daltontrees

Love it! A hoot.

It sholdn't be a fight, the Council is only trying to control the spread of DED. As far as I know there are only 2 places this happens, Brighton (which is partly isolated by geography from othe DED areas) and Edinburgh which is a World Heritage Centre and has a lot of good elms still that are important for the amenity of the city. The Council might get it wrong sometimes. A section of yellowing leaves could be early DED or it could be a bit of storm damage or other causes. Maybe that's what happened here. If you ask the Council they will come out and re-appraise, as they keep records of all suspected DED cases. Let them see it close-up. They can't make you remove it, but it's some testament to their sense of purpose that they might be willing to pay to remove it.

That's not a helpful attitude. After they get infected they stand as 'breeders' for several years afterwards and leaving a breeder in place launches a huge number of beetles that then infect other trees. It's not about risk of harm, it's about minimising spread of DED. Instead of telling the Council to bugger off, do you not stop and wonder why they're patrolling the city trying to catch early infections so that they can keep as many of the elm population as possible.

Not so daft, but I don't know. The statutory responsibility of a Council to ensure the adequacy of foundations may or may not (depending on what the Building Regs say) include adequacy against subsidence or heave. I just don't know. I'm in Scotland where shrinkable clays are almost non-existent and we have our own Building Standards here so I know zip about English system.

The difficulty with reading into the case is that we don't know if it was low value. The court on a point of law overruled a tribunal's interpretation of the law, and sent the case back for re-valuation. By rights it should have gone from the Council being completely liable to the builder being mostly liable. I don't think the amounts were ever published. The law is getting a bit clearer and I think we should be grateful that Gloucester took it to appeal as a matter of public interest. You're right about a culture of settling. I'm sure there's a sub-culture of completely spurious claims that take advantage of it. The conservatory case I suppose was one where because a conservatory doesn't need bulding warrant there is no objective standard for foundation design and the builder probably just made something up. But for a house extension where a warrant is needed, supported by a structural engineer's calculations and certification of design, an inadequate foundation would have been stopped before getting on site. Or an inadequate foundation woud hav ebeen contributory negligence.

Sorry I meant trespass as a form of nuisance. It's still wrong. So much so that I think it is considered a 'strict liability offence' i.e. there is no need to prove nuisance, simply being there is wrong. But I'm in Scotland where attitudes to trespass are different and the law has been changed radicaly to allow or codify rights to roam.

Good question, i.e. a bastard to answer. As I understand it encroachment is relatively trivial if it can be abated easily. But it becomes nuisance when it prevents the reasonable use of the garden. In that respect it doesn't even have to be causing damage (myth no. 1). Encroachment becomes negligence when it foreseeable causes damage or other loss. English case law is littered with confusing written judgements that conflate nuisance and negligence (myth no.2) but as time goes by the important distinction is made between nuisance (prevention of use) and negigence (damage or loss). Trespass as a legal principle no longer exists but it was treated in old authorities as nuisance, and was referred to recenly in a big case as nuisance, but that's only relevant in wilful acts of encroachment. Tree roots encroach gradaually and unseen; the intent (or even neglect) and foreseeability are far from obvious. Trespass, nuisance and negligence are all (in England) torts, wrongs of act or omission. In some ways it doesn't matter what brand of tort it is, it's still a wrong against another. But nuisance is a breach of property rights (the rights to enjoy your property) and negligence by tree root damage is a differnet kind of wrong against a person's property, causing loss.

You'd think so, but no. There is specific case law (known as the candy floss conservatory case) where the foundations were totally substandard but the adjacent tree owner was still liable (to some degree) for subsidence. It might be different if the foundations were meant to have been designed to a particular standard e.g. the current NHBC guidelines, but weren't. The tree owner then might argue contributory negligence, which I think personally is valid and fair. The house owner would then have to sue the designers. I expect in the next few years a case like that will come through, as the candy floss case really dodged the scale of the issue (because it then referred the compensation issue back to a tribunal).

It doesn't matter what came first. At law, encroachment is negligence if it causes foreseeable damage.

I can't be bothered replying to first time posters becuase they usually do vanish if no-one has given them an authoritative, detailed, free, copper-bottomed solution to their vague problem within say 10 minutes. Arbtalk should have an AI engine for such requests, it could generate eloquent generic advice without saying anything useful or commital. We could call it Arbificial Intelligence.

