Bringing down the conifers

The tree surgeon gets started

Today was a landmark for my garden. Or more precisely, today a landmark was removed from my garden.

Four conifers, up to about 50 feet high, were taken down. The tree surgeon we hired from Poole arrived with his team and by mid-afternoon the garden was flooded with daylight, released from behind a canopy of dense, dark foliage.

The jackdaws and pigeons won't be happy to have their roosts removed, but the trees were keeping the garden in shade and were annoying us and the neighbours. Their absence will be enjoyed.

Tips when hiring a tree surgeon

I've learned a few things from the tree-felling experience, never having employed a tree surgeon before.

First, I'd recommend using someone local. Our team came from Poole and in hindsight, that was too far. While commuting for an hour or more used to be an acceptable part of my day years ago, it was too much for these guys. They arrived on the late side and the team were itching to go before the job was entirely complete.

Second, be clear about how the waste wood will be dealt with. When he came to view the garden and quote the owner of the business said he would take away all the wood and chippings. But when it came to it, partly because of the distance, this was not going to be easy. His van was filled with chippings, but there was still a lot of waste on the ground.

I could have insisted that he took it, as part of his verbal agreement, but I decided to let it stay. I know people with woodburners who would value the logs and the chippings make a good mulch for the garden.

The process of taking down the trees didn't quite work out as planned. The owner assured me his team would climb up and lower the logs down, so as not to damage what was on the ground. Nothing, he said, would go into the neighbour's garden. The trees were on the boundary.

But his team has different ideas. Part of the job was to replace the garden fence, so they trashed the old fence and dropped a lot of logs into the neighbour's garden. Fortunately, they were only too happy to see the trees come down. They also destroyed our rose arch which, admittedly, was flimsy but it would have lasted another year or so. I took something off their bill for that.

All in all, they got the job done for a reasonable price, but if my garden had been smarter they would either have taken more care, or have seen their bill slashed further.