Comment by giardini | Hacker News Reader

Comment by giardini | Hacker News Reader

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Any tree will eventually extend roots beneath your foundation and do damage. They will shift and crack the foundation (unless you use pillar construction), break pipes and structures and will penetrate your sewer lines. If you're lucky you will kill them before they do any severe damage.

Though it sounds absurd, rather than a tree, it might be better to put up a shade (i.e., two poles and a sail cloth between them) to block the lith/heat. It would definitely be cheaper than having a tree although your neighbors might not like it.

A tree must be trimmed annually once it reaches a certain size; eventually it must be removed. But then a new problem arises: the dying tree roots, which extend entirely across and below the land, and which had previously remained placidly underground and invisible, now begin to rot, swell and rise irregularly everywhere. They thrust upward at random ruining the lawn's former level appearance. You can no longer mow your lawn: the lawnmower strikes the rising roots and either breaks the blade or the lawnmower stalls. The surface is no longer level. You can let your lawn lie fallow for 20 more years until the roots rot completely or...

... you pay someone enough to remove all the roots and fill them in with soil, then re-level and re-sod the lawn. That likely triples the cost of removal.

Trees look great - from a distance.

It is a tribute to the old "pier and beam" construction techniques that their use evades these problems somewhat by allowing you to raise/lower the piers in response to tree growth/intrusion, thus maintaining a level house (so your grandkids can play marbles on the wood floor in the living room).

Root barriers may be a reasonable solution too, but they must be maintained. I am unfamiliar with their success rate.

I recently saw an 11-story high-rise whose foundation is endangered by the "nice trees" that were planted at its base to form a park for the building's inhabitants decades ago. The trees are moving everything: the building, the streets around the building, *everything!! Imagine having bought a condo in that buiding! What a disaster.

How long is eventually, because in the Pacific Northwest, there are 100ft+ trees every which way and lots of houses built in between them. I have never heard of this lawn issue, nor any foundations ruined by the trees (not planted directly next to the house).

Lots of houses have decorative maples/plums/cherry/crabapples/fig in their front yard within 30ft of the foundation. I thought the rule of thumb was roots go as far as the circumference of the tree branches.

My experience is mostly in the southeast region of Texas where the land is flat and fertile. This would be considered good farmland by most people. It is in these regions, separated by mostly pine forests, that I have seen considerable housing development.

Pricier homes of the Pacific Northwest are usually well-clear of the larger trees that challenge foundations. And I'm sure they're usually built by people knowledgeable about tree intrusion. By well-clear I mean half a football field away. I don't know about more densely-populated areas.

Smaller decorative trees are not usually a problem but nonetheless are best kept away from structures. It's the "nice old 50-year old oak tree" or the "30-year old pine tree" that is within 20 feet that will ruin your lawn and house.

I have a neighbor who simultaneously removed an oak tree from his back yard and a rather large young pine from his front yard ~12 years ago. The back yard is just starting to settle down. The front still looks bad. He mows his lawn in shifts: part at a time until he tires. During the rainy season you can still easily trace the oak tree's rotting roots as they steer the rainwater through the back yard. He saws and hacks at the roots, trying to keep the general flow toward the front yard and the street (as drainage is supposed to be in these neighborhoods). I know that he would be happier with a simple flat backyard of grass for his grandchildren to play on.

Every old tree near our lovely family home eventually had to be removed. This, despite the classic pier-and-beam construction. The shifting had gone too far to adjust the piers. It was time to adjust the trees: and my father, being an engineer, had to run the operation himself.

What an eye-opener that was: who knew that when an inch-thick braided steel cable holding an oak tree in suspension as it is sawed down could break, whip backward, slash and tear a 3-inch deep by 3-foot wound across the side of an even-larger pecan tree in less than the blink of an eye? Thank God no one was standing in the open area when the cable broke!

> Pricier homes of the Pacific Northwest are usually well-clear of the larger trees that challenge foundations.

That's not an accurate explanation. In the PNW, in many cities, older more expensive neighborhoods tend to have more trees, not less. It's a serious equity issue, given the heat island effect.