Well one could possibly contrive a situation where it's justifiable, but not in the normal business of life. I cant even think of one.

It won't rot and die because of the inclusion. The inclusion may split open in the future, leaving a fraction of the tree and a gaping wound that will never heal over.

Aoother arbtalk thread where no-one answers the question put by the OP. No, you can't cut down the tree on adjacent land. Not lawfully in any circumstances unless with the owner's permission. You could cut back roots and branches to the boundary. You may be able to mitigate or eliminate the adverse effects of the tree on your soils in various ways that do not involve removing the tree.

First chance I get to try this again for myself I will take it, but I don't do so much tree work these days. I'll try it with a silky on something small, the principle is the same at any size.

As on attached pic. I doubt if it will need a winch. If anything it might close on the saw. If it starts to, then pull out and cut through the bark on either side then nibble it from the sides till it goes.

Norway maple is famous for this. Sometimes it ends badly. Looks like it's too late to prune it out. Could be managed with bracing, thinning or reduction, depending a lot on wind exposure.

Based in these few pictures, I'd say it's do-able and if you don't it will be an isse for the tree for all its life. So on balance, I'd remove it while the tree is still young and vigorous. But' you'd need to leave zero stub and the only way to do that is a small gob immediately below the bottom of the inculsion and then effectively tear off the part to be removed. You've probably seen natureal tear-outs in beech loads of times. The key is not to touch the bark of the arch of the tear-out AT ALL with any saw, and at the same time prevent the bark below being torn too far down the stem. Personally I have long thought that the best success with pruning comes with mimicking nature, because trees have evolved to cope with branch losses for 100s of millions of years. So imitating a natural tear-out without letting the tear go too far down the stem would be best. These's all sorts of articles and discussion about how trees manage to split their vascular system at unions without compromising strength, but the best way to see it is to tear off an inclusion fork, that is the exact point nature has desingated as the weakest point surrounded by the best regenerative tissue. Callus will be stimulated by flexure, so leaving a great big lumpy pruning stub will prevent flexure and wood development on the retained side. It will look a bit like the dreaded flush-cut but in most ways it's the opposite, physiologically. Hope you follow what am suggesting and go for it and post pics now and in the future.

A poplar with an upper central leader that is 2 foot diameter. In my opinion the only good poplars are either dead ones or ones that are far from anyone or anything.

It might be nonsensical. Just saying that as a contractor I wouldn't expect it to be my role to revisit the rationale, I'd just do it and get paid for it. Being inquisitive is great, personally I can't help being that way. But speculating based on a vague description and without the consultant being available to comment is not going to change anything. It's got to be about retention of habitat, though, even if it's only for a few years. Maybe bat roosting, maybe saproxylic insects.

Speculating that the removal of the hollow and a mertre of stem below it will leave a clean single wound that thas a better chance of occluding. Most big interventions are doomed to failure, and if there is aready fungal hollowing in heartwood/ripewood then the prognisis is not good. Might just be buying time. Might be partly aesthetic. Might be wrong. Don't know. If i was engaged as contractor I'd just do it.

The consultant has specified what is to be done. No need to know why.

If it is to be a medium-term fixture, then attaching it by ratchet strap or lashing won't do, you will need to support its weight properly in a way that doesn't fail if the piece decays and reduces in diameter. I suggest thinking about 1. supporting its weight from above and 2. attaching it to the stem to prevent movement as two separate things. A cross bucket knot with a spare length of rope will support it from above, hanging from a suitable fork.. Then you can lash it to the stem with ratchet strap or a second bit of rope using any of a number of girth hitches. If you plan it carfully you can tie the bucket knot with the reef knot in one of the 'handles' so that it can be untied and retied around the fork when you hoist the piece into the tree.

Add i just tried it, I managed to collapse it by pulling it in the 'wrong' direction'. Almost impossible in the other direction, though.

My first uses of it was glacier crossings, it only had to take one body weight. Haven't used it for big pulls. Maybe I have to revisit. Looking at it closely it seems to be in effect an alpine butterfly in one direction of pull but with an extra buffer in the other direction.

Can't have everything! It looks very close to being an alpine butterfly and has a directional aspect to it. And looks horrible. I'd be learning the alpine butterfly if I was you. It is an easy visual check