Kent is our home. We work these streets every week.

A canopy that is old in some places and brand new in others

Kent's housing stock tells you a lot about its trees. Around downtown and the older blocks off Main Street and Summit Street, the homes are close together and the shade trees are as old as the houses. Silver maples, oaks and the occasional big sycamore are common, and many of them have been pruned by three or four different crews over the decades, not always well. Further out, the ranch and split-level neighborhoods from the 1950s through the 1970s have the next generation of trees: maples and pears that are now big enough to matter.

That mix is why a Kent estimate rarely starts with a price. We start with what the tree is, how it was treated in the past and what sits under it. An old silver maple with a history of topping cuts needs a different plan than a sixty-year-old red oak that has never been touched. Both can be kept in a lot of cases. Some cannot, and we will say so.

Sand, gravel and clay, sometimes on the same street

The glaciers left Portage County with uneven ground. Parts of Kent sit on sand and gravel that drain fast, which means trees there dry out hard in August and show it as early leaf drop and scorched edges. Other lots are dense clay that stays wet in spring and starves roots of air. The Kent Bog nature preserve just outside town, with its tamaracks, is a reminder of how varied the ground is here.

Soil changes the advice. On sandy ground we talk about watering through dry spells and keeping mulch wide and thin. On clay we look harder at root flare problems, grade changes and compaction from parked cars or old construction. It is one of the reasons we diagnose before recommending plant health care in Kent rather than selling a standard program.

Rentals, the river and working with the city

A lot of Kent properties near campus are rentals, and landlords call us for different reasons than owner-occupants: a limb over a tenant's car, a dead tree that a tenant reported, or a property that changed hands with deferred work. We give landlords a written scope they can keep on file, and we can coordinate access with tenants.

Kent also has clear rules about public trees. The city's tree code requires written approval from the city arborist before anyone removes a tree on public property, and trees on the line between the right-of-way and a private lot are the city's to maintain. If a tree you are worried about sits in the strip by the street, we will tell you at the estimate, and the right first call may be to the city rather than to us.

Questions we hear locally