Garland County
Tree Service (501) 781-0394

Stone-pier craftsman bungalows stepping up a hillside street under old white oaks and pines in Hot Springs

Read before you spend

Tree owner guides for Hot Springs

Some tree questions cost nothing to answer well and hundreds to answer badly. These cover the ones Garland County actually asks: whose tree it is when the Park line or a neighbor's fence runs through the picture, what to do with a pine the ice bent, where the brush goes when the county has stopped all burning, and how to prune a crape myrtle without wrecking it. When the honest answer is "leave the tree alone," the guide says that.

And when a guide ends at "have someone look at the tree," the looking is what the crews here do. Each kind of job has its own page, written up the same plain way: taking a tree down, the trim and prune work, what happens to the stump, clearing a lot or a view, and the storm calls, plus the price sheet. The rest lives on the homepage.

Oct 15, 2026

A broken limb hung up in the tree over your roof

The wind or the ice has moved on and the yard is mostly picked up. One thing is left, and you keep looking up at it. A broken limb, or the top of a pine, lying across the branches above the roof or the drive. It has been up there since the storm, and it looks like it means to stay.

Oct 12, 2026

Does a lightning-struck tree in Hot Springs have to come down?

Sometime this summer a storm put lightning into the tallest tree on the lot. Maybe you heard it hit. Maybe you only found a strip of bare wood down the trunk weeks later, or bark lying in the grass. The tree is still green in October.

Oct 8, 2026

Mistletoe in a Hot Springs hardwood comes out with the limb, not by the clump

The leaves came down over a weekend, and now there are green balls high in the big tree out front, plain from the porch and from every porch across the street. They were up there all summer, hidden.

Oct 5, 2026

Tree damage at a Hot Springs lake house while you are out of town

The storm went through Garland County overnight and you found out from a neighbor's text. The weekend place on Lake Hamilton, the Village house you leave for the winter, or a parent's house the family looks after from away has nobody in it. The damage that would be urgent with you home is urgent now. Someone else has to look at it, though, and the price has to be agreed with an owner who is not standing in the yard.

Oct 2, 2026

Why a Hot Springs stump keeps sprouting

The sweetgum came down two summers ago and the stump is still there, wearing a ring of green whips that the string trimmer takes off every few weeks. The pine that came down beside it has done nothing but turn gray.

Sep 29, 2026

Clearing a wooded Hot Springs lot to build on

You bought a wooded slope above Lake Hamilton, or a lot in Hot Springs Village, and a house is going on it. Some of those trees have to go before the builder arrives. Which ones, and in what order, decides how much of the lot you still have when the roof goes on.

Sep 26, 2026

Which tree comes down first on a Hot Springs lot?

Six or eight trees on a hillside lot, several of them tall pines, and room in the budget for one this fall. The tree people point at is usually the ugliest. The one that should go first is the one with something underneath it.

Sep 22, 2026

What pruning can and cannot do for a Hot Springs pine

Five pines standing over a hillside bungalow, and the question is nearly always the same one. Can they be cut back some? A loblolly is not a shade tree, and what it does with a cut is not what the oak next to it does.

Sep 18, 2026

Clearing a lake view in Hot Springs without topping the trees

You bought the lot for the water and you can hear it better than you can see it. The fastest-sounding answer is to have the pines cut down to a height. That answer buys a couple of good seasons and then hands you a row of broken-topped trees and the same blocked view.

Sep 15, 2026

When a Hot Springs tree removal needs a crane instead of a climber

Start at the street, not at the tree. On the hillside blocks off Park Avenue, and on nearly every lot that falls away toward Lake Hamilton, the stretch of ground between the pavement and the trunk is what settles how a tree comes down and most of what it costs.

Sep 11, 2026

What pine beetle looks like on a Hot Springs pine, and how long you have

A loblolly that was green in June and rust-red by Labor Day did not die of old age. A beetle the size of a grain of rice got under the bark, and by the time the crown turned, its brood had most likely moved to the next pine over. The trunk showed it weeks before the needles did.

Sep 2, 2026

Bent pines after an ice storm: save it or take it down?

Oaks shed limbs in ice. Pines bend. The morning after, half the yards in Garland County have a loblolly bowed over the drive, and the question is the same in every one: does it come back, or does it come down?

Sep 2, 2026

Where does the brush go when Garland County bans burning?

Take down one big pine and you have a pickup load of trunk and a small hill of limbs. Most of the year here, lighting it is not an option. Here is what happens to the wood instead, and what each choice does to the estimate.

Sep 2, 2026

How to prune a crape myrtle in Hot Springs (and what not to do)

Drive any street in Hot Springs in February and you will see crape myrtles cut back to fists on stubs. The tree survives it. It also blooms less, grows weaker, and never gets the smooth trunks it was planted for.

Sep 2, 2026

Whose tree is it? The Park line, the neighbor's fence, and the Village

Around Hot Springs a tree can hang over your roof and still not be yours to cut. Find the line first. The money question is easy once you know who owns the trunk.

Written estimates, before any saw starts

Guide didn't settle it? Ask about your actual tree.

Describe the tree and the question. Sometimes the answer is a price, and sometimes it is that the tree is fine and should stay. Either way it costs nothing to ask. Or call (501) 781-0394.

Itemized on paper - the tree, the haul-off, the stump if you want it gone
A tree on a roof, a car, or a service drop jumps the schedule
Steep-lot rigging and crane days are priced up front, never sprung after

Call (501) 781-0394