Experts Advise Residents To Take Care With Trees And Who They Hire To Help

As residents venture outside this weekend to deal with the damage in their yards, experts advise caution with damaged trees and strangers offering their services to help.

Craig Foss, a community forestry coordinator with the Idaho Department of Lands, and Karen Hinson, Coeur d’Alene’s urban forester, offered these tips to tree owners:

If a tree limb rests on a power line, don’t mess with it. Hire a licensed tree service or contact the utility.

Make sure who you hire is insured. “If they’re not adequately insured and something goes wrong, you could be left with a pretty bad situation,” Foss said.

If you do your own pruning, wait until the weather warms slightly. Pruning frozen branches can damage them, Hinson said.

Prune properly. A bad pruning job can cause more problems in the future. County extension services and the city parks departments carry free pamphlets on how to prune trees.

Be gentle with ice covered trees. Grab the end and lightly shake it, or take a stick and lightly tap it to remove the ice.

If you’re tempted to collect firewood from the piles of branches around town, be sure to ask the property owner first.

Take unwanted wood debris to the county transfer station on Ramsey Road just south of Kathleen Avenue.

, DataTimes