City forester warns residents about snow affecting tree branches

With snow expected to fall between Wednesday and Thursday, Colorado Springs foresters are warning residents that brittle branches may fall down as snow accumulates on tree leaves.

Dennis Will, a city forester with the Parks and Recreation Department, says that the trees may be especially prone to breakage during this storm because it has been so dry lately.

“The difficulty for the trees is they grew like mad in the summer and then all of a sudden it quit raining and so the trees have slowed down in their processes,” Will said. “They weren’t quite ready for winter.”

The cold front that hit Colorado Springs between October 9-10 brought strong changes in temperature, freezing the leaves onto the trees and preventing them from falling off naturally, Will said.

“As the night progresses as it gets colder, hopefully the snow won’t be as wet and it will be a little bit lighter,” Will said. “But like we saw in May, if we have a heavy wet snow then all bets are off. A lot of trees will be susceptible to damage.”

A heavy snowstorm in late May caused several tree branches to fall down throughout the city. Will said his team of 15 city foresters is still cleaning up all the debris that fell on city property.

He wanted to emphasize that the city is not in charge of cleaning up branches that fall on private property.

“Those trees that are in the right of way — typically that’s the space between the sidewalk and the curb and gutter — those belong to the city of Colorado Springs and those are the trees that city forestry is responsible for,” Will said.

If you would like to report debris on city property, you can call the city forestry department at (719)385-5942.

KRDO Only 2019