands-on experience with forests, soils, wildlife, and aquatic ecosystems. Throughout the 2025 competition season, students have showcased their knowledge of Ontario Envirothon’s four core topics – forestry, soils, wildlife, and aquatic ecosystems – along with this year’s current topic “Roots and Resiliency: Fostering Forest… READ MORE »Ontario Envirothon 2025
We hope you are managing this roller coaster transition from winter to spring! While this is somewhat normal for this time of year – here in Central Ontario, we have seen lows of -20oC and highs of +18oC within days of each other! On top of that, a significant ice storm event this past weekend affected a region of southern Ontario… READ MORE »Spring update from Deb Pella Keen, MLF Executive Director
