Trees along Woodlawn Cemetery's Memorial Avenue of Trees, where one in memory of "The Officers of the Forever Scotland Camp" will have to be cut down, after testing positive for Dutch Elm Disease. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)

City removing memorial tree with ‘heavy heart’ due to Dutch Elm

By CKOM News Jul 16, 2026 | 3:05 PM

A disease has infected a tree with significant meaning in Saskatoon, requiring the city to remove it.

After testing positive for Dutch Elm Disease, Thai Hoang, director of parks for the City of Saskatoon, said the ‘difficult’ decision was made to remove a tree along the Memorial Avenue of Trees at Woodlawn Cemetery.

Hoang called it “an action we have to take with a heavy heart.”

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The Memorial Avenue of Trees is located at Woodlawn Cemetery. It was created at the request of the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire to commemorate the men and women who died during the First World War.

“While any historic elm that must be removed is a loss, this hits a bit harder,” Hoang said in a city release, noting that the city has taken measures to protect the trees “as much as is practical,” which included inoculating the trees against Dutch Elm Disease.

“However, that is not a fail-safe and because of the high likelihood of root grafting between trees, the disease easily spreads.”

The tree in question – in memory of “The Officers of the Forever Scotland Camp” – tested positive earlier this week. It must be removed immediately, according to the city’s Dutch Elm Disease rapid response plan.

“It is something that hits us pretty hard, here at the city,” Hoang said, speaking at Woodlawn Cemetery on Thursday.

City archivist, Jeff O’Brien, said the memorial is not simply public, but “intensely personal,” as none of the men it stands for are coming home.

“There would be no grave here in Saskatoon for people to stand at, no place to put flowers on, but you could have a tree in Woodlawn Cemetery – growing in celebration of the specific person that had been lost,” he said.

“The Memorial Avenue of Trees is unique in Canada, for the simple reason that it still exists,” O’Brien explained.

He said there used to be several arboreal memorials in cities like Victoria, Montreal and Winnipeg. However, they’ve all been cut down over the years.

“All the other roads of remembrance in Canada are gone, except for this one,” O’Brien said.

“If I have a child and he’s fallen in France, he’s not coming home again. There’s nowhere I can go and stand and remember my child. These trees gave us the chance to make our mourning personal.”

Parks Canada was notified of the pending tree removal, as the Memorial Avenue of Trees is a National Historic Site. That designation was given to the site in 1992 in recognition of it being the last remaining Canadian arboreal memorial.

The release from the city noted that its parks department will follow the direction of the 1922 city council, which promised the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire it would replace the trees, if necessary. This has been done, the city noted, because trees have died before, from drought and other issues.

Preventing the spread of Dutch Elm Disease

The city reminded residents that actions like not storing, transporting, selling, buying or burning elm wood or branches – which is illegal – as well as not pruning elm trees during the provincial pruning ban between April and Aug. 31 can help stem the spread of Dutch Elm.

Pruning during those warmer months, it noted, can attract elm bark beetles, which can spread the disease from infected trees to healthy ones.

All elm wood should be disposed immediately, for free, at the city landfill, if needed. The city warned elm wood is not to be taken to the compost depot or placed in resident’s green bins.

–with files from 650 CKOM’s Brittany Caffet