Metro Tree & Excavation

He came over and asked if he could leave tree shavings under my Dogwood Tree. My neighbor had a huge Magnolia tree cut down. There was a ton of shavings after the stump was ground up. He also said he would cut my grass for $25. I told him he could leave a few shavings, not a lot. When I came outside his worker was continuing to pile shavings under my tree. I told him hey that's enough. That is way too much. They were trying to keep from having to haul it all away. He said he is a professional landscaper but it clearly is unprofessional. He also left would shavings in my yard in a hole, which I did not ask him to do. Nor did he get my permission. It looks very odd and crazy. The wood shavings may even lead to making the hole bigger. I called him and he said he would remove some of the wood from the tree. I sent him a text. I am afraid all the wood shavings will damage my tree and possibly lead to termites. I didn't hire him and my yard should not have been impacted at all. It's going on 3 weeks now!

I do not usually do business with companies I have not researched on Angie's List, and this experience has reinforced the wisdom of that approach. After being offered a good price on removing one tree, "because they were in the area" we have been pitched lots of other work, while the original work was never done. We agreed to have one tree removed, and said he could clean up the island area between our house and the next door neighbor. It is in a very natural state, and is our other island, and our back yard. Our neighbors prefer a much more sparse look - two trees, lots of mulch, decking, concrete etc. No problem - to each his own, right? We keep the back very natural because it provides a visual and noise privacy shield between us and our neighbors. And I find it very peaceful. The first sign of trouble was when I looked out and realized that to do the work on the trees for our neighbor (they had 90% of their trees ripped out - with the exception of two that I thought were leaning dangerously and were touching my house) Cecil had driven his pickup and chipper across OUR yard, and parked in OUR yard. Our grass in not in good shape, and we are currently looking at our options, since it seems we have too much shade to grow grass well. But that does not mean I want heavy vehicles driven across it. He did not ask - just did it. The next sign of trouble was when they were chipping the trees of our neighbor, and started blowing the chips into the island area they said they were cleaning out, covering some fallen branches. I came out and told them to stop doing that - that when the one tree came out, I would be removing that island area completely, and pulling it back to just outside of my other trees - there was no point in extending the island to a tree I didn't have anymore. There was also no point in covering up fallen branches (the ones he said he would chip as part of the cleanup). He was clearly frustrated, and kept asking me didn't I like what he had done - it was opened up, it looked better - and I told him I was frankly horrified that he had clear cut all those trees and didn't like it at all, and as for what he had done in the island area, it was going to be tilled and dethatched later, so it was okay, but we weren't done with it. He kept saying he was going to fill it all in with the wood chips and make it all nice and pretty. He was going to join our island with our neighbors. He was a peace-maker. A lightbulb then went off for me. We have had trouble with these neighbors in the past - they moved in about a year ago. I watched their lawn company blow their leaves up and over their fence into our yard so my husband could clean them up. Several times, even though I asked the crew chief to stop, and then I had to say something to the woman of the couple. Two months ago, they had their yard redone for a reality TV show, and the crew drove over our yard several times, leaving huge ruts in the soggy lawn (lots of rain and some snow that week). They wore a path cutting through our yard to theirs, rather than walking on the street. Parked outside my house and sat in their cars late at night. Whistled and cat called my early-twenties daughter as she went in and out. Again, I asked the woman to intervene, but this evidently made me a "discourteous neighbor" and she denied they were doing it at all (in the meantime, the show producer came over and said they wouldn't do it again and tried to fix the damage). It became obvious to me that our neighbors did not like our yard, and the natural look, and wanted that whole island to look the way she wanted - so Cecil was doing to OUR yard what SHE wanted. And wanted to charge me for it. And she wanted him to use our yard for his trucks and equipment, rather than her nice yard. So as his truck was AGAIN sitting in my yard, after I told him not to drive it through there, I told him NOT to drive it back through - just to back the chipper and truck up through their yard and go out that way. He proceeded to tell me he was a Born Again Christian, and was a Man of God, and Didn't I Believe in Jesus Christ? How unprofessional can you get? I politely told him we had different beliefs and I didn't want to discuss it,. He pressed me again about Jesus, I repeated myself. Then he got in the truck and drove it back through my yard. I am pretty sure he is not coming back to take out that tree.