Tree Trimming in Springfield

Springfield is the state capital and the largest city in the region, with a mix of historic homes near the downtown core and newer subdivisions spreading out toward the edges. A lot of the older neighborhoods date back to the late 1800s and early 1900s, so the trees are mature and sometimes massive. Being the seat of government means there are also large institutional properties, parks, and state office campuses with significant tree canopies. Tree work here ranges from careful pruning around century-old homes to storm cleanup after the severe weather that rolls through central Illinois.

Overgrown or dead branches drop fast during the ice storms that hit central Illinois every winter. Springfield sits in a wide-open prairie with no natural windbreak, so trees here take the full force of those storms. A lot of the older neighborhoods like Iles Park and Laurel Hills have silver maples and cottonwoods that were planted in the 1960s and are now pushing 60 feet tall — those limbs get heavy, and heavy limbs fall.

We look at the tree in person before we quote anything, because a photo doesn't show a hollow trunk or a root system heaving up against a foundation. We cut to the branch collar — that's the slight ridge where the branch meets the trunk — so the tree seals itself over instead of rotting from an open wound left by a flush cut.