Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Black Walnut Pruning

I had actually hoped to remove the black walnut tree. The leaves and fruit are a huge mess and dye everything black as they decompose. The tree branches were so dense that the rain garden next to the driveway was in deep shade all day long. I think all the deciduous plants we'd planted there have died from lack of sun. The ferns have survived mostly.

The huge tree is crammed between the houses and last winter it dropped branches on our roof. They were not super large, but it did have me worried about the possible damage to the house should it drop one of the bigger branches.

However, in the last few years, Portland passed a law that prevents homeowners from removing trees on their private property if the trunk is more than 20" wide. The black walnut is 30" wide.

It is possible I could have found an arborist that would take our side about the danger to the structures and write a letter for us to submit to the city to get permission, but every attempt would cost hundreds of dollars, so we just had the stupid tree pruned back as much as possible. (They also have laws about how much you can prune trees. LOL)

I didn't think to take before photos yesterday before the tree guys came to do the pruning, but I did find a couple of decent shots from last month. I took the comparison shots this morning.
I'm pretty sure the guy crawling around in the branches was part monkey.
Same shot, zoomed out.
The company, should anyone local wish to use them, was Harrity Tree Specialists. They did a nice job working around the structures and they didn't do any major damage to the stuff under the tree as they dropped branches to the ground. (Later amendment. I think they dropped a branch on the fence. The gate will no longer close and there's a large gap between the boards now. Sigh.)

The rain garden is finally getting some sun again. We shall see next spring if the bleeding heart has died; I hope not.

Now, assuming the weather cooperates, Jeff and Aaron will spend a couple of days spreading the pile of mulch they left in our driveway, fixing the broken fence post and digging in soil amendments in that planting bed, then we'll be able to plant the two pawpaw trees and all the rest of the hosta.

7 comments:

  1. All parts of a black walnut ( leaves, wood, bark) contain jugalone so be careful to use the mulch only around resistant plants.

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    1. Yes we know, thanks. Actually most of the plants we've planted recently are resistant. The columbine isn't, so we'll be careful to keep the mulch away from them.

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  2. They did a nice job, but it's too bad you couldn't have it removed, since that was your desire.

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    1. Thanks. My mood about the tree has much improved now that there is some sun on that side of the house.

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  3. Black walnut can also poison dogs.

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    1. Luckily, our dogs haven't had any interest in the black walnut tree, other than the squirrels hanging out in it.

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  4. A gardener in a facebook group was talking about their dog getting poisoned. And I found this article when I just now did a search.

    https://pethelpful.com/dogs/Warning-to-Fellow-Dog-Owners

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