Tree Service in Alma, MI

They call Alma "Scotland USA," and every Memorial Day weekend the Highland Festival fills the Alma College green with bagpipes, kilts, and heavy athletics. The rest of the year it's a handsome Gratiot County college town on the Pine River, and it wears its trees well — big sugar maples arching over the side streets, red oaks standing in the older yards, white pines rising above the rooftops near campus.

Trees like that are the reason we love working in Alma, and the reason the work takes a steady hand. Hayworth Tree Service is family-owned, licensed and insured, and much of what we do here is caring for tall, mature trees that have been part of the neighborhood longer than most of the houses' current owners.

From the Pine River to the college green

Old trees don't ask for much, but what they ask for matters. The bread and butter is pruning — clearing deadwood, lifting a canopy off a roofline, keeping a heavy maple balanced so it doesn't tear itself apart in a wind. On oaks, timing is everything: we prune red and white oaks only from November through March so a fresh cut doesn't open the door to oak wilt, which moves through a stand of oaks fast once it takes hold. If a tree's showing trouble we can't read from the ground, we'll give it a proper risk assessment and tell you what we find.

Old, tall trees need a steady hand

Height changes the whole job. A seventy-foot maple over a Pine River back yard can't just be dropped — it's taken apart from the top down, piece by roped piece. When a grand old tree is structurally sound but carrying too much weight or a suspect fork, a crown reduction or a cabling and bracing job can keep it standing safely for years to come. And when a tree is truly failing — dead, diseased, or hollow — we remove it cleanly and can treat the ones nearby that are still worth protecting from disease and pests.

Alma sits at the center of our Gratiot County routes. We're across the river in St. Louis all the time, down in Ithaca most weeks, and north up to Mount Pleasant regularly.

What Alma homeowners tell us

The feedback we hear here comes back to a few things. We answer the phone and get out for the estimate quickly. Our pricing is fair and written down, and folks appreciate that we'll talk them out of an unnecessary removal as readily as we'll do one. We work carefully around houses, wires, and the sidewalks people actually use. And we clean up thoroughly — the wood hauled or stacked as you like it, the yard raked, nothing left behind but the job done.

If there's a towering old tree you're proud of but a little worried about, let's give it a look before winter or the next big blow. Call Hayworth Tree Service at (208) 635-2100 and we'll set up a free, no-obligation estimate and honest advice, whether that means saving the tree or safely taking it down.