We were kept incredibly busy during the recent storms of late last year and early this year providing emergency tree surgery for customers who had suffered storm damage.
Here are a few photos of some of the work we carried out and an explanation of the works.
This Western Red Cedar’s whole rootplate was lifting by about half a foot during the winds after a severe storm. It was incredibly unstable and we expected it to fail at any minute. It was in direct line of falling on 2 lines of fencing, a summer house and potentially even the neighbours house.
So we decided to brace the trunk to another neighbouring (stable) tree and get it down quickly for the customer, who was incredibly worried about it/liability of the damage it would cause.
The customer wasn’t concerned about the shrubs below so we took it down in big sections as the wind was still gusting 40-50mph and we wanted to limit the time in the tree and the risk of being in it if it failed. The tree came down fine with no damage and the rubbish was left to clear up at a later date, the main concern being the potential risk of it causing thousands of pounds worth of damage if it fell. The cutomer was very greatful and appreciative that we turned up sharpish due to his concerns.
Emergency Tree Surgery
This next job, the customer had already had a smaller Conifer fall in his garden as well as a goat Willow which hadn’t caused any damage, we had priced to clear this up, when unfortunately that night he had another large Conifer blow onto the house and he asked us to sort this one out ASAP to get it safe.
We took small sections off this tree very slowly and methodically checking periodically that it wasnt moving, then propping the tree up as the weight was slowly taking off to reduce it sliding down the front of the house and causing further damage.
This tree’s rootplate had also lifted up 2 sections of fence panel and brought down a BT pole.
The whole tree came down perfectly and without any further damage to the house. The only damage the whole tree had caused was luckily just 2 sections of guttering.
The last of the tree was logged up and cleared and we ground the stump out at a later date and levelled the whole area so BT could re-instate the phone lines.
This Willow blew over in the high winds.
The customer wanted to keep the main trunk as a feature/climbing frame for her grandkids and we were happy to oblige and do something different than the normal of just completely clearing the whole tree. She was extremely happy with the result.
This large Oak tree in Crawley blew over a few days after the extremely strong winds over Christmas on a relatively calm day, much to the customers shock. The tree was from the neighbouring property to our customers and we had told our customers before that the tree was in decline and showing signs of severe dieback. Our customers told there neighbours this but they decided to ignore their/our advice and left it. This shows the importance of monitoring trees for signs of disease and decay.
The tree destroyed a beautifully trimmed conifer hedge and also demolished a greenhouse which was crushed under the trunk.
The rootplate shows clear signs of white rot and could easily have been prevented from causing this damage with our free and simple advice that we can offer.
We managed to clear the whole crown first leaving the trunk till last which was logged up and will be sold as firewood this year or next, re-using the whole tree sustainably.
This Macrocarpa suffered a pretty significant failure of one of its main leaders resulting in a demolished summer house and a headache for the customer who then had to deal with the insurance companies.
We cleared the fallen limb for the customer and then at a later date reduced the height of the rest of the tree to reduce the sail area (area that catches the wind) to prevent any future failures.
These old apple trees also sadly succumbed to the high winds, they were part of a previsouly old Orchard and was a real shame to loose them.
We logged all the wood for the customers log burner and burned the branches on site. We also winched out the rootballs so the customer could turf over the area to make it smart again.
This picture shows the finished area left clear for the customer.
The following conifers we turned up to do as an emergency job as the customer was very worried as one had completely fallen over, another was at 45 degress and the rest of them were moving excessively in the still very strong wind.
We actually had to fell a few first of all to make the area safe as they were imminently about to fall on the area we would be working in, before we could tackle the trickier ones and also the bigger ones.
We ended up felling the whole row in the end as they all showed signs of moving excessively at the rootplate and also cleared the trickier partial fallen tree that was going into the neighbours property. The customer was incredibly greatful of our work as he hadn’t slept properly the night before watching as a few of them actually fell (in the high winds) and the others blew excessively towards his neighbours property.
We carried out many jobs during the storms but due to weather and also safety aspects we didn’t get to photograph many, as the weather was too bad for many pictures on a lot of the days and also time was of the essence with many jobs that were dangerous and needed to be done fast and with our full attention.
We even had a strange job of retrieving a trampoline blown into a tree and luckily we deemed this safe enough to take a few pictures haha.
If you are at all concerned about your trees, have suffered please get in touch and need emergency tree surgery, call us now on 01825 791979