Driftwood, Texas · Hays County
Tree removal in Driftwood
Big rural lots, long driveways, and oaks that have never been touched.
Driftwood regulates removals from the ground up — assume you need to ask before anything comes down.
About 20 minutes from me in Kyle. Whatever the answer turns out to be, it is a form and a measurement rather than a refusal — these get approved all the time. Call me and I’ll tell you where you stand.
What Driftwood actually regulates
Most Driftwood work is acreage rather than yards, and that changes the job. There's usually room to drop a tree whole instead of taking it apart in the air, which is faster and cheaper for you. Access matters more than anything else here: if the truck and chipper can get near the tree, the price comes down.
Under the threshold
Not regulated
No permit needed — Driftwood has no city government to require one.
Driftwood is unincorporated, in Hays County, not a city. No municipal tree ordinance exists because there's no municipality. Deed restrictions, a plat note or an HOA can still say otherwise on your specific lot, so it's worth a quick check of your paperwork before you assume you're clear.
The ordinance, in its own words
Driftwood is a census-designated place in Hays County, Texas — it has no incorporated city government and therefore no municipal tree ordinance.
Source: Texas Almanac (Texas State Historical Association) — Driftwood place record. This is a reading of the code, not legal advice and not the city’s own determination. Ordinances change.
Everything else the Driftwood code attaches
- If it's not construction-related
- Nothing to file with the county for a straight removal. If your lot is in an HOA or has deed restrictions, those are private rules, not government ones, and worth reading before you cut.
- How it's measured
- Not applicable — there's no ordinance to measure against.
- Who to call
- No city — unincorporated Hays County
Check your own tree against Driftwood’s rule
Permit checker
Measure it, then check it
Pick Driftwood, put the trunk measurement in, and it will show you exactly which band you are in and what the code says about it.
How a removal actually goes in Driftwood
This is the easiest access in my service area. Acreage, long driveways, and usually room to drop a tree whole instead of dismantling it in the air. Whole-tree felling is faster and cheaper, so Driftwood quotes tend to come in below what the same tree would cost in Sunset Valley. Twenty minutes from me, long driveways, gates and cattle guards. The question on every Driftwood quote is how close the truck and chipper can get, because wood that has to be carried a hundred yards costs more than the same wood at the kerb.
Everything gets hauled away and the ground raked off behind us. Want the logs kept for firewood? Say so before we start and my crew will cut them to length and stack them rather than running them through the chipper.
The trees I get called about here
Live oak and ashe juniper, with some post oak on the sandier rises. Big unmanaged oaks are the norm — decades of no pruning means long heavy horizontal limbs and a lot of interior deadwood. That's not a crisis, but it is the reason limbs come down in a storm out here. Big acreage means the option nobody in town has: felling a tree whole. If there's a clear lay and room for it to go over in one piece, that's dramatically faster and cheaper than dismantling it from the top. Most of what makes a removal expensive is the absence of that option.
Before you decide to remove it
A mature live oak took fifty years to reach that size and I can take it down in a morning. Neither of us can put it back. So the first thing I want to know is whether it actually needs to go — a tree that looks finished is quite often a tree that needs the deadwood out of it and nothing more. Here’s how to tell the difference, and here’s the risk check if you want to work it through yourself.
If it does need to come out, the permit side is the easy part. The rules for every town I’ve read are here, and here’s everything else I do in Driftwood.
Questions I get asked
Do I need a permit to remove a tree in Driftwood?
It depends on the trunk size. Driftwood is a census-designated place in Hays County, Texas — it has no incorporated city government and therefore no municipal tree ordinance. That is Texas Almanac (Texas State Historical Association) — Driftwood place record, and it is quoted in full further down this page.
How do I measure my tree for Driftwood's rules?
Put a tape around the trunk 4.5 feet above the ground to get the circumference, then divide by 3.14 for the diameter. Driftwood writes its rule in inches in diameter. If the trunk splits into several stems below 4.5 feet, measure below the split — that usually puts you in a higher bracket than you expected.
What if the tree is dead or dangerous?
Most ordinances around here treat a dead, diseased or genuinely hazardous tree differently from a healthy one somebody would simply rather not have, and a written assessment from a Certified Arborist is usually what the city wants to see. There is one on my crew. Get the condition documented before you file anything, not after.
How much does tree removal cost in Driftwood?
Access is the biggest driver, ahead of size — whether there is a drop zone or whether every piece has to be roped out over a roof is the difference between a morning and a full day. Then trunk diameter, then lean and deadwood. Send me a photo and the circumference and I can usually price it from that.
Got a tree in Driftwood you’re not sure about?
Text me a photo and the measurement round the trunk. I’ll tell you which side of the line it’s on and what it takes to get it done.
Same-day callback on estimates
Call or text before 5pm on a weekday and you'll hear back from me the same day. Not an answering service — me.