Trees are often given more credit than they deserve. Many of the touted benefits are half truths, which make it even more misleading. Trees have their benefits, until they start impeding on maintenance, quality of life, or safety. That's why there are parks and agricultural reserves - to have trees for environmental benefits, but away from personal property.

The first issue is that trees are dark, at least compared to other things that might blanket the land, such as grass or snow. As a result, planting more trees typically makes the land darker. Since dark surfaces absorb more heat, a dark tree-covered surface will trap more of the Sun’s heat – and warm the local climate.

As a result, there is a delicate balance between trees’ ability to take in CO2, reducing warming, and their tendency to trap additional heat and thus create warming. This means planting trees only helps stop climate change in certain places.

Specifically, according to a 2007 study that has been repeatedly confirmed, the best place to plant new trees is the tropics, where trees grow fastest and thus trap the most CO2. In contrast, planting trees in snowy regions near the poles is likely to cause a net warming, while planting them in temperate climates – like that of the UK, much of Europe and parts of the US – may have no net effect on climate.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200521-planting-trees-doesnt-always-help-with-climate-change

I used to love the idea of big trees all over the yard. But with Oak Decline running rampant in our region and climate change leading to windier, stormier, and longer severe weather seasons in the Mid-Atlantic, the risks that very tall and older trees bring are risks I don't want to take.

I'm now looking for significantly landscaped yards with variety of large bushes, shrubs, and smaller trees.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Trees are great, until they fall on your house.

We had a tree looked at by an arborist who assured us it was healthy and didn’t need to be removed. It fell less than a year later and did some damage. The roots of mature trees also get into drain lines and cause all sorts of sewage issues.

There are a lot of trees in old neighborhoods that are coming to the end of their lifecycles and they are dangerous. It can cost $2-8k to remove each tree.

So while I love trees, I would see large trees in old neighborhoods to be a liability.

Yup, lots of the neighborhoods around here are getting to an age where the mature trees are starting to die. I see it a lot.

Yup -- this is true in many close-in Arlington neighborhoods. I have had a neighbor's mature silver maple drop a giant branch on my fence. I had a mature cherry tree fall over during a storm in my own yard (miraculously not hitting any structures). A neighbor had a branch fall on her playing children during a perfectly calm day (child ended up unconscious and in the hospital, but recovered). A mature Oak down the block blew over and was completely uprooted during a storm. Neighbor's tree dropped a branch on my car, cracking windshield. Same neighbor had a sycamore fall on their house during a storm. None of these trees were visibly dying, and several of these folks used arborists to maintain their trees. My general feeling is that mature trees are desirable only when they are 50+ feet AWAY from any structures. Tough to do in places like Arlington when most lots are only 50 feet wide.

Agree with this. Lived in an older Silver Spring neighborhood (small lot sizes and some very large 70-80+ year old trees) and know of many trees that fell during various storms. Our nieghborhood was impassible for days after the derecho. I Like trees, but would I also would prefer that the really large species are planted at least 50’ or so away from the house. There are plenty of small and mid-sized trees that are better suited for small lots or to be closer to the foundation.

Trees add significantly to the value of a property, assuming they are healthy and well maintained. Trees also usually reduce both heating and cooling costs, assuming they are planted correctly and of the right type. Best of all in my opinion is having some nature closely adjacent to a home which mature trees provide.

I would love to have more flowering trees, especially the cherry trees and red buds, and crepe mytrle trees. But I definitely hate old and tall oak tree planted right front of house. I

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Trees are great, until they fall on your house.

We had a tree looked at by an arborist who assured us it was healthy and didn’t need to be removed. It fell less than a year later and did some damage. The roots of mature trees also get into drain lines and cause all sorts of sewage issues.

There are a lot of trees in old neighborhoods that are coming to the end of their lifecycles and they are dangerous. It can cost $2-8k to remove each tree.

So while I love trees, I would see large trees in old neighborhoods to be a liability.

Yup, lots of the neighborhoods around here are getting to an age where the mature trees are starting to die. I see it a lot.

Yup -- this is true in many close-in Arlington neighborhoods. I have had a neighbor's mature silver maple drop a giant branch on my fence. I had a mature cherry tree fall over during a storm in my own yard (miraculously not hitting any structures). A neighbor had a branch fall on her playing children during a perfectly calm day (child ended up unconscious and in the hospital, but recovered). A mature Oak down the block blew over and was completely uprooted during a storm. Neighbor's tree dropped a branch on my car, cracking windshield. Same neighbor had a sycamore fall on their house during a storm. None of these trees were visibly dying, and several of these folks used arborists to maintain their trees. My general feeling is that mature trees are desirable only when they are 50+ feet AWAY from any structures. Tough to do in places like Arlington when most lots are only 50 feet wide.

Our town has a mature, tall canopy. As you drive into town in the summer, the temp drops about 5 degrees. Such a difference.

Anonymous wrote:Trees are great, until they fall on your house.

We had a tree looked at by an arborist who assured us it was healthy and didn’t need to be removed. It fell less than a year later and did some damage. The roots of mature trees also get into drain lines and cause all sorts of sewage issues.

There are a lot of trees in old neighborhoods that are coming to the end of their lifecycles and they are dangerous. It can cost $2-8k to remove each tree.

So while I love trees, I would see large trees in old neighborhoods to be a liability.

Yup, lots of the neighborhoods around here are getting to an age where the mature trees are starting to die. I see it a lot.

Trees are great, until they fall on your house.

We had a tree looked at by an arborist who assured us it was healthy and didn’t need to be removed. It fell less than a year later and did some damage. The roots of mature trees also get into drain lines and cause all sorts of sewage issues.

There are a lot of trees in old neighborhoods that are coming to the end of their lifecycles and they are dangerous. It can cost $2-8k to remove each tree.

So while I love trees, I would see large trees in old neighborhoods to be a liability.

Anonymous wrote:Not desirable if on your lot, desirable if between your lots and neighbors. You'll need to consider cutting them down if they are on your lot even more so if close to the house

When we built our new hours we cut all the trees down and have much less maintenance inc gutters

So glad you are not my neighbor. Why didn't you just build on a treeless lot in the first place?

We live in a town with very tall, beautiful mature trees. They giv our property the most pretty dappled shade and just look and SOUND beautiful and peaceful. We don’t do any regular maintenance of the trees because they are healthy. The one thing we do have to do given all the trees is more leaf cleanup in the fall but our landscape guys do it. We also have a tree that drops cotton a couple weeks out of the year which is a little messy but again it’s so worth it and we have our landscapers maintain the appearance of everything.

Anonymous wrote:Most trees in the DC area should be cut down after 20 years they were y meant to get that large

Okay fool.

Look up the lifespan of these trees that you know nothing about.

In some cases it distinguishes a “brand new build” houses from a neighborhood where trees were left in tact or have grown tall providing shade and beauty - and yes some maintenance.

I live in Westmoreland Hills so we have a ton of old trees.

I absolutely love them but it is very much an investment to keep them healthy and safe. Arborists aren't cheap.

If I had a big lot I would love big mature trees but reality is that a lot of these trees were planted when many of these homes were built 60+ years ago. Trees too close to the house can have the root dig into the plumbing and that'll be a very expensive fix. A lot of these trees have not been maintained, I see dead branches, diseased trees all throughout my neighborhood - even branches from these big trees can cause expensive and fatal accidents.

This is my risk tolerance to these amazing big trees, I've gotten an arborist to come out on my lot and basically have said the same concerns but not many people think about the negatives to trees.