Emergency Tree Removal in Fort Worth, TX

More storm injuries in DFW come from people approaching downed wires than from the falling tree itself. When a post oak or cedar elm brings a line down across your yard, the rules are not optional, and they decide whether a removal is safe or deadly.

What to do in the first five minutes

1. Stay back at least 35 feet from any downed or sagging wire and keep children and pets inside, since debris can hide a live line.
2. Call 911 if a line is arcing, smoking, or anyone is near it.
3. Report the line to Oncor at 1-888-313-4747 so they can de-energize it.
4. Do not move limbs, ladders, or anything else touching or near the wire, and never assume it is dead because your lights are off.

Who removes what

Oncor will clear a tree or limb that is impacting their lines or equipment, but they will not remove a tree from your roof or yard that is not on their gear; that part is the homeowner's responsibility. If the limb damaged your weatherhead, meter base, or service mast, those pieces belong to you, and a licensed electrician must repair them before Oncor restores power. We sequence our removal around the utility: we secure the obvious hazards, hold off on anything energized until Oncor clears it, then take the tree down and can tarp the opening the same visit.

How you handle the first hours after a tree comes through your roof shapes what your insurer pays. Move too fast and you can lose the proof an adjuster needs; move too slow and water damage spreads. The goal is to stop further loss while preserving the record.

Document before you clear

• Photograph and video the tree, the point of impact, and the interior from several angles before any debris is touched, as the Texas Department of Insurance advises.
• Capture wide shots that show the whole scene and close-ups of cracked rafters, punctured roof decking, or a crushed fence.
• Save your written estimate and the dated, itemized invoice, since adjusters cross-check the work against the cost.
• Note the date and time of the storm and when you reported it to your agent.

Tarp now to prevent secondary damage

Most policies expect you to take reasonable steps to prevent further loss once the initial damage is done. A temporary tarp or board-up over an open roof or window stops the next North Texas downpour from soaking insulation, drywall, and flooring, which keeps a one-room claim from becoming a whole-house one. We can install that emergency cover during the removal so your home is buttoned up before the adjuster ever walks the property.

Coverage realities to confirm with your agent

Removal is usually covered when the tree hits a covered structure, often including a tree that fell from a neighbor's yard, while a tree that simply topples in an open yard frequently is not. Your deductible, any removal-cost cap, and whether the payout is based on replacement cost or depreciated value all vary by policy, so call your agent before the first cut and let the numbers, not the door-knocker, drive your decisions.

Not every battered tree is firewood, and not every tree that looks fine is safe. After a hail-and-wind event or an ice load, the difference between a tree worth saving and one that has to come down often hides inside the trunk and root plate, where an untrained eye cannot see it.

Often worth saving

• Only smaller limbs broken, with the main leader and trunk intact.
• A solid, upright trunk with no long vertical crack.
• A root plate that has not lifted out of the clay.
• Mature live oak, bur oak, or pecan with good structure, which are slow to replace and worth protecting.

Usually has to go

• A split trunk, hollow cavity, or crack running down into the root flare.
• More than roughly half the canopy gone, or large limbs torn from the bark.
• An uprooted or visibly lifted root plate, common in saturated DFW clay.
• A trunk now leaning toward the house that was upright before the storm.

A note on oaks and timing

Storms do not respect the oak-wilt calendar. Oaks should not be pruned from February through June because fresh cuts attract the beetles that spread oak wilt, but a genuine emergency, like an oak split over your bedroom, overrides that rule. When we have to cut an oak during the high-risk window, we paint the wounds immediately to reduce infection risk, something a rushed storm-chaser crew rarely bothers to do.