On my smallish lot, I have a HUGE old maple tree that is causing some friction between myself and my neighbors. This tree has got to be over 200 years old with a trunk nearly four and a half meters in circumference. It’s probably twenty meters tall and at least as wide. This time of the year it drops bushels of those mono-winged seeds referred to as ‘helicopters’. In the autumn it will drop even more leaves all over everything. My neighbor to the south complains about the tree dropping sticks and small branches on his yard with the largest he’s shown me being about one centimeter in diameter. Annoying but not dangerously large he agrees. My northerly neighbor (somewhat playfully) complains about the mess in her yard from all the debris and says that her compost pile is becoming overly large.
I love having this tree and it’s one of the reason I bought this property three years ago. It’s beautiful and healthy and shades half my yard and most of my house very nicely. The tree has been inspected and pruned by a certified arboriculturalist and he claims this tree will almost certainly outlive me. With that being said, even I get sick of the mess it makes. I’m considering offering my neighbors a deal. If their willing to spit the roughly $1,000 to $1,200 removal cost three ways with me, not including stump grinding, then the tree can be gone in a week. Hardly a perfect solution but an effective one.
I’ve already checked with the city. As the tree poses no danger to life and property then legally there is no issue. Morally, I’m not so sure. This tree can easily fill your home’s rain gutters every day for two weeks, twice a year. If your neighbor caused these problems for you then what would you expect them to do about it? Would you say my offer of spitting the removal cost is fair and reasonable?
Is that really what you want to do? Get rid of the tree that was one of the reasons you bought the place? Lots of people have trees on their property and the leaves from some of those trees regularly end up on other peoples property.
If you feel some obligation to do something, offer to help them clean up when the leaves and helicopters fall. I think you’d really regret cutting it down. There goes all your shade, some privacy, birds chirping…
My neighbors have big old maple trees. I just clean out my gutters a couple of times a year. I’ve never heard of anyone getting all that worked up about leaves or seeds blowing around. It is just part of life in the burbs YMMV. What I would do is pick up the sticks from your southern neighbors lawn after a storm, which is when the tree drops branches. Of course get his permission to go into his/her yard to do so. I’m not sure I would offer to split the cost of tree removal since then you are admitting the tree is a problem and your neighbors may decide it is unreasonable for them to have to pay to get rid of it. If one of them approached you about taking it down, it would make sense to offer to split the cost.
Finally, I hate to see an old tree get cut down, I like trees.
Twice I year I think about getting rid of the tree when it decides to leave it’s detritus over a ten acre area. The rest of the time I really do like having it right outside my bedroom window. I probably would regret losing it. I guess I’m hoping that I can offer the deal, they’ll reject it and I can say “Fair enough, your problem now.” I also know that’s the kind of deal that could turn around and bite me in the arse.
There’s a tree on your smallish lot that’s almost as tall as a seven story building? That’s a pretty fucking huge tree, in context.
I don’t know what else to say. It sounds like you’d really hate it if you cut it down, but it also seems like a big pain in the ass for your neighbors. Maybe you could keep the tree but offer to find some way to help your neighbors deal with the mess when the tree sheds, at least partly at your expense.
I also have a huge old maple tree, but mine’s on my tree lawn (or whatever you call that strip between the street and the sidewalk. So the tree is actually on the city’s property, and every few years they stop by to prune it. It’s not unusual for it to drop twigs and branches, especially when there’s a lot of wind. Sometimes things are blown into a neighbor’s yard. I can’t imagine any sane person making an issue of this.
There is one person who does make an issue of such things, but he’s two doors down. He complains when some of the leaves he has to rake in the fall are from other people’s trees, or when someone’s dog steps on his lawn.
If you don’t want to remove the tree, then don’t. You would seriously regret it.
Offer to split with them the cost of a lawn service guy who can come in and leaf-blow/mulch the tree’s leavings into oblivion. Shouldn’t cost much to get someone to do this during the times of the year that the tree is a real pain in the ass.
Where I live, your other neighbours would be outraged to know you’re even considering cutting down what sounds to be a magnificent specimen because a few don’t like the dropping. Sounds like the tree has been there over a hundred years, certainly longer than the houses.
That means the houses were build within range of the tree, so that’d be the builders bad. But really, if the tree was there when they bought their houses they have no complaint with you. Period.
Were I wanting to placate the neighbours, I’d sooner offer to pay to have their yards raked 4 times a year than cut down my tree. Your third of the $1200 should cover a lot of years. In my opinion what’s in the eaves-trough is for them to deal with (see above paragraph), I wouldn’t want to actually mess with anyone’s house.
My city is called ‘The Forest City’ because it is so treed. And the homeowners, literally for blocks around, will rag city hall, something fierce, if one of the grand old trees has to come down. So much so, that the city arbourist has ordered the tree cutters to leave, by the stump, for several days, the damaged/rotted portions, on display, for all to see why the tree was taken down, decreasing the calls to city hall.
Also, where I live, no chance you could get such a tree taken down for less than 2500$.
Please don’t cut down that tree! Introduce the idea to neighbors that what rains down does not have to be raked up into a pile like most people do. Simply chopping it up with the mower when the lawn needs cutting will not only make getting rid of the debris an easy task but will lend long term benefits to the lawn. The same thing can be done in the fall, it may seem way too thick to do but it’s amazing how quickly the leaves chop up and disappear. This litter is like gold to the soil for both lawns and gardens.
