Commercial Tree Inventory Starter Checklist

A record of each tree on a property with its location, species, approximate size, condition, observed defects, recommended action and priority — usually delivered as a map plus a spreadsheet you keep and update. It turns 'there are a lot of trees here' into a list you can budget, schedule and hand to a successor.

Above roughly a dozen significant trees, and sooner if the site has public access or a duty of care to tenants or residents. Below that a simple list and annual photographs are enough. The test is whether you could currently say, without walking the site, which three trees need attention first.

It converts an unbounded liability into a budgeted line. Instead of an emergency spend whenever something fails, you get a prioritised programme spread across budget years, at lower unit prices because work is scheduled and batched rather than urgent. That is easier to defend to a board or an owner than an unpredictable line.

By consequence first, condition second. Trees over occupied buildings, parking, walkways and play areas come before trees over lawn, whatever their relative condition. That ordering feels wrong to people who want the worst-looking tree dealt with first, and it is the ordering that actually reduces risk per dollar.

An annual walk to update conditions and close out completed work, with a fuller re-survey every few years or after a severe storm. An inventory that is never updated becomes a historical document, and the whole value is that it describes the site as it is now.

A location precise enough to find it again, species, trunk diameter, an overall condition rating, the specific defects observed, what is underneath it, the recommended action, a priority, and the date of the observation. The date is what makes the record defensible later.

It is the practical evidence of active management rather than neglect, which is the distinction that matters if a tree ever causes damage. It cuts both ways honestly — it also records that you were told — but a documented programme you are working through is a far better position than no record at all.

Someone qualified in tree assessment and, ideally, not the company that would perform the resulting work. An inventory that recommends removals is worth more when the person writing it has no bid attached, and it is the same reasoning as not using a seller's inspector.

They are the most predictable large cost most Vermont managed properties face and they deserve their own column. Inventory them, rank by what is beneath, decide treat-or-remove for each, and schedule the removals across budget years while the wood is still sound rather than facing a set of brittle dead ash at once.

The inventory sets the programme; the contract executes it. A cyclical arrangement — deadwood and clearance on a rotation, inspection at a stated interval, urgent work on call — spreads cost predictably and keeps the record current as a by-product. Without the inventory a maintenance contract is just scheduled guessing.

Establish ownership before including them. The right-of-way is often wider than the pavement, frequently extending well behind the shoulder, so a tree the property has always maintained may be public. Getting that wrong means either budgeting for someone else's tree or authorising work you had no authority to order.

A map, a spreadsheet you own in an editable format, and a short written summary of the priorities and the recommended programme. Insist on the editable data rather than only a PDF — the inventory has to be updatable by whoever manages the site next, or it becomes a snapshot rather than a tool.