Tree service in Johnson City, Texas

What I see in Johnson City yards

Ranch-scale work: pasture cedar clearing, oak deadwooding, storm cleanup along long county-road frontage. Worth batching with anything else out that direction.

The trees I get called about in Johnson City

Ranch-scale plateau country — pasture ashe juniper, upland live oak, and Texas red oak in the draws. The work is deadwooding oaks, clearing pasture cedar, and storm cleanup along long county-road frontage. Pasture juniper, upland live oak, and Texas red oak down in the draws where moisture collects. Red oak is the one that matters for oak wilt — it's the species that forms the spore mats that infect the neighbourhood, so a dying red oak out here is worth identifying properly rather than ignoring. Johnson City is ranch country on the western edge of my range, up where the Pedernales has cut through and the plateau starts breaking into granite country toward Llano. The trees are live oak mottes, Ashe juniper, and Spanish oak on the slopes, and the work is a different scale from suburban tree service — it's acreage. What I get asked about most is oak wilt in the mottes, because a live oak motte is close to the textbook case of a root-grafted stand: dozens of stems that are functionally one organism, so an infection at one end works steadily through the whole thing.

How to tell these species apart, and what goes wrong with each one.

The ground underneath: Edwards Plateau

Shallow, stony, alkaline clay over limestone. Live oak, ashe juniper and cedar brakes. Roots go wide instead of deep because there's nowhere deep to go, which is why wind-throw is the failure mode out here.

Permits in Johnson City

I haven't read Johnson City's ordinance closely enough to summarize it here, and I'm not going to guess at a rule that could cost you a mitigation bill. Call the city's planning or development services department and ask two questions: what trunk diameter triggers a permit, and is there a protected species list.

I have verified the rules for Austin, Kyle, Buda and Dripping Springs — those are written up here, along with how to measure your trunk properly, which every one of these ordinances depends on.

Working on a Johnson City property

The western limit of my radius at forty-eight minutes, on big properties with good room to work. Worth batching with anything else out that direction. The western limit of my radius at about forty-eight minutes, on ranch-scale properties with long county-road frontage. Plenty of room to work; the constraint is purely the drive, so it needs pairing with other work out that direction. Open ground and room to fell, which makes the work itself quick. The cost driver is purely the drive — it's the far edge of my radius, so it only makes sense as a planned day rather than a call-out, and it's worth batching several trees into one visit.

Questions I get from Johnson City

Getting me out to Johnson City

Johnson City is about a 48-minute run for me. At that distance it works best batched with other work out that way, so give me a little notice if it isn’t urgent. Call or text me a photo with something in frame for scale and I can usually give you a number without driving out. Estimates are free either way.

One rule that applies everywhere, including here: don't prune oaks between February 1 and June 30. Here's why.