Coming up on almost 5 decades of being a tree guy, the most often asked question to me is, “When is my tree going to croak/fall on my house?”
My response is usually:
A. It will probably outlive me at the rate I’m going.
B. Don’t park your Porsche under it.
C. I can’t believe it is still standing.
D. It isn’t if, it’s when.
In reality, how the hell do I know? A few years back, there was a tree climbing competition in Lithia Park. The master’s challenge tree was a huge beautiful Red oak. That tree had a hundred of the best arborists crawling all over the damn thing for the weekend and shortly after the event, it puked and completely toppled over!
Now who could have seen that coming? None of us had any red flags, and we are the “professionals” There are certain guidelines, and a format for assessing the hazard value of a tree. It is the unseen factors that come back to bite you in the ass. Over my years as an arborist, I have called about a dozen or so that puked within days or even hours of them giving me a hinky feeling. I guess my crystal ball was firing on all 8 cylinders that day, I just don’t know. It is almost like some people expect me to provide the day. date and time of said pukage! That said, IF I could provide that information, I would probably be sitting on a white sand beach somewhere, beer in hand, happily rich and retired.
One thing is certain, I will NEVER tell you to remove your beloved tree unless I see enough red flags to warrant removal;
I’ve seen plenty of trees recommended for removal from some tree guy that was just plain bullshit. I have also seen guys working on a tree that by all rights should have killed the arborist working aloft. We Choose to live amongst trees, and sometimes that doesn’t turn out so well. If we were to remove any tree that COULD puke at any time, we would be living on the moon. I take no pride in killing any tree but enjoy the mechanics of safely rigging the poor thing down without damaging the surrounding items like houses, Porsches and such. You may have a crystal ball of sorts yourself and if it indicates future doom, follow your gut and call a professional… Beware of the unscrupulous There are sadly self proclaimed tree companies that feed on unfounded fear as removals can be quite spendy, and they know if they put the hit on your tree, they stand to make a wad of money, GET A SECOND OPINION OR THREE! Before removing any tree consider replacement. This is most important! and to do that, you must, as always,
Plant high and often…
