If your yard is looking a little bare, there's a City of Toronto program that will give you a free tree to plant on your private property, an opportunity to quite literally 'spruce' the place up.

The City of Toronto's ongoing Community Canopy Program promotes the growth of tree canopies across the 416 and intends to cover 40 per cent of the city with tree canopy by 2050. Tree cover offers many benefits, including a reduction in energy requirements for homes, improved air quality and even improved property values.

Toronto hopes to achieve this ambitious tree canopy target through its program providing residents with free trees and guidance on how to plant trees on their private property to maximize all the aforementioned benefits.

To mark Earth Day this week, the City has partnered up with the Arbor Day Foundation to bring Toronto residents free trees to plant on their private property as part of the Community Canopy Program.

Local property owners can get a free one-gallon tree (standing roughly 2-4 feet tall) through the program, which can be reserved in less than ten minutes using an online portal.

City of Toronto

The City of Toronto/Arbor Day Foundation portal explains the program is an investment "in tree planting and stewardship on private land to help enhance and expand our urban forest, and to improve the health of the environment."

"With some of the greatest potential on private land, everyone's help is needed to reach our 40 per cent canopy cover target."

Toronto is the first Canadian municipality to offer such a program.