Tree Removal in Santa Rosa, CA

Tree Removal in Santa Rosa usually starts with a simple question: is the tree on a flat, fenced lot in a 1960s subdivision, or on a sloped parcel in the hills where oaks, bays and madrones grew long before the house did? The two jobs have little in common. Down on the valley floor, the work tends to be a liquidambar, a Modesto ash or a pine that has outgrown a narrow side yard and now leans over a garage. Up in Fountaingrove, Skyhawk or the roads off Calistoga Road, the trees are often native, often big, and sometimes still recovering from fire. We plan each removal around the lot it sits on.

Fire left a lot of trees in limbo

The Tubbs Fire in October 2017 destroyed about five percent of the homes in the city, with Coffey Park and Fountaingrove among the hardest hit. Three years later the Glass Fire pushed in from Napa County; Cal Fire counted 338 destroyed homes in Sonoma County, and the city's own damage map showed about 30 destroyed buildings inside Santa Rosa limits, with Skyhawk among the neighborhoods that burned. Many of the oaks that survived those fires looked fine for a season or two and then declined. Scorched bark at the root flare, cracks low on the trunk and dieback that starts at the top are the signs we look for when an owner asks whether a fire-touched tree can stay.

Ask about permits before anything is cut

Santa Rosa's tree chapter (City Code Chapter 17-24) requires a city permit before anyone alters, removes or relocates a heritage, protected or street tree. Ordinary trees on an already developed single-family lot, hazard trees and utility clearance work fall under the exemptions, but the categories are worth checking before a saw comes out. Penalties are not small: unpermitted removal of a covered tree is a misdemeanor, and the code allows the city to bar development and building permits on the property for two years. When a job looks like it touches a heritage or street tree, we flag it on the estimate so you can confirm with the city first.

Frontage trees are the owner's job

Under City Code Section 13-32.010, the property owner, not the city, is responsible for trees and hedges along the frontage. Branches must clear the sidewalk by at least 8 feet and the roadway by at least 13 feet. That rule is behind a fair number of the calls we get: a homeowner receives a notice about a low limb over the street, and the tree turns out to be in worse shape than anyone thought.

Weather that shapes the work

Santa Rosa averages a little over 32 inches of rain a year, nearly all of it between fall and spring, and summers are hot and dry. The city hit 115 degrees on September 6, 2022, its record high. Long dry spells stress shallow-rooted trees, and the first heavy winter storms then load wet, top-heavy canopies just as soils soften. Late fall is when we see the most split trunks and uprooted pines. If a tree has started to lift its root plate after a wet week, call (707) 385-5238 and keep cars out of the fall zone.

What a removal here involves

• A walk-through of the tree, the house, fences, the street and any overhead lines
• A check for permit issues: heritage, protected or street tree status
• Sectional dismantling where there is no room to drop the tree whole
• Chipping on site and hauling of wood, or wood left in rounds if you want firewood
• Stump grinding as a separate line item, so you can decide later

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