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Originally Posted by _Matt
I realize you guys are speaking more generally about the canopy, but I don't know how applicable it is to this site. It appears to have been clear-cut at some point in the past, a very unfortunate treatment of the land. I used to help my grandfather clear land at his cattle ranch. We would take down cedar trees and destroy them like weeds. Oaks in the pasture were never touched and sometimes even cleaned up.
The adjacent neighborhoods have many more trees.
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I think there's more trees along the creek simply because it's a good water source for them. And trees tend to grow in neighborhoods more because people pick them out at the plant nursery/garden store because they like them, and then plant them. Another major contributor is fence lines and power lines that act like highways for squirrels, rats and birds where they "plant" stuff after eating it. My neighborhood is totally forested now, but 50 years ago when my family first came here only a year or two after it was built, there was nothing except for the old growth Oaks, Elms and Pecans. All the other tree species were either planted by people or the wildlife along fence lines and power lines. And with the added human activity, a neighborhood is going to have more wildlife from things like food and water dishes people leave our for their pets. In a wide open natural piece of land, you're really only going to have tree species growing there that are indigenous to the region. There was a satellite imagery website that let you see photos of an area going back to the 50s, and there were almost no trees in our neighborhood except for the old growth stuff. It's weird and interesting to see how much humans can affect the natural environment, even within a neighborhood.