As far as feeling obligated to help clean neighboring gutters, I say hell no. The neighbors can move if they choose to, that’s their problem. Or you can supply them with some free beer if you feel generous. (Who cares about a few helicopters when free beer is involved?)
Just be a good neighbor in other ways. Mature trees make any neighborhood so much more livable and inviting, especially in the summer. And as another poster mentioned, if the tree is that old then they should have taken that into account before they bought their house.
My neighbor has a huge Oak that causes me similar problems but it also blocks the southwest sun saving me big bucks in AC costs during the summer.
You would regret cutting it down just to save them a little work.
We have one of those trees too. We pick up the sticks that fall on the neighbor’s lawn, but not the helicopters – those are easy to deal with by mowing.
The neighbor installed those new gutters that have covers, and I’m pretty sure they did it because of the detritus from our tree – they have no trees on that side of the property. Maybe that’s your answer – covered rain gutters. If your neighbor sees you doing it, maybe he’ll do it too. It’s probably cheaper than removing the tree.
Props for giving consideration to your neighbors, but I am betting if you posed the idea of tree removal to them they would not be in favor of it. Another vote for leaving the tree.
Just commiserate with the neighbors. Tell them that, yeah, it’s a hassle for a couple weeks out of the year, but the tree is worth it for how it looks. Remember that they get to enjoy it during the year as well, it’s not like only you are able to look at it.
Finally, are you even allowed to cut it down? Where I live, Ann Arbor, MI, you’d have to get a permit to cut down a landmark tree (one that large), and to get that, you’d have to show a reason. Leaves and little twigs wouldn’t cut it.
As to the actual questions you asked, if you don’t really want to cut the tree down, ask for them to pay the whole cost. If you do, and you asked me to split the cost, I’d say hell no, because I wouldn’t want it cut down. I’d be more willing to pay for someone to rake your yard once a year, so it wouldn’t be cut down.
Legally you have no obligation to the neighbors for this naturally growing tree. If the tree is healthy and it falls on them or their house, same zero obligation where I am from. But you feel and understand some moral obligation to be helpful. I think it would be fair to explain to the neighbors that you would like to help them out. Always continue to express your love for the beast. This thought only comes into your head because you want to be helpful. So offer to pay half and get the other half from the two next door neighbors equally.
I have a neighbor who sent his neighbor a check for the full amount ($1,700) to get the neighbor to have his tree removed. My friend was concerned that he might be put out of his house during repairs if the tree fell on his roof. It was worth that much to him. Since you are only talking about debris, I say 50/50 is fair enough. Shop this job around as prices are quite variable. Make sure the contractor is licensed and insured. Such work is very dangerous
If this is a silver maple, I would assume that you are already aware of the tendency of it to drop large branches as it ages - very weak wood upon that species, fwiw. Other maples are not so ‘dangerous’ to structures in the long run. Just wanting to make sure that the OP is aware of this factoid In the recent ice storm here, many silvers lost most of their branches due to this. I would not tolerate large overhanging silver maple limbs whatsoever.
Also, a number of places allow neighboring landowners to cut any branches overhanging their property-lines if they choose to do so. I have cut back a neighbor’s limbs, more than once, to ensure more sun upon my veggie garden, but it was mostly just tangles of mulberry & catalpa trees growing against our privacy fence, and neighbor is a total slob about their property anyways. No harm done in my action (basically) - ‘prize’ trees would be different, of course, and OP is having a different situation by far.
OK, general opinion here seems to be that leaves, seeds and not dangerously large sticks and branches from my tree falling onto my neighbor’s yard are not something most reasonable people would consider a significant issue. If my neighbor has a problem with it then it’s just his too bad. If I want to be nice and neighborly then I can support his cleanup efforts with either my time or money but I have no real obligation to do so. Fair enough, lets run with that.
Some specific issues you kind people have brought up.
Not true, see below.
I’m not sure which species the tree is. The neighbor thinks it’s a sugar maple due the the amount of sap that drips off the leaves when the weather is right (freezing nights with warmish days) but I can’t prove anything. This whole issue started when my south neighbor spotted me talking to my tree pruner about lopping a major limb off the tree. That limb is twenty feet long, as thick as my body and right over my bedroom. I don’t care what species the tree is, that limb is coming down before it takes my house with it. He was quite emphatic that taking the tree down entirely would be OK by him. We didn’t discuss sharing cost at all but he did make an offer for the firewood.
Any clue how effective these are? My gutters need replacing in the next year or three anyway so these my be a good investment.
I hate tree murderers !!! (really, I don’t like seeing a tree being cut, a bit like the dog in “Asterix”. And a 200 years old, majestic, tree on top of that !!!)
However, if I had a neighbour with something causing a nuisance, I really wouldn’t like him to ask me to pay to remove the cause of the nuisance.
Maybe you could try to figure out a way to help them dealing with the consequences, but I’m not sure how. Offer to clean up their yard yourself in autumn or something similar, maybe?
Dude if it’s a sugar maple get a tap in that thing and make some syrup! I bet a fifth of sweet sweet maple syrup would calm them down some. I have neighbors on both sides of me that have trees overhanging into my backyard. One is a cherry tree, the other is some ginormous tree of some kind. The ginormous tree is to the south of me, so it makes the garage nice and cool in the summer. The cherry tree I was going to prune back, until I found out I can get a 5 gallon bucket of sour cherries in the spring. I like the idea of pruning it some so there’s not as much offal in the fall.
In the recent ice storm here, many silvers lost most of their branches due to this. I would not tolerate large overhanging silver maple limbs whatsoever.