Sunday, May 17, 2009

Dead Tree Removal

When we purchased 'The Gear' all the trees and shrubs had been woefully neglected for many years. The yard was littered with broken branches ranging in size from twigs to branches the diameter of your arm. The last 4 years has resulted in many days of trimming dead or damaged branches from all the trees in the yard.

We also have many ash trees. If you live in the Midwest you probably know about the emerald ash borer that is killing ash trees. They believe the emerald ash borer entered this country embedded in a wooden pallet from China. Here in North America the emerald ash borer does not have any natural enemies and is free to multiple and kill ash trees in the Midwest.

You'll know if you have an emerald ash borer problem if you notice D shaped tiny holes in the tree trunk. Another sign is sections of dead branch at the end of a healthy branch. Sometimes you will also notice new growth coming out of large branches or on the trunk.If you have ash trees you can hire someone to do injections or you can treat your trees with Advanced Bayer Tree and Shrub Insect Control. We have had fairly good results with this treatment but several of our trees were too far gone and have died. So it was time to call in the pros to cut down the dead trees.

The emerald ash borer problem is so urgent that they are collecting ash seed just in case all the ash trees are killed or damaged because of infestation. I know there was a homeowner, several years ago that had very old and very healthy ash trees on his property near Detroit. Authorities wanted to come in and cut all his trees down. I know he went to court but I am not sure what the out come was. This was several years ago before the Advanced Bayer treatment was available.

Here's a photo of the little ugly bugger.Minnesota just issued a statement on May 14th indicating that Emerald Ash Borer was detected in the St Paul area. I would suggest that if you live in Minnesota that you start using Advanced Bayer now before you see any damage. If you start now, your tree will be fully inoculated and hopefully kill the larvae before it can do any damage.

We decided to use Precision Tree Care to cut down 1 dead elm (thank you Dutch Elm disease), 1 very large half dead silver maple that was precariously close to power lines and the house, 1 large dead ash tree, and trim a black walnut limb that was hanging over the sun room and heading for the chimney. We decided to have the tree service just cut down the trees and we would cut the wood up to fireplace size and clean up the yard ourselves. We will save the elm and maple for the fireplaces and the rest of the wood will burned in the fire pit as soon as weather permits to keep any emerald ash borers from leaving the yard and infecting more trees.
The tree service was asked to take care and not step on my hostas which were of course right in the way. I can report that not one hosta leaf was damaged. I was very happy with their work and will be calling them back later in the fall to cut down an extremely large semi dead ash tree and to trim several branches close to the power lines so that the utility company doesn't come out and hack and whack my healthy, very large, and perfect shaped ash tree.

One of the reasons you hire professionals such as Precision Tree Care is because they have the knowledge, experience, and tools to do the job correctly. As a journeyman myself, I have done my fair share of rigging but I was really impressed with how they rigged large tree limbs so that they could safely bring them to the ground without hitting the house, the hostas, or the rigger himself.

If you live in Michigan in the Flint area, or the cities of Fenton, Grand Blanc, or Holly I strongly recommend Precision Tree Care for your tree trimming or removal.

2 comments:

  1. We lost 4 ash trees on our property in Clinton Township this past year. Very sad - those trees shaded and beautified the yard, kept the grass from burning, kept me from having to water the lawn and kept the temperature in the house cool. Don't know what it will be like this summer. Will have to ask the renter.

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  2. I love this blog!! The flash up the top is awesome!! Tree Service

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