Ogden gets weather that finds the weak points in a tree. Canyon wind, and heavy wet snow that loads a canopy with more weight than it was ever built to hold, are the two…
Ogden gets weather that finds the weak points in a tree. Canyon wind, and heavy wet snow that loads a canopy with more weight than it was ever built to hold, are the two events behind most of the calls. Plenty of Weber County properties are old enough to have full-size trees standing close to the house, so when something lets go, it generally lets go over something. The morning after, resist the urge to start cleaning up. Walk the yard first, from a distance, and look up before you look down. The mess on the lawn has already finished happening. What is still overhead has not.
Do a slow circuit of each tree from far enough back to take in the whole crown. You are looking for limbs that broke but did not fall and are hung up in the branches, fresh tears where a limb pulled away from the trunk, a split at a fork, a lean that is new, and soil heaved or cracked on one side of the base. Take photos. Note what is under each problem: a car, a walkway, the room where somebody sleeps. That list, in that order of priority, is what a crew needs to hear from you when you call.
Priority after a storm is simple to state and easy to get backward. Anything dead, broken, or hanging above a place where people or property sit is the urgent item. A branch caught in the canopy is held there by friction and geometry, and both of those change with the next gust of wind. Everything already on the ground can wait for a normal appointment, because the worst it will do is look bad for a while. When you call, lead with the overhead hazards and where they are, and let cleanup be the second half of the conversation.
Storm-damaged wood also behaves differently from a routine cut, which is a large part of why this is not homeowner work. Bent and pinned limbs hold stored tension and move unpredictably the moment they are released. A partially torn limb may be attached by a strip of bark and nothing else. A hung-up piece can shift as soon as it is touched. Crews deal with this by taking the load on ropes before making a cut, and by working from a position that is not underneath the thing they are cutting. That is training and equipment, not nerve.
Power lines come first. If any part of a tree is contacting a line, or close to one, stay away from it and treat the ground around it as unsafe. Line clearance is generally the utility's responsibility, and the service drop running from the pole to your house is not a homeowner project under any circumstances. Report it and let the utility do their part before any tree crew starts work in that area. If a line is down, keep people and pets well back and call it in immediately. Nothing on a cleanup schedule is worth improvising around energized conductors.
The other two things to leave alone are ladders and anything overhead. Most of the serious injuries in storm cleanup come from running a saw off a ladder, or from standing under a limb that turned out to be the one holding everything else in place. Wood already on the ground is reasonable to handle if you are comfortable with a saw and take your time. Anything above your shoulders, anything under tension, anything near a structure or a line is a specialist job. A limb weighs far more than it looks and gives no warning.
Call the utility, not a tree crew, and keep everyone away from the tree and the ground beneath it. Clearance around energized lines is generally the utility's responsibility, and the service drop to a house is never something a homeowner or a general crew should be working near. Once the utility has done its part, a tree company can address whatever is left in the tree. Do not let anyone talk you into a shortcut on this one.
Sometimes, and the first step is patience rather than a saw. Some trees recover their form once the load melts off, particularly younger, more flexible ones. Others hold the bend, and some have already split at a fork under the weight without it being obvious from the ground. Give it a few warm days, then have someone look at the base and the union points. Cutting on a bent tree while it is still loaded is how people get hurt.
Often yes, depending on how much of the crown went with it and what the wound looks like where the limb pulled away. A clean loss on one side can usually be cleaned up and lived with. A tear that ran down into the trunk, or a split that opened up a fork, is a different assessment entirely. Have someone look at the wound and the tree's overall structure before deciding. That is a call worth making with information, not adrenaline.
Some trees do have to come down. How that goes is decided by access, by what sits underneath the tree, and by whether it can be dropped whole or has to be taken apart in pieces from the top down.
Learn more →Real pruning takes specific limbs off at the branch collar for a specific reason: clearance, deadwood, a rubbing branch. It does not mean shortening everything on the tree, and we match you with crews that know the difference.
Learn more →Wind and heavy wet snow leave limbs hanging over driveways, cars and doorways. That is the real urgency. You get crews who triage the hazard over your head first and worry about tidy cleanup second.
Learn more →Grinding is a separate operation from removal, with its own machine and its own gate-width problem. It also makes a startling volume of chips, so you should decide up front how deep it goes and where those chips end up.
Learn more →A lean, a split fork, mushrooms at the base, a strip of bark gone: the tree is telling you something. An assessment reads it honestly, and often the honest answer is that the tree is fine and should be left alone.
Learn more →Get the tree looked at by someone who will tell you to leave it alone.
Call 801-823-6018Describe the tree, what is under it, and what changed. We will take it from there.