Trying to not kill a tree

[rslaback]

Last summer I bought another residential property in my subdivision which already had a 40 x 28 shop on it. When the shop was built it appears that the excavator graded it via bulldozer and just pushed the material to about 6 feet past the building site.

The rest of the lot has significant mole or gopher damage to the point that you can't really even drive on it. This summer my wife and I are toying with doing a prairie restoration to both level out the rest of the lot and also to replace weeds with something for the local bee population to snack on.

In the middle of the 2' deep, 50' wide and 20' long pile of topsoil left by the original excavator when building the shop a 40' Aspen tree has grown. I'd like to level some of that mess out but want to make sure as to not kill off the tree in the process. Anyone have any idea how much of the berm I can remove without killing off the tree?

Dirt pile is in blue. Tree is in red.

 

[Cardboard Man]

The rule of thumb is use the canopy as a guide. Pretend that the roots below reach as far beneath the soil as the branches reach in the air. Stay out of this root zone and you should be ok.

 

[sberry]

Bulldozer it over. Level it out so you can work there vs fart with it and plant something new vs the expense of keeping one pain of a tree that is probably not where you would plant one. Aspen grow fast and are short lived.

 

[Kaizen]

Get rid of it and plant some linden trees. More pollen on a mature linden for bees then several acres of dandelions


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[KEH]

Not going to give advice on what kind of tree to plant since I'm in a different climate zone, but I agree with getting rid of existing vegetation and starting over. Be aware that buried tree trunks and roots will eventually decay in the ground and the ground will sink where they were buried, leaving holes in the surface. You could have the tree parts chipped up, but I found that that was expensive and tried to put limbs, etc in gullies, but that was not too satisfactory. The best solution is to burn the debris but local laws may prevent that. Maybe you could use firewood.

KEH

 

[sberry]

Fwiw, I was watching Old House and they had some.debate about some really nice trees. They were beauties but.the landscaper said,, I understand they are great but you are building your dream house, they are in the way now, they will be in the way and it won't get any better, only thing is the cost will go up to remove them.

 

[SGKent]

unless you can incorporate that berm for the canopy width into your landscape plans the tree comes down. You won't be able to remove that many feet of soil without damaging roots. Roots grow in a zone where there is oxygen. That is why in heavy soils or wet soils roots stay near the surface. Having one of those huge machines that picks up a tree with its rootball would be way to expensive do a tree like that.

 

[Whitworth]

Aspens are spindly and ugly. They have tap roots and spread via suckers, can be difficult to kill and remove when necessary. Not ornamental and not practical in the sense of being a sound or visual barrier.

 

[Higgins]

We recently moved to TN and would KILL to find someone who could relocate some 5-6" pine trees!!! No good, as they dont do that down here. Found a company in Nashville, or Knoxville but that 2 hrs away and they wont come out to Putnam Co. Even when I was willing to pay the travel time.

So 2 of the pines are gone, the others will be gone soon.Just happy i'm able to push them over with the Bobcat . But it really hurts everytime I do it!!

 

[Radix2]

We recently moved to TN and would KILL to find someone who could relocate some 5-6" pine trees!!! No good, as they dont do that down here. Found a company in Nashville, or Knoxville but that 2 hrs away and they wont come out to Putnam Co. Even when I was willing to pay the travel time.

So 2 of the pines are gone, the others will be gone soon.Just happy i'm able to push them over with the Bobcat . But it really hurts everytime I do it!!

Pines don't have deep roots, why don't you just dig them up with the bobcat and move them. 5-6 in pines shouldn't be very big or heavy yet, stake straight until they re-establish.

 

[58Yeoman]

Our pines in central Illinois are dying off from some kind of disease. I've lost 5 pines, a blue spruce and one very large pine, about 45' tall.