Neighbors at odds over removal of cottonwoods

Where shade is at a premium -- in new home developments, parking lots and office parks -- trees are a hot commodity for their cooling effect and their beauty.

But the western cottonwood tree, a fast-growing and short-lived variety that thrives in wide-open spaces and along riverbeds in Nevada and elsewhere, may be an exception to that rule, at least when it comes to residential landscaping, according to several Las Vegans familiar with the tree.

To several members of the Peccole Ranch Homeowners Association in northwest Las Vegas, the trees are more trouble than they're worth. The association wants to get rid of all of the cottonwoods dotting the surface of their communal grounds.

Beginning several months ago, the association began the process of cutting down and uprooting nearly 1,000 such trees planted by developers at the master-planned community spearheaded by Peccole Nevada Corp.

That's because the shade the trees provided wasn't enough to offset the destruction their roots caused as they spread across the surface of the earth in search of water, buckling sidewalks, uplifting backyard walls and wrapping themselves around pools and pipelines, representatives for the association said.

The representatives are not alone in their distaste for the cottonwood. Their sentiment is echoed by several local landscapers and native plant experts, who all agreed that cottonwood trees can do serious damage to sidewalks and other structures. They are best suited to farms and other large expanses of land, Jeanette Michaelson, a botonist and a landscape manager for Pulte Homes, said.

To the developers who planted them, the trees were miracle growers that looked substantial even when they were relatively young, Diane Howe, the general manager of the homeowners association, said. Only about 15 years old now, many of the cottonwood trees had reached heights as great as 70 feet before they were cut down.

To many residents unaware or unaffected by the property damage caused by the cottonwoods, they're a little bit of heaven, an oasis in the desert of Southern Nevada, towering over homes and offering a bit of respite from the harsh rays of the sun. Golden yellow in the fall, they're a unique contribution to the color palette here.

"They're the reason I moved into this place," said Damian Mace.

Mace, along with his fiancee, was recently alarmed to discover barren stumps directly behind his apartment complex, The Palms at Peccole Ranch, 9599 W. Charleston Blvd. Until last week, nine cottonwood trees had towered over the land there.

"They're like instant landscape," said Joe Vickers, a manager for Landscape Services, a local company that designs outdoor spaces for developers and home builders in Las Vegas, referring to the cottonwood. When planted, the tree is typically 6-feet tall. By the end of its first year in the ground, it can reach 10-feet, Vickers said.

His company, though, avoids planting the cottonwood because of its potential to damage curbs and sidewalks and also to injure people, he said. Because the tree is fast growing, its wood also tends to be weak, he added. Branches can fall randomly, harming passersby, he said.

Removing the trees is perfectly reasonable, said Jim Morefield of the Nevada Native Plant Society. Cottonwood trees are extremely aggressive in their search for water and tend to crowd out other plants as well as cause damage to structures, he said.

By the end of this summer the homeowners association hopes to finish cutting down the remaining trees along the meandering paths of the development's "greenbelt," a narrow swath of land that runs for nearly 17 miles and serves as a communal recreation area for residents.

Cutting down the trees was not a measure the homeowners association took lightly, said Richard Bentel, the president of the group's board of directors. The trees were very beautiful and the idea of cutting them down angered many of the new residents at first.

"Most of the people doing the complaining weren't here at the beginning," said Bentel.

"They didn't know anything about why we were cutting them down," he said, adding that the association did notify its residents of its plans at meetings and in community newsletters. "But they don't read it."

A number of people had fallen on the exposed roots of the trees and the association's liability insurance increased, Howe said. A sign warning pedestrians of the trip-and-fall hazard hangs next to at least one entrance to the walkway where the trees were planted.

Last year, the association had to replace a lengthy stretch of sidewalk inside the "greenbelt" and repair walls for a total cost of about $2 million, Howe said.

"We wanted to get rid of the problem that was causing the problem," Bentel said.

The area surrounding the walkway still has 800 or 900 non-cottonwood trees, including plum trees and pines, Howe said. And the association plans to replace as many of the trees as they can afford, she said. In the first phase of replanting, they will plant a minimum of 300 to 500 new trees, she said.

In addition to causing property damage, the cottonwood trees are also a very water-intensive tree, according to Doug Bennett, a conservation manager with the Southern Nevada Water Authority.

The association wants to do its part to cut down on water waste, said Roberta Starzec, a Peccole Ranch Homeowners Association board member.

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