Winter storms present new danger in Auburn area: fallen trees

News reports on the most recent storm to roll through Northern California included rain and snowfall totals, wind speed, road closures and chain requirements. But the storm that lasted from last Saturday night through Tuesday did much more than douse Placer County with several inches of rain and dump snow up Interstate 80, from a light dusting in Auburn to several feet in the high elevations. It toppled several trees, which fall where they decide to fall when they decide to fall – on houses and fences and across streets. Photos and posts about trees taking out fences and barns quickly were posted to several Facebook pages in Placer County this week. The Auburn Police Department received five hazard calls throughout the storm, "which typically include calls such as trees in the roadway, power lines down, etc.," Lt. Bryan Morrison wrote in an email to the Auburn Journal. Evan Foss, owner of Evan Foss Enterprises in Newcastle, said he received "a dozen calls" for service, including one in Cool where "eight big oaks fell down and scared the living heck out of the horses. I spent all (Tuesday) cleaning that up so (the owner) could get her horses back out to pasture." While now is the time to create defensible space as preparation for the 2022 fire season, it's also the time to thin out trees or have them removed as defense against winter storms. "You want to ID potential hazard trees before they fall in the big storm," said Elisa Noble, who served as executive director with the Placer Resource Conservation District for 6½ years and now owns a business doing a variety of things, including property management consultation. She also serves on the North Auburn Ophir Fire Safe Council and encourages people to get involved in their local fire safe council. Winter weather damages trees. Foss, a 2010 Placer High School graduate who has done professional tree work since 2011 and started his business in 2018, said snow will freeze into hard ice and won't fall out of the tree. "The wind comes, you have 2,000 extra pounds of ice, and it just topples," Foss said, adding the trees in Cool were "good-size healthy oaks, 50 to 60 years old." The clean-up process is no small job. Foss said much of it requires heavy equipment, to include a crane, to get trees off structures and taking down a section of fence to move big logs and trees. "It's quite the process," he said, recalling several horse properties where storms knocked down fences, allowing horses and cows to get out. He has seen trees fall into swimming pools and pine trees take out other trees in backyards. Foss said certain trees can be trimmed and weight reductions can be made, while trees leaning heavily toward or over a structure can be considered for removal. "But sometimes, Mother Nature takes its own course and very healthy trees are overcome by strong winds/snow load," he said. "And improperly trimmed or unbalanced trees can be very susceptible to those forces as well." Noble said oak trees with big, heavy branches also have shallow roots and, combined with several years of drought, the trees become stressed and the ground "can't soak it up fast enough." She said akin to fire prevention, trees need to be limbed up in preparation for rain and snow. "You should be thinning overstocked trees and brush. They get stressed out and become hazard issues in the winter and fire risk in the summer," Noble said. "Drive down Mount Vernon (Road) and sees those leaners. Take care of it before it happens because it's gonna happen."