Do you need a permit to trim or remove a tree in Anaheim?

Three kinds of trees, three different answers

• A tree inside your property line, outside Anaheim Hills.

  Anaheim's tree permit is written for the Scenic Corridor, and the street tree rule covers the parkway. A shade tree, fruit tree or palm in your own yard in the flats falls under neither, so you can have it trimmed or taken out. If you live in a newer tract, check your HOA's rules first; those are separate from the city's.

• A street tree in the parkway.

  The strip between the sidewalk and the street is public, and so are the trees in it. The city trims about 6,000 of them a year on a district schedule. You need written permission from the city to cut, trim, prune or remove one, topping one is banned outright, and if one gets damaged you can be ordered to remove and replace it within 30 days at your cost. Ask through Anaheim Anytime or call Public Works at (714) 765-6860.

• A big oak, pepper or sycamore in Anaheim Hills.

  Inside the Scenic Corridor, oaks with a trunk 25 inches or more around and peppers or sycamores 50 inches or more around are "specimen trees." Removing one needs a city permit, and so does trimming or topping one hard enough to damage it, as the city arborist judges it. The details are below.

Where the Scenic Corridor is

The code draws it as everything in Anaheim east of where the 55 meets the 91, west of the Orange County line, south of the old Santa Fe railroad line and north of the city's southern limit, except the Anaheim Canyon business park. In plain words: Anaheim Hills and the Santa Ana Canyon side of the city. Our base is in Anaheim Hills, so these are trees we see every week. If you are on the line and unsure, the city's Planning and Building Department can tell you from your address.

Specimen trees in Anaheim Hills: what the rule actually says

• Only three kinds of trees. Oaks, peppers and sycamores. Eucalyptus, palms, pines and fruit trees are not on the list, whatever you may have read.
• Measured around the trunk, four feet up. Oaks count at 25 inches around, which is a trunk about 8 inches across. Peppers and sycamores count at 50 inches around, about 16 inches across. A tape measure settles it in a minute.
• Hard trimming counts, not just removal. The code's word is "destroy," and it includes trimming, topping or pruning a specimen tree to the point of damage. A correct thinning cut is a different thing from cutting a tree back to stubs, and we do not top trees.
• Trees you or a previous owner planted can be exempt. If the tree was part of the house's original landscape plan and cannot be seen from a street, public or private, or from a shared slope, the permit does not apply. A big oak in a hidden backyard is often this case.
• Damage counts too. Paving or piling material over the roots, nailing or wiring things to the trunk, and burning near it are all listed as injuring a specimen tree. Worth knowing before a patio or a pool goes in next to an old oak.

If a specimen tree is dead, diseased or dangerous

The city has a simpler permit for that, as long as an ISA certified arborist writes a report first. The report has to show at least one of these:

• The tree is dead.
• It is diseased in a way that threatens healthy trees nearby.
• Age, disease, a storm, fire or digging has weakened it enough to be an immediate danger.
• It could fall on the house, another structure or utility lines.
• It has damaged the house or its driveway, and the roots cannot be cut without killing it.
• The Fire Department ordered it removed.

The application goes to the Planning and Building Department on form Z205 with a site plan, photos of the tree, a list of replacement trees, two copies of the arborist report and the fee from the city's fee schedule.

The order matters. A specimen tree that comes down before the city approves the report has to go through the discretionary permit instead, and that one goes to the Planning Commission. Every specimen tree removed is replaced with 36-inch box trees from the city's list: one tree for a trunk under 38 inches around, two for 38 to 64 inches, three over 64.

What this means when we come out

• We do not touch parkway trees. If the tree you want trimmed is the city's, we tell you so and point you to Public Works instead of taking your money.
• If a tree looks like a permit case, you hear it before any work starts. When a specimen tree needs an arborist report, we work with an ISA certified arborist so the paperwork and the work line up.
• Most yards are none of this. The palms, shade trees and fruit trees on a normal lot get trimmed, removed or ground out with no paperwork, and everything we cut is chipped and hauled.
• Nesting birds apply everywhere. State law protects active nests year round, and for many birds the season runs February through August. Between February and August, have the tree checked for nests before any cutting.

More tree work

• Tree trimming
• Palm tree trimming
• Tree removal
• All tree service

What clients say

Anaheim tree permit questions