Tree Service in Akron, OH

Tree service in Akron usually means working around a century of growth. The city's population tripled between 1910 and 1920 during the rubber boom, from about 69,000 to more than 208,000, and whole neighborhoods like Goodyear Heights and Firestone Park went up for factory workers in a few years. The trees planted along those streets and in those backyards are now 80 to 100 feet of oak, maple and beech standing a few feet from houses, garages and power lines. Most of what we do comes down to three questions: is the tree healthy, is it too close to something that matters, and what is the safest way to cut it back or take it down on a lot with very little room?

Snow, ice and summer storms

Akron averages about 47 inches of snow a year, and the wet, heavy kind that comes in late fall and March is hardest on trees that still hold leaves or have long, horizontal limbs. Summer is the other risk. On August 25, 2023, a line of storms produced six confirmed tornadoes across northeast Ohio and left about 220,000 FirstEnergy customers without power; in Akron a large branch went through a roof on Goodview Avenue, a tree landed on a car in Goodyear Heights and a fallen tree closed Mogadore Road. A year later, on August 6, 2024, an EF1 tornado with winds near 104 mph tore through Richfield and Boston and knocked down trees across Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Thinning heavy crowns, removing deadwood and reducing long limbs over roofs before storm season costs far less than cleaning up after a failure.

Pests and diseases that change the job

Emerald ash borer was first identified in Ohio in 2003, in Lucas County, and spread across the state within a few years. Most untreated ash in the Akron area is now dead or dying, and standing dead ash turns brittle, which makes it harder to climb and less predictable to lower. Beech leaf disease, caused by a microscopic nematode, was first found in Lake County in 2012; Ohio State University Extension reports it in 25 Ohio counties and notes that infected beech of any age can die within two to seven years. Oak wilt hit trees on Akron's north and west sides badly enough that the city warned residents in 2017, and spotted lanternfly has now been seen in Summit County. Each of these changes what we recommend: remove, treat, prune, or wait.

Devil strips, the city and the power company

The strip of grass between the sidewalk and the curb (the devil strip, in Akron) is city right-of-way. The City of Akron's Parks Maintenance forestry crew removes and trims street trees there, and residents request that work through 311 or the city's online service request page. The city has also been planting heavily, about 1,800 new street trees in 2025 alone, so many devil strips now hold young red oaks, sugar maples and serviceberries. If a tree in front of your house looks like a city tree, we'll tell you before quoting. Trees tangled in Ohio Edison's lines are handled by the utility, which trims around its lines on a four-year cycle in Summit County.

Get a Free Estimate

What an estimate includes

• A look at each tree: species, lean, deadwood, cracks, cavities and decay at the base
• What's underneath it: roof, garage, fence, patio, driveway, the neighbor's yard
• Whether it's on your property, in the devil strip, or near utility lines
• How the job will be done: climbing and rigging, a bucket truck, or a crane
• What happens to logs, brush, chips and the stump
• One written price per tree, with nothing added unless you approve it

Akron is the center of our service area, and we work out from it across Summit County and into western Portage County. North of the city that means Cuyahoga Falls, Stow, Munroe Falls, Silver Lake, Hudson, Twinsburg, Macedonia, Richfield and Peninsula along the Cuyahoga Valley. To the west and south it means Fairlawn, Bath, Copley, Norton, Barberton, Wadsworth, Coventry Township and the Portage Lakes, Green and Springfield Township. To the east we cover Tallmadge, Kent, Streetsboro, Aurora and Ravenna. Akron's inner-ring neighborhoods have the oldest and largest trees on the smallest lots. Suburbs like Hudson, Bath and Copley have wooded lots on an acre or more, with ravines and long driveways that change how equipment gets in. Who owns the trees along the road and what each city or township asks before cutting differs from one place to the next, so each town page covers what we know about that community.