neighbour's oak pruning

[Tellme_why]

Hi Forum,

My neighbour's oak need pruning; it's massive and just 2ft from my fence, causing havoc dropping tons of leaf and acorns, starving all my trees of light. The most annoying thing are dead branches and stick falling off at any little wind blow.

Most of my gardening time is spent cleaning up the mess of this tree that is not even mine.. 

I don't understand why law says I have to foot the bill for pruning and not my neighbour, moreover I have to ask permission for pruning their mess.

The neighbour's property is empty, dunno how to speak to him so just preparing to do a search and getting ready what to say.

 

I had once a gardener knocking door asking jobs so I shown this massive tree and he said he could only do bits and pieces but not a whole pruning to stop any branch trespassing to my  property "otherwise the tree gets unbalanced" he said. I am not sure whether this is true - I suspect he was after small jobs and quick bucks too much drama for this monster.

 

Question. See pictures of the tree and how I'd like it to be pruned (second picture). Is this possible? Can I ask the neighbour to pay for it? What kind of permission needed to get the job done?. No impeding TPO on this tree.

 

Final point, I really look forward to reduce this tree proper so hopefully a gang of grey squirrels living off its acorn leave my garden alone and can get my life's back - namely my flowers not eaten by these ba***s..

 

Thanks!

 

 

Edited April 25, 2021 by Tellme_why
bes

[Khriss]

10 minutes ago, Mick Dempsey said:

That was not your objective, it was to get a TO to put an order on the tree.

 

So you say....  Frankly that tree could be in a CA or already have a TPO on it... We have been here before. K

[Patrick goulding]

1 hour ago, Stubby said:

As far as I know you can not disturb any nest that is active crows or otherwise . On the other hand if he flies down on your crop and " does damage "  you can shoot the bugger . Work that out /.

Date of issue: 1 January 2021.

Legal basis of this licence

This general licence permits activities that would otherwise be criminal offences under Part 1 of the 1981 Act^{[footnote 1]}.

The Secretary of State^{[footnote 2]} has issued this general licence under powers in section 16(1)(j) and (k), and (5), of the 1981 Act.

This licence covers situations where the Secretary of State is satisfied that there is no other satisfactory solution as regards the species and purposes that this licence covers. As required by section 16 of the 1981 Act, the Secretary of State has consulted with Natural England as to the circumstances in which, in their opinion, general licences should be granted and Natural England has given this advice to the Secretary of State.

The Secretary of State can modify or revoke this licence at any time. The Secretary of State will not do so, unless there are good reasons.

Purpose of this licence

This licence allows you to carry out activities in relation to certain species of wild birds^{[footnote 3]}, for the purposes of preventing serious damage to livestock, foodstuffs for livestock, crops, vegetables, fruit, fisheries or inland waters.

If you are an authorised person^{[footnote 4]}, and you act in accordance with this licence, you can take the following action but only for the serious damage purposes shown for each species of wild bird in Table 1 to:

• kill^{[footnote 5]} or take the wild bird
• take, damage or destroy nests of the wild bird
• take or destroy eggs of the wild bird

Table 1: action you may take to prevent serious damage, shown by species

Species (scientific name) for which action is to be taken	Livestock - direct attack	Livestock - feedstuffs and spread of disease	Crops, fruit and vegetables	Fisheries	Inland waters
Canada goose (Branta Canadensis)	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Carrion crow (Corvus corone)	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Egyptian goose (Alopochen aegyptiacus)	No	No	Yes	No	No
Feral pigeon (Columba livia)	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Jackdaw (Corvus monedula)	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Indian house crow (Corvus splendens)	No	No	Yes	No	No
Magpie (Pica pica)	Yes	No	No	No	No
Monk parakeet (Myiopsitta monachus)	No	No	Yes	No	No
Ring-necked parakeet (Psittacula krameri)	No	No	Yes	No	No
Rook (Corvus frugilegus)	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Wood pigeon (Columba palumbus)	No	Yes	Yes	No	No

The scientific name of a species will be used in any dispute or legal proceeding.

Who can use this licence

You can only act under this licence if you are an authorised person. This includes the owner or occupier of the land on which action authorised by this licence is to be taken, or any person authorised by the owner or occupier.

You do not need to be registered to use this licence.

[Patrick goulding]

1 hour ago, Stubby said:

As far as I know you can not disturb any nest that is active crows or otherwise . On the other hand if he flies down on your crop and " does damage "  you can shoot the bugger . Work that out /.

Have a read of that a lot of words lol but a good read you can control some birds under a general license as long as you have got just cause you can control by destroying nests. Just thought some folks might find this interesting.

[Patrick goulding]

Just now, Patrick goulding said:

Have a read of that a lot of words lol but a good read you can control some birds under a general license as long as you have got just cause you can control by destroying nests. Just thought some folks might find this interesting.

You can see it better on the Basc.org web site you can understand the documents better. 👍 

[Tellme_why]

23 hours ago, Mick Dempsey said:

That was not your objective, it was to get a TO to put an order on the tree.

 

Brilliant Mick

[topchippyles]

23 hours ago, Mick Dempsey said:

That was not your objective, it was to get a TO to put an order on the tree.

 

Should be tied to the particular tree and given 30 lashes 😁

[Mr. Squirrel]

Late to the party, but I’d suggest that given how close to the boundary this tree is, any advice that you can prune it back to said boundary is a pretty poor recommendation . You can technically do so, but within the tolerances of the tree.
This looks like I’m doing so you would be causing pretty severe damage. It would also look awful and make virtually no difference to leaves and twigs falling in your property. I don’t imagine you’ll be able to replicate the pollards so forget that notion. 
Best bet is to learn to love it, it’s an impressive tree after all, or leave… you moved into a house with a massive tree in the neighbours garden, why do you expect them to devalue their property for you?  

Edited May 25, 2021 by Mr. Squirrel

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

On 25/04/2021 at 20:40, Mick Dempsey said:

That was not your objective, it was to get a TO to put an order on the tree.

 

Getting a TPO initiated is no easy matter hereabouts. Lazy bastards seem to want to throw up any excuse not to whilst trying (abysmally) to enforce 60 yo ATPOs. 
 

Only in the public sector can such inefficiency survive - nay thrive!