Pruning is 68x Cheaper than Removal

treelooker

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Remove or Retain? Keep or Kill? I'm doing ta cost/benefit analysis involved in these decisions, on street trees for instance. So far it looks like pruning a tree is 68 times cheaper than replacing it.
In very general numbers. if it cost $500 to prune a mature tree, and it needs pruning again in 10 years, pruning costs $50 or 5000 pennies per year.
The branches cover a circle that is 80 feet wide, roughly 5000 square feet of canopy per tree.That comes out to an expense of 1 penny per square foot of canopy per year to retain the tree.

It might cost $2,500 to remove the tree, dispose of the debris, and grind the stump.
A new tree might cost $500 to put in, and grow at a rate of one foot per year. It would need water and mulch and fertilizing and weeding and pruning for 40 years, at maybe $10/year, or $400. That is a total of $3400, or $340,000 pennies to put back that 5000 square feet of canopy. That comes out to 68 pennies per square foot of canopy.
Then we would have to add in the cost of the loss in contributions for the 40 years without the canopy, and the cost of the use of the money it takes to replace it.
Does this seem close?
Did I forget anything?
 
Agree with ya there Mick. A lot of times it is easier to wreck out a tree than it is to climb through and needle out all of the deadwood.

In general I would say there is no "in general" to the price comparison. I would say it is purely case by case.
 
You're taking the cost of pruning and amortizing it over 10 years but counting removal and 40 years of maintenance in one year... Also, in 40 years, the mature tree would have cost $2k to prune (or reached the end of its life cycle) compared to the $3400 for the removal and replacement.
 
That's good point Carl, eventually, the tree WILL need to be removed.
 
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In general I would say there is no "in general" to the price comparison. I would say it is purely case by case.

That isn't how numbers work. Average enough sample trees together and you can very confidently say "in general ....."

Regardless of the topic, this is always true.



love
nick
 
Also- if we are just talking the direct expense to the client, it's always cheaper to cut down large or eventually-to-be large trees down than it is to maintain it in an urban environment.

Like you said $2,500 or maybe $5,000 to remove it once vs $500-$2,000 every few years to prune it.

I think this is why, at least around LA, there aren't as many big trees in less affluent neighborhoods. People realize "I can't keep pouring money into this tree."


love
nick
 
You forgot to add in the cost of removing the mature tree you've been pruning for 40 years, which would likely be more than the cost of removing it 40 years ago (say $3500 as opposed to $2500 to remove now). So over a 40-year cycle the customer is now invested $5500 in to your prune first method, whereas the remove first method is only at $3400.
 
At the end of that 40 year period, are we s'posed to assume the tree remains in great shape, and good to go for another 40? And then another 40 after that? Ad infinitum?
 
Grind that stump after the requiem mass, while wearing a long black robe with a hood.
Carry a scythe.
 
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Thanks for the replies. This was based on a followup inspection of mature street trees http://www.historictreecare.com/wp-...ks-Managed-with-Specified-Crown-Reduction.pdf pruned in 2012.

Would another city with a similar population of trees budget for pruning? After looking at a 68:1 or even 34:1 ratio for the cost of replacement vs. retention, I tend to think so; that's why I'm trying to do the arithmetic. We'll see.
Yes a 5-year cycle would be better; that would change the cost ratio to 34:1? But based on inspection, imo the trees in question won't need much pruning until 2022, after their 2012 reduction/retrenchment/regeneration pruning. O and the work was done by a non-certified arborist who lacked verbal skills (tried 4 times) but learned quickly and understood trees very well. He was much easier to work with than certificants who are deluded into believing that the 'rules of thumb (or dumb...)' taught by ISA are facts.
Nick your pruning cycle is really short--why?

The goal was to look at the next 40 years. The trees will live indefinitely, so yes Carl I did not try to compute beyond 40 years. And I totally agree that trees can be reduced until they are stumps. After all that is what happens in nature; a gradual retrenchment. How can we go wrong copying nature?
 
Nick your pruning cycle is really short--why?

I just said "every few years" ...intentionally vague knowing that there isn't an accurate single number. New trees should be pruned more often to establish structure, then by maturity be pruned maybe every decade. Hence..."few"


love
nick
 
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I just said "every few years" ...intentionally vague knowing that there isn't an accurate single number. New trees should be pruned more often to establish structure, then by maturity be pruned maybe every decade. Hence..."few"


love
nick

ok got it, but ime a pruning cycle can be 5 years min on average. And yeah the bottom line is tree value; the owner's gotta see it or our job is tough.
 
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