Sunrise Tree Service

A city with a tree minimum

Sunrise is unusual in Broward: the city does not just protect trees, it requires them. Every single-family lot has to keep a minimum of four trees, three in the smaller RS-7 districts, and a permit is required before removing any tree on any property. That changes how tree work is planned here. A removal is really a removal plus a replacement, and the permit application needs a tree survey unless the lot has five or fewer trees, in which case a sworn affidavit will do.

We work inside those rules every week. The estimate visit tells you whether your tree can come out, what has to go back in, and whether it qualifies under the state's dangerous-tree exemption, which our ISA Certified Arborist can certify. Then the crew trims, removes, grinds and cleans up, from the 1970s lots of Sunrise Golf Village to the newer homes out by Sawgrass.

Tree services we provide in Sunrise

• Tree trimming & pruning - oaks, black olives and mahoganies in Sunrise Golf Village and Springtree thinned and raised off roofs, which usually avoids a removal and a permit altogether.
• Tree removal - permitted removals with the tree survey or affidavit, the replacement plan and the city application handled together.
• Stump grinding - stumps ground below grade so the replacement tree the city requires can go in the same spot.
• Palm trimming - queen, royal and foxtail palms cleaned on the schedule the Sunrise Lakes and Welleby associations expect.
• Storm & emergency service - downed trees cleared after storms, with the arborist available to certify dangerous trees for permit-free removal.
• Lot & land clearing - overgrown lots cleared with the tree survey done first, since every tree on the lot counts toward the minimum.

Sunrise neighborhoods and the trees in them

Sunrise Golf Village and the original sections east of Pine Island Road were built in the late 1960s and 1970s with planted black olives, live oaks and mahoganies that are now fifty years old and far larger than the lots they sit on. Limbs over roofs, roots in the driveway and canopies that have never been thinned are the standard calls. Sunrise Lakes, the 55-and-over condo community along the golf course, has association-managed common trees and a steady need for palm cleaning and storm pruning.

Welleby, Springtree and the neighborhoods along Oakland Park Boulevard are 1980s and 1990s builds with smaller lots and the usual South Florida package: queen and royal palms, an oak or black olive in the swale, ficus hedges on the lines. The hedges are the most frequent problem, overgrown and losing leaves to whitefly. Out west, Sawgrass and the homes near the Sawgrass Expressway sit on the edge of the Everglades, where melaleuca and Australian pine still turn up on the property lines and the wind comes in with nothing to slow it.

Tree removal permits in Sunrise

The City of Sunrise requires a tree removal permit before removing any tree on any property, and removing one without a permit is treated as a public nuisance. The application needs a tree survey unless the lot has five or fewer trees, where a sworn affidavit can substitute. Single-family lots must keep a minimum of four trees (three in RS-7 districts), and required trees are replaced one for one. Under Florida Statute 163.045, a tree that an ISA Certified Arborist documents as a danger to people or property on a residential lot can be removed without a permit, fee or replacement; our arborist provides that certification when it applies. Nuisance exotics like melaleuca and Australian pine still need the permit but no replacement. The city's Urban Forester reviews applications under Section 16-172 of the code. We prepare the survey or affidavit and the replacement plan with the estimate. Our Broward tree permit guide covers the county rules.

Storm season on the western edge

Western Sunrise, from Welleby to Sawgrass, is the last line of houses before the Everglades, and storms arrive there with full force. The planted trees on small 1980s and 1990s lots are the ones that go over onto roofs: black olives with sail-like canopies, oaks with long limbs that were never reduced, and ficus hedges that have become shallow-rooted trees. Thinning, limb reduction and dead-wood removal in spring are what keep them standing, along with removing trees that are already hollow or leaning. After a storm we clear trees off houses first, then streets and driveways, and we cut debris to the lengths the city's contractors will pick up.