Melbourne has lost almost 2000 hectares of tree cover in the past five years as suburban backyards are cleared for new housing.

Members of the Upfield Urban Forest group: Anna Sinn, Greta and Esme Holroyd, Tamar Hopkins and Gerard Morel. They are photographed in the Urban Forest near Brunswick station. Credit:Chris Hopkins

The amount of urban forest that was removed between 2014 and 2018 is roughly equal in size to Reservoir, Melbourne’s largest suburb by area.

The eastern suburbs, long celebrated for their leafiness, experienced the greatest loss of greenery in that time, accounting for more than two-thirds of Melbourne's total tree canopy loss, researchers at RMIT University found.

By contrast, the western suburbs have enjoyed a small recent recovery in green growth, although this has been from a much lower base and has mostly occurred on public land.