Pruning and Lopping in Cromer

The flats

Cromer sits inland from Dee Why and Narrabeen on comparatively flat ground around the Dee Why Creek catchment, bordered by the Cromer Heights ridge and Narrabeen Lagoon's western arms. That flatness makes it one of the more straightforward parts of the Northern Beaches to work in.

Access is the reason. Post-war and later subdivision means streets where a chipper and tipper can park, driveways a truck can use, and side gates wide enough for a stump grinder. Compare that with an escarpment block at Bilgola or Whale Beach, where everything is carried up stairs, and the difference in quoted hours is substantial.

The rules still apply

Northern Beaches Council runs one set of tree controls across the whole LGA, so easy access does not mean fewer requirements. There is a size threshold, an exempt-species list covering the common declared weeds, and pruning beyond routine deadwooding generally needs the same approval as removal.

Two local layers: riparian controls along Dee Why Creek and its tributaries, where bank vegetation is treated more carefully; and bushfire prone land mapping toward the Cromer Heights ridge and the reserve edges, where 10/50 entitlement may apply inside mapped areas. Check the address on the NSW Rural Fire Service tool rather than assuming.

What grows here

The native remnant on the flats and the creek margins runs to swamp mahogany, paperbark, swamp oak and cabbage tree palm on the wetter ground, with angophora, red bloodwood and Sydney peppermint on the rises.

The larger share of the work, though, is garden planting from the 1960s and 1970s that has simply outgrown the blocks: liquidambar, jacaranda, camphor laurel, cocos palm, and a fair number of eucalypts planted as tube stock and now thirty metres tall three metres from a house.

Salt exposure here is moderate rather than severe — enough to favour coastal species on the seaward side, nothing like the ocean frontage a couple of kilometres east.

The work

Crown reduction, staged. Where a sound tree has outgrown its position but is worth keeping. No more than about a quarter of the live crown in a season.

Clearance pruning. Foliage off roofs, gutters and solar panels.

Deadwooding. Particularly on the larger eucalypts.

Removal where the species was the mistake. A forest tree planted a few metres from a dwelling is not a pruning problem. Repeated reduction on the wrong tree in the wrong place costs more over a decade than removing it once and planting something appropriate.

Palm work. Cocos palms are common through the older gardens, generally exempt, quick and light. Note that the native cabbage tree palm is a different species and is usually not exempt — worth identifying correctly before cutting.

Nearby

Belrose is up on the ridge to the west, Mona Vale covers removals to the north, Northern Beaches Council covers the rules and the Northern Beaches region page covers the peninsula.

Ring (02) 9000 1943, or read what lopping should mean.

Other numbers for this area

You can also reach us on (02) 9538 7842. Either number reaches the same team - tell us the suburb and what the job involves and we will get an arborist out to look at it.