Tree Service in Grand Rapids, MI

Good tree service in Grand Rapids starts with knowing what the trees here are up against. The city gets about 75 inches of snow in an average year, much of it lake-effect snow coming off Lake Michigan 25 miles to the west, and wet snow piles weight onto long horizontal limbs that look perfectly sound in October. Summer brings the other half of the problem: thunderstorm lines that cross West Michigan at highway speed. Most of what we do comes down to the same few questions on every property: is this tree sound, what would it hit if it failed, and what is the safest way to cut it back or bring it down where there is not much room?

Storms that shaped the neighborhoods

West Michigan has a long record of wind damage. On May 31, 1998, a derecho crossed the region with straight-line winds of 60 to 90 mph and estimated gusts up to 130 mph; the National Weather Service lists Walker, just west of the city, among the hardest-hit areas, and thirteen Michigan counties were declared a federal disaster area. More recently, a high-end EF1 tornado with gusts near 110 mph touched down in Alpine Township on August 24, 2023, and tracked almost nine miles toward Rockford. Trees that fail in storms like these are seldom a surprise afterward: a split fork, a hollow base, a heavy limb that grew out over a roof. Finding those weak points ahead of time is cheaper than cleaning up after them.

The city's street trees

The City of Grand Rapids Forestry Division looks after more than 75,000 street trees, and the city has worked toward a goal of 40 percent tree canopy since 2009 (about 34 percent was measured in 2015). A tree in the grass strip between the sidewalk and the street is a city tree. Residents can't prune it themselves, but they can apply for a free permit to hire a company to prune or remove it at their own cost. The city reviews permit requests within two business days, and for removals the stump must be ground and the strip returned to its original condition. When we visit, we tell you if a tree looks like it belongs to the city so you can get the permit first. Rules in East Grand Rapids, Wyoming, Kentwood and the townships are set by each community, and we check what applies at your address.

Pests and diseases that change the plan

Three problems come up again and again around Grand Rapids. Emerald ash borer was first found in Michigan in 2002 and reached Grand Rapids around 2007; it has killed tens of millions of ash trees in the state, and the dead ash still standing in many yards gets more brittle every year. Oak wilt is the second: the Michigan DNR asks people not to prune oaks from April 15 to July 15, when beetles carry the fungus to fresh cuts, and the city's own forestry page advises holding off on oak trimming from April through September. Red oaks can die within weeks of infection. The third is newer: hemlock woolly adelgid, which the state has confirmed in Ottawa, Muskegon and Allegan counties along the lakeshore. The City of Grand Rapids lists it, along with ash borer and spongy moth, among the invasive pests its forestry staff manage.

Old houses, tight lots, river bluffs

Grand Rapids grew up along the Grand River, where a flat, narrow valley is bordered by steep hills and bluffs. Heritage Hill, just east of downtown, holds about 1,300 homes built from 1848 onward, many on lots where a mature tree stands a few feet from the foundation. On those streets, and on hillside lots where a truck can't reach the backyard, trees come down in pieces: a climber removes limbs and trunk sections from the top, and heavy wood is lowered on ropes. On open suburban lots in Byron Center or Ada, there is often room to fell part of a tree in one direction. The method follows the site, and the quote spells it out.

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What happens to the wood

The city's curbside yard waste program takes bundled branches up to 4 feet long and 2 inches thick, but not logs, stumps or whole trees, so the wood from a removal needs a plan. We agree it with you before the job: rounds left for firewood, brush chipped and the chips left as mulch, or everything hauled away. Ash and oak in particular should not travel far; state agencies ask people not to move firewood, since that is how ash borer and oak wilt jump to new areas.

What a visit covers

• Each tree's species, lean, dead wood, cracks, cavities and fungus at the base
• What sits underneath: roof, garage, deck, fence, driveway, the neighbor's yard
• Whether the tree is on your lot or in the city right-of-way
• Service lines and distribution lines, and whether Consumers Energy needs to be called first
• Access for climbers, ropes, a chipper, or a lift or crane on the hardest jobs
• Wood, brush, chips and stump, settled in writing with a price for each tree

The city of Grand Rapids is the center of our area, from the old West Side and the Heritage Hill and Eastown neighborhoods out to the newer streets on the northeast and southeast sides. Around it we work in Wyoming, Kentwood and Grandville to the south and southwest; Walker, Standale and Comstock Park to the west and north; East Grand Rapids, Ada and Cascade to the east; and farther out in Rockford, Sparta, Cedar Springs, Lowell, Caledonia, Byron Center, Hudsonville, Jenison and Allendale. The weather is shared across all of it, so snow load and summer windstorms come up everywhere. What changes is the setting: compact older lots with city street trees in the core, wooded lots with oaks in the eastern townships, and newer subdivisions where young trees planted with the houses are now big enough to need their first real pruning. Each area page covers what we know about that community.