Tree Down!

So, after 20+ years of watching this fir tree grow from a 15 foot baby to a 50 foot giant and watching as the root system spread across the ground, I finally had to call in a tree guy. He showed up and recommended that I let him feather the tree. That entailed having one of his guys climb the tree and remove enough of the branches to allow it to more easily withstand the windy conditions we get up here on the hill several times a winter.

I hoped that the feathering would do the trick but two years later the roots running across the ground were pulling up further above the ground and was getting more nervous about what could potentially happen if we left the tree alone much longer.

I called several tree experts in to take a look and give us a bid on taking it down. All seemed to agree that removing it would be a good idea. Their bids to remove it varied wildly.

This fir tree towers above our home, the hot tub and has spread out to crowd out a beautiful dogwood. So, I was not much concerned with its demise. Leslie, on the other hand, has the philosophy that we should leave everythng alone. After a discussion though she has begun to defer more to my thoughts on this so this time it was easier to convince her the fir needed to be removed.

We got bids from three outfits here in town. The bids varied from $1,000 to $1,700. In this case I wanted the roots crawling across the ground removed and the stump ground so we could plant new grass. Stump ginding adds several hundred

dollars to the price of the job so, in the past, we have left the trunks. In the other cases the trunks were out of the way and didn't make a difference aesthetically. This stump would.

This morning, the crew showed up and made fast work of the tree. It's kind of sad when you think about how long it took for that tree to grow and the beautiy it added to our yard. But, if it had fallen it would have cost far more to repair the house, which is where it most certainly would have landed.

The branches went first as the tree climber ascended to the top. These were hustled off by the crew to a grinder parked out in the driveway. This kind of work doesn't even attract any gawkers around here. So many nasty, dirty cottonwoods have been taken down in the neighborhood as well as other species due to rot and or the danger of falling, that no one pays much attention.

The tree was down and carted away in about an hour leaving only the stump and roots to be grinded up. The chipper and sounds of chain saws ended and the take down team drove off to the next job.

Sometime later in the afternoon, a single guy drove up in his truck towing the stump grinder, a pretty massive device that looked out of some medieval torture chamber.

The goal was to grind out all the roots running along the ground and to grind the main stump down about 18". We'd come along after a few weeks and fill in the holes with new top soil and reseed with a new lawn.

The biggest issue aestetically is the gapping hole the absence of the tree leaves for the neighbors to peek in on us in the hot tub. So we plan to plant a tree or two later on. But these must not be of a species that grows anywhere near the height of that fir. We thought of a couple of dogwoods similar in height to the ones we already have in the yard but ones of differing colors. That'll be a ways off. Maybe in a year or two when the lawn is well established and the stump has settled down. Anyway, the project is done. Happy day!