In January 2007, an ice storm dropped roughly two inches of ice on Greene County. The downed trees, broken lines, and structural damage cost the county around forty million dollars in public infrastructure alone — to say nothing of private property. As of late 2024, local news reports area tree services were still dealing with structural failures from trees that were stub-cut after that storm and regrew with weak attachments.
Southwest Missouri storms are predictable in a specific way: they're not constantly happening, but when they hit, they hit hard, and the trees that fail are the ones that were already going to fail. The prep work is therefore knowable.
This checklist is the one we use ourselves when walking a property pre-season, and what we tell every commercial client to do at minimum once a year.
What to check (and when)
Late autumn — before ice season
Late October through November, when leaves are mostly off the deciduous trees and the structure is visible:
- Walk the perimeter of every mature tree. Look up. Identify any dead branches 1.5 inches or larger in the canopy.
- Check the trunk and root flare. Mushrooms or conks growing on the trunk or at the base are decay fungi — they need an arborist's eyes on them before winter loads hit.
- Look for cracks. Vertical cracks running down the trunk, especially in the central leader, mean structural compromise.
- Inspect co-dominant stems. Trees with two main trunks of similar size — particularly with bark pinched between them ("included bark") — are prime ice-storm failure candidates.
- Look at the soil at the base. Heaving, cracking, or visibly exposed roots on the uphill side of a leaning tree is a red flag for root-plate failure.
If you find any of these, get them looked at before the storm. Corrective pruning, deadwood removal, or cabling done now is far cheaper than the cleanup after a failure.
Early spring — before storm season
March through April, before thunderstorm and tornado season:
- Re-check anything you flagged in autumn that didn't get addressed.
- Look for winter-storm damage you didn't see — branches partially broken but still hanging, called "hangers" or "widow-makers." Wind events tear them down later, often onto something valuable.
- Check fast-growing weak-wooded species first. Silver maples, Bradford pears, willows, cottonwoods, hackberries. These are the trees most likely to split in May–July straight-line winds.
Mid-summer — the bagworm and pest window
June and July, for evergreens specifically:
- Inspect cedar, arborvitae, juniper, and pine for bagworms. If you can see the bags, they're already established. Treatment is most effective in June while caterpillars are small.
What to fix (in order of priority)
If you only have budget for some of it, prioritize this order:
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Dead trees within striking distance of structures or occupied areas. This is non-negotiable. Dead trees fail unpredictably and the failure mode is rarely clean.
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Major dead branches in living trees. Especially branches over driveways, walkways, roofs, vehicles, or play areas. Removal of dead wood reduces falling-debris risk and prevents decay fungi from working into the living parts of the tree.
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Structurally compromised trees that can be saved. Co-dominant trunks with included bark might be candidates for cabling and bracing rather than removal. Cracks might be assessable as "stable" with the right inspection. This is where an arborist visit pays for itself.
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Trees with active disease. EAB-affected ash that's still in the treatment window, oaks showing wilt symptoms, anything declining year over year. Earlier intervention = more options.
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Trees that survived past storms with stub cuts. The 2007 ice-storm legacy work continues. If your tree was "topped" or had major scaffold limbs cut back to stubs rather than properly reduced, those stubs grew back as weakly-attached new branches. Targeted reduction and cabling can salvage some; others need to be removed.
What to do during a storm
Don't go outside while a storm is active. Trees fail during the storm; cleanup is a tomorrow problem unless something is actively threatening people inside the house. After it passes:
- Stay clear of any downed power lines. Call the utility first, then us.
- Don't walk under partially failed trees. Hangers can drop hours after the storm with no additional wind.
- Photograph damage before any cleanup, in case you'll be making an insurance claim.
- Move vehicles out from under any visibly damaged canopy.
When to call us
Call immediately if:
- A tree is leaning over a structure where it wasn't leaning before.
- Major limbs are partially broken and visibly swinging.
- A trunk has split or partially uprooted.
- A tree is on a power line, vehicle, or structure.
- Bark has been stripped vertically along the trunk of a tree you want to save.
Call within a day or two if:
- Branches are down in the yard but not threatening anything.
- The tree is structurally fine but needs cleanup of broken or hanging material.
- You see something concerning but it's not actively dangerous.
We answer the office line (417) 323-6775 during business hours; emergency calls route to Jordan's cell after hours.
Insurance documentation
Most homeowner's policies cover removal of trees that have damaged a covered structure. They don't generally cover removal of standing hazardous trees that haven't hit anything yet, or routine cleanup of branches in the yard.
If you'll be filing a claim:
- Take photos before any cleanup, including wide shots that show the tree, the damage, and the structure it hit.
- Note the time and date of the storm event.
- Save any receipts for emergency mitigation work (tarps over damaged roofs, etc.).
- We provide written documentation as part of any storm-cleanup job — what we removed, what condition the tree was in, what the failure mode was. Submit it with the claim.
The bigger picture
Storms are events; tree care is a discipline. The single biggest predictor of how much storm damage a property takes is the condition of its trees going into the storm — not the storm itself. A healthy, well-structured tree can shed an ice load and survive. A stub-cut survivor of an old storm fails again in the next one.
Late autumn is when we do most of our pre-storm assessment work. If you've got mature trees and you haven't had an arborist's eyes on them in a few years, book a walk-through before the next round of weather rolls in.
(417) 323-6775 · Request an assessment