It kind of started with hurricane Florence, but mostly it was poor planning and research on our parts.
My neighborhood is made up of mostly half to one acre lots. There are five other lots that border mine.
Hurricane Florence pushed three of the trees backwards. They were the ones directly behind our 12x16 outbuilding. The rain from that storm was running off the roof and concentrated on the bases of the those trees. Then the constant winds pushed them backwards. Luckily, they didn't fall, but I felt they eventually would. Also, it really opened my eyes to the root system.
The roots were huge, but more concerning was how far from the tree they had spread. Being that the trees (42 in all) were so big, some leaning, some with huge dead spots, but all having roots running who knows where, I was afeered they might (if they haven't already) find someone's septic tank, mine included.
We removed the east trees and planted tea olives. We removed the south trees and went with a wooden privacy fence. This was a couple years back.
Now that I'm not working, I'm removing the west trees and will plant tea olives in their place.
