The latest home improvement project was one that I did not have to pay for, or execute. It involves this Norway maple right next to our driveway (and the neighbor’s driveway – those are their cars in the picture). And have I mentioned that’s where our power lines come over to the house from the street?
You can see the huge split in the trunk in the picture above. What’s harder to tell is that this is fairly far back from the street. However, it’s very much in line with a bunch of other trees the whole length of the street, so I figured I’d better check into the city setbacks. Which led me to the city’s street tree map. Which this tree was on. So I called the city arborist, who came by with his metal detector, found the surveying posts, and determined that it is in fact about 7/8ths on the city’s land. So it’s their responsibility. And they will replant, with a native, and more into the city setback so it’s clear who owns that one. Needless to say, I was pleased.
So the process started on Wednesday. They used a bucket truck to lop off the top, leaving about twenty (maybe thirty?) feet of trunk.
And this is after they came back yesterday. This was amazing – they came back with a back hoe with a claw on it. That held the trunk while one guy chainsawed it down, and the claw then put it into the back of the trunk, and held it while he chain sawed it into small enough pieces to fit on the back of the trunk without poking out over the side. It took 15 minutes. Those guys are amazing. (And yes, the neighbors do in fact own the same Tucson in the same color as me.)
So that has really opened up that part of the yard. They will come back eventually and grind out the stump, though I was warned that might take some time – they put that dead last in the budget for the year. We figure we can put some pots of plants out there for the summer. I’ll keep an eye on the light, and see what we might be able to do next year.
The North Wind and the Sea 