Climbing Trees With the Star Arborists of Central Park

On a recent June morning, under a cloudless blue sky, the American elms near the Central Park Mall and Literary Walk looked so green they almost glowed. And high up on their twisty boughs—if you looked closely enough—you could spot harnessed figures among the leaves, tending to the trees.

These are the Central Park Conservancy’s arborists—sometimes known as “tree doctors”—who work to preserve and maintain the park’s more than 19,000 trees across 843 acres.

Unlike other public parks throughout the city, which largely fall under the purview of the Parks Department, Central Park is managed by the Central Park Conservancy, a nonprofit founded in 1980. Its five-person tree care team—K Satterthwaite, Brady Byers, Dylan Barrett-Smith, Dylan Berger, and Jordan Foreman—works year-round to evaluate the trees’ health and structure, examining, climbing, and pruning when necessary.

Millions of visitors see their work in the park each year, but this spring, the arborists themselves stepped into the spotlight, blooming into social media stars when a video of them went viral in certain corners of TikTok and Instagram. In the comments, viewers voiced their appreciation for the arborists’ expertise (“Very interesting!”) and for the team members themselves (“Okay, what’s everyone’s number?”), having discovered what some called their new “favorite show.”

Swooning admirers aside, many fans of the video also seemed enchanted simply by the idea of spending one’s days up in the trees, making sure that these living landmarks continue to thrive.

Dylan Barrett-Smith didn’t grow up dreaming of being an arborist—but that’s only because he didn’t know it was a job. “I always liked working outside, I always liked working with my hands,” he tells me, taking a break to chat after pruning a tree. “And this is kind of the best of both worlds, because you get to be in Central Park every day.”

He knows the ins and outs of the whole park by now, and one of his favorite areas is the East Meadow; he likes the “beautiful mature beeches and elms,” and he likes seeing the doctors and nurses on their breaks from nearby Mount Sinai. His favorite part of the job, however, is the cohesion and camaraderie of the arborist team: “We often get to work all together.”

The Boston native studied biology in college, but his passion for the outdoors led him to work at a land trust and at Brooklyn Bridge Park, before landing at Central Park two years ago.

What did he make of the fanfare about the videos of the team? “I don’t even have an Instagram,” Barrett-Smith says, laughing. “But my mom actually texted me after the video was posted and was like, ‘Your video has a lot of views.’ The next morning, I looked, and I was like… this is weird. I was really surprised.”

Left to right: Brady Byers, Dylan Barrett-Smith, Dylan Berger.

K Satterthwaite, the tree care manager, has been an arborist at Central Park for seven years. She got into it after working in public green space restoration. “I was like, whoa, people climb trees professionally? I want to do that,” she says. Satterthwaite grew up in Seattle, and when they arrived in New York, they felt like the trees could use a little love. (Beyond working for the Conservancy, Satterthwaite is also a Citizen Pruner, a volunteer who works on trees around the city.)

“Caring for these trees and feeling like I’m doing something for the public good,” Satterthwaite says, “that’s really fulfilling.” She works on the park’s endowment (or adopt-a-tree) program, too, meeting with people to help them dedicate trees to loved ones.

Brady Byers, a lead arborist at the Conservancy who grew up in Pennsylvania, has been with the team for three years. He studied forestry in college before working in residential tree care for a while. He realized that he wanted to work with the same group of trees over time—to really see the effects of his work—and that drew him to Central Park. He also realized just how much New Yorkers rely on the park for access to nature, and wanted to be a part of that resource.

Plus, “I think it really is a big boon for my sanity,” Byers says of his work, laughing. “Being on the tree care team, my life is just these trees.”

Dylan Berger is the newest arborist on the team, having joined the Conservancy about six months ago. He applied online and did an in-person test to show that he had the climbing prowess and other necessary physical skills, in addition to the certifications, for the job. “I was actually scared of heights as a kid,” he admits. Now, he calls what he does “the job of a lifetime.”

“If you’re trying to be an arborist in New York City, this is kind of as good as it gets,” he adds.

If internet dwellers are hungry to spend time in the world of the arborists, it may be because in our hyper-digital lives, their work stands out as distinctly (and literally) down-to-earth.

Multiple arborists tell me that their job gives them a unique point of view on life. For one thing, they’re always looking up. They become tree encyclopedias for their friends and loved ones, and occasionally do free pruning work for their families when they visit home. They live, breathe (with the help of multiple allergy medications, I’m told) and dream of trees.

And of course, there’s the literal view from the treetops, which shows a rare version of New York. Barrett-Smith recalls a recent project that brought him about 75 feet high in the bucket truck above the canopy, with a view of all of midtown that one almost never sees, unless from a hotel or apartment window. Below, the city hummed along. “You get a different perspective,” he says.