Tree Service in Fisher’s Creek, WA

That layout makes for a good neighborhood to live in. It also means calls from this side of SE 164th usually start with a question about ownership rather than about a tree.

That Green Strip Behind the Fence Is a Stormwater Facility

The ground behind a lot of these back fences is neither woodlot nor spare land. It is working infrastructure that has to keep moving water, which puts what grows there, and what may be cut there, in somebody else’s hands — the city on a public facility, a management company on a private tract.

The consequence is blunt. If the tree leaning at your roof stands on the far side of that line, hiring anybody to cut it is not an option you have, and a contractor who agrees anyway hands you a problem you will own long after he is paid. We work out whose it is before quoting, and where it is a real hazard we put what we see in writing so you have something to pass on.

Ash Is the Tree to Keep an Eye On Out Here

Oregon ash is the native that tolerates ground sitting saturated for half the year, so it shows up all through these low strips alongside cottonwood, willow and volunteer alder. Ash has always shed limbs, and dead ash goes brittle in a hurry, which turns a neglected one into an awkward removal.

There is also a borer that has been working through ash on the Oregon side of the river, and nobody can tell you from a driveway whether your tree has it. Looking is still worth doing. Dieback starting in the upper crown, shoots pushing out of the trunk down low, and woodpeckers working the bark hard is the combination to have someone put eyes on.

• Leaning ash, cottonwood and alder taken off the wet edge of a yard
• Hazard pruning where a crown has grown out over a fence, shed or path
• Written risk assessments when a city desk, an insurer or a board wants it on paper
• Permit paperwork for parcels touched by a critical-area overlay
• Blackberry, brush and volunteer alder cleared off the back of a lot, stopping at the line

The Business Park Side of the Neighborhood

The commercial edge around Columbia Tech Center is a different animal to a back yard. Those trees live in small cutouts ringed by asphalt, get pruned to keep sight lines clear at driveway approaches, and their clearance over stalls and delivery lanes is usually a lease obligation rather than a preference. The tree is rarely the hard part.

The lot being full between eight and six is. We run that work early, late or on a weekend, cone off only what we are standing under, and send whoever signs the invoice something in writing they can file.