Tree surgeons in Hayle, Connor Downs and the Towans

The Towans, the dunes running from the harbour to Gwithian, are one of the largest dune systems in the south west, and the chalets, holiday parks and houses at Phillack, Riviere Towans and Upton Towans stand among pines, sycamores and evergreen oaks planted to hold the sand and give shelter. Trees on sand have almost no anchorage. They grow fast in the mild, damp air, get very big, and then go over in a gale with their whole root plate, sometimes taking a chalet's corner with them. Reducing the sail of these trees, taking out the ones that have started to lean, and lifting out the root plates of the ones that have gone is a large part of what we do in Hayle, and the digger and lorry make short work of a fallen pine on the Towans.

Hayle's other half is water: the tidal estuary, Copperhouse Pool, the Carnsew basin and the channels of the old harbour. The ground around them is reclaimed, soft and wet, and it grows willow, poplar, alder and self sown sycamore at speed. These are weak wooded trees that split and shed in wind, and along the King George V Memorial Walk, the back of Copperhouse and the houses at Ventonleague they hang over gardens, paths and the road. The estuary is a protected site for birds, and work along its edge is timed for that and done from the land side. The digger works off mats here or not at all.

Hayle was Harvey's foundry and the Cornish Copper Company, and the town still has the granite terraces, the engineers' villas and the mature Victorian planting of Foundry Square, the Millpond and the streets up to Penpol. The town centre is a conservation area and part of the Cornish Mining World Heritage Site, and the older trees, including the limes and the evergreen oaks around the Millpond, are protected. The work on them is careful reduction and dead wooding, with the council consulted where a preservation order applies. The regeneration of the harbour and North Quay has brought new landscape planting that is now reaching the age where formative pruning pays off.

Behind the town the land climbs to Connor Downs, Gwinear, Angarrack and the farmland towards Camborne, and the work is farm and smallholding work: hedge banks, shelter belts, windblown trees across tracks after a storm, and the occasional big beech or sycamore over a farmhouse. The Angarrack valley in particular is wooded and steep, and its trees come down over the lane most winters. From here it is a short run back to the A30, so Hayle jobs and Camborne jobs often share a day.

The A30 makes Hayle easy to reach with the lorry and crane, and the estates and the holiday parks have room to work. The Towans tracks are sand and the estuary edge is soft, so vehicles are planned job by job. We look at everything first and the free tree health check covers TR27.