The difference in foundation damage is because of soil profiles, not planting behaviors. We don't tend to have expansive soils around here. Take away the clay and you lose the hydrological forces which allow tree root to inhabit previously occupied pores.

> My experience is mostly in the southeast region of Texas where the land is flat and fertile.

That's evident. You are extrapolating your experience across the rest of the world, and it simply doesn't jibe with the reality that we live in.

Trees get a lot of blame, unfairly, for damage due to clay and expansive soils.

In Texas, the damage due to "roots" is not due to tree growth alone, it's the desiccation and rehydration of clay that's the problem. Very similar to frost jacking of walls in Northern climates

That hasn't been my experience with many trees and homes. Lots of people live with trees around - maybe most people who are in houses. I don't personally know of anyone with these problems, though I've heard of things like it.

Maybe the tree doesn't need to be right next your structure?

> A tree must be trimmed annually once it reaches a certain size; eventually it must be removed.

Definitely not my experience!

It is a peculiarity of how houses are built in Texas. A lot of Texas has clay a few feet underground. This clay soil is vulnerable to trees sucking up water which leads to foundation issues. Some homes have root retarders to prevent this. https://www.texasinspector.com/files/Structural-Slabs-FPA-SC...

Another Texas problem is that the sewer gray water line is placed relatively shallow. I had neighbors who to pay a crew of dudes shoveling like mad to unearth the sewer line so the plumber can repair it. The most common reason was roots from a large tree. https://www.metroflowplumbing.com/detecting-and-preventing-t...

Trees reach a certain size, grow old and then they die. You either remove them or let their parts fall.

We have a nearly 50-year-old oak in our backyard. It is dying. Limbs are falling off it. We trim it. But it WILL die. We will dismantle it in an orderly manner rather than wait for a hurricane to hurl its parts into neighborhood homes.

There are methods for cultivating otherwise large-growth trees. I've seen them in French literature. Roughly they trim the tree each year and limit its above-ground height to human height. The trunk is allowed to grow significantly thick and branches are limited in length. I do not recall the name of the technique but IIrc it is primarily used in growing fruit.

I see neighborhoods filled with large-growth trees which are not tended at all, generally speaking. The evidence doesn't match the theory.

Yes trees fall, and so does every building and everything else under the Sun, which itself will die. Trees have long lives, centuries for many. That's a pretty minor risk. Buildings need maintenance too.

A similar tirade can be made about rain, wind, sunshine, heat and cold. Entropy happens. I think the nature of what you're saying isn't universal. Different style foundations, different kinds of ground and different kinds of trees will mean different things. Some issues can be avoided with minimal foresight. Some won't happen for decades at which point the balance of benefit vs cost comes into question. Some issues are really just expectations that many would consider unnecessary, like having a flat lawn.

Where I live in the Midwest, trees around houses is incredibly common. I wouldn't want to live in a neighborhood without them.

Didn't intend to make a tirade but:

Yes! Search for a house without a tree in a neighborhood full of trees. Enjoy!

Having a flat lawn may be unnecessary, but generally, most people want a lawn that a lawnmower can cross w/o self-destructing [or that their oft-drunken uncle can walk across after dark without tripping on a root and passing before his time.]

A lawnmower blade is usually not adequate for a 4-inch root knuckle risen from the depths - that requires a chain saw. But then you're chain-sawing in dirt, mud and root, so neither safe nor easy. This is a contest the homeowner cannot win, merely survive.

If he’s that drunk all the time, the uncle might want to wear a helmet.

"Any tree" is patently false. There are trees that are known pavement-breakers, and trees whose roots are too timid to move smallish stones.

Sure. Here are some:

"27 Tree Species That Are Bad For Foundations (Explained)"

https://homeinspectioninsider.com/tree-species-that-are-bad-...

“unless you use pillar construction”

And no good reason not to, generally. Our house is elevated on 18 concrete piers, anchored onto the bedrock - because the soil is shallow and not stable. We have trees growing inches from the house.

> Any tree will eventually extend roots beneath your foundation and do damage. They will shift and crack the foundation (unless you use pillar construction), break pipes and structures and will penetrate your sewer lines. If you're lucky you will kill them before they do any severe damage.

And yet this isn't a problem anywhere else in the world.

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