One of the features of our old house is the trees, some that were there when I purchased the home, many I’ve planted over the past 20+ years. One tree, a hardwood maple, that stood out because it nicely shaded the back porch. In the summer of 2000 it was damaged in a storm (I wasn’t home so I missed the excitement). Matt’s Tree Service trimmed it the best he could and it hung in there for many more years. Slowly the damaged area slowly died and rotted. From time to time I would trim off dead parts and in 2018 I had Matt come out and do a little work again. But 2020 being the difficult year it was the old tree finally died. I trimmed some off and then finally had Matt come drop the rest that was hanging over the house. Below are some photos of the Old Back Tree.
These photos would be before the 2000 storm damage, probably 1998.
These were the fall of 2000, you can see the storm damage in the center of the tree. I was just starting to build the back porch. During the summer a storm broke down the center section (along with damaging a lot of other neighborhood trees). Matt’s Tree Service managed to trim out the damage and save the tree.
This would have been 2002 when I had the pole barn built. You can see the tree is still doing OK.
2004 the tree was filling out as I continued to build more back deck.
Jump ahead to 2018 and Matt did an excellent job of shaping all our big maples including the old back tree.
Late 2019 the back half of the tree gave up and in the summer of 2020 I cut that part off because it was aiming away from the house.
Finally in November 2020 I had Matt come drop the rest of the now dead tree. I finished cleaning it up and now have to figure out what’s next.