Summer Time “Sudden Limb Drop” American Elm Tree – Livonia, MI
Tree Removal
In the June of 2012, this elm tree had a large branch drop on a local school. Luckily school was out for the summer and nobody was around when it happened. The limb did not completely detach from the tree, it came to rest on the roof and hung up in another limb below it. This saved the building from any major damage.
When I first arrived on the scene, I was asked why such a big limb would break on a perfectly calm day? My answer is known to arborists as “sudden limb drop”. This usually occurs on hot summer days in periods of drought, just like the conditions we saw in June. The tree is losing large amounts of water through transpiration, which is like sweating for trees. Sudden limb drop occurs when a limb dries out quickly, becomes brittle, and then can no longer support itself.
The next issue was whether or not to remove the whole tree. While it looked healthy from the street, there was actually a large dead section in back over the school. Upon inspection it was obvious the tree had contracted Dutch Elm Disease. It was then we decided the tree must come down. The tree was removed over the course of 7 hours with the assistance of a 28-ton crane. We hauled away 15 yards of wood chips from brush chipping and over 30,000 lbs of logs. When we were done it was like the tree was never there.
Why hire us?
- Precision – Much of the tree was over the school, stretching out over the roof 40 feet or more. There was also utility lines and a sidewalk to avoid. With the help of the crane there wasn’t even a dent in the lawn.
- Efficiency – The tree was taken down, hauled away and the stump ground in 7 hours. A less equipped service would have struggled with a tree of this size, taking extra days to handle the large logs and grind the stump.
- Economical – Large hazardous trees are often underbid by ill-equipped and inexperienced services, while larger companies can overbid due to difficulty and taking too long on the job. We usually aren’t the highest or the lowest, we charge a fair price for quality work.
The time lapse video below shows the removal process from, 7 hours to 7 minutes.