Tell the contractor about the tree

If a tree or limb is touching an overhead electric line, or a line is down, that is a utility emergency rather than tree work. Treat any downed line as live, keep well back, keep other people back, and contact the utility. No tree service should be working near an energized line.

What to include in your message

1. The address. Whether the property sits on an open rise, down in a river bottom, on a wooded slope or in an established neighborhood says a great deal about the ground before anyone visits.
2. What you want done, or what is worrying you. A tree down, a limb over the roof, a crown that came back thin, a stump left from last year, a fencerow closing in. If you are not sure what the tree needs, just describe what you are seeing.
3. What stands underneath it. This changes the job more than anything else. House, garage, shed, fence, deck, pool, driveway, power drop to the building, septic field, well. So does whether there is room to drop a section or whether the tree has to come apart in pieces.
4. How long it has been going on. A limb lost in a storm last week, a lean that appeared after a wet spell, and a crown that has thinned a little each year for three years point to three different problems.
5. Access. Gate widths, a narrow or steep drive, a bridge or cattle guard, soft ground, and anything a truck or a grinder would have to get past.
6. Any deadline, and whether a homeowners association or the city has already been involved.

Photographs that help most

Take one wide shot from far enough back to show the whole tree together with whatever is near it, so the height and the reach are obvious. Then get in close on the bottom few feet of the trunk and the ground around it, because that is where the most consequential problems live: mushrooms or a hard shelf-like growth, a vertical crack, bark falling away, or a trunk flare that has vanished under soil or mulch.

If there is a lean, photograph it from two directions at right angles, since a tree that looks alarming from one side often looks upright from another. Include the ground on the uphill side of the trunk if you can, because lifted soil or a crack opening in the turf is the difference between a tree that has always grown at an angle and one that has started to move. If a limb is hung up in the crown, get a picture of it from a safe distance and then stay out from under it.

What happens next

A contractor working the Springfield area will reply to arrange a look at the tree. On site they will check the trunk and the buttress roots for decay, sound the trunk for hollows, work out how much of the crown is still live, see how equipment gets in and where debris can be stacked, and identify what is beneath the tree and what the drop zone allows.

Scope and cost follow that inspection; they cannot honestly come first. An image will show you a crown and a lean, yet it hides the two things that decide the job, namely how much solid wood remains inside the trunk and how well the ground is holding the roots. Quoting blind is therefore guesswork. Nothing obliges you to accept the proposal when it arrives.

One timing note worth knowing in advance: oaks are best pruned in the dormant season, because fresh wounds cut during the warm months can be found by sap-feeding beetles carrying oak wilt from one tree to another. If the work is on an oak and the limb is not an immediate hazard, waiting for cold weather is usually the better call, and a contractor should raise that with you.

Request a site visit

Send the address, what the tree is doing, and what stands underneath it, and a contractor will follow up.