Weeping Willow

Despite the name, it is not from Babylon. NC State explains that Linnaeus got the origin wrong, and UF/IFAS gives northern China. The two fact sheets disagree on cold hardiness: NC State lists zones 6a to 8b, while UF/IFAS gives 2 through 9A. If you are in a cold zone and your “weeping willow” is thriving, it is worth confirming exactly what was planted. UF/IFAS also lists named forms sold under the same umbrella, including ‘Babylon’ and ‘Tristis’, the golden-barked ‘Aurea’, and the curled-leaf corkscrew willow ‘Crispa’.

UF/IFAS says weeping willow roots are aggressive, spread about three times the distance from the trunk to the edge of the canopy, and often run on the surface. It says not to plant one near underground water or sewer lines or close to septic drain fields, where the roots can do serious damage. NC State says the same about water and sewage pipes. Surface roots also lift sidewalks and get in the way of the mower.

The UF/IFAS siting advice amounts to giving the tree what it wants and keeping it away from everything it can damage. It wants full sun or very light shade and moist soil, and it handles clay, sand and alkaline ground. It belongs by a lake or a retention pond, where the soil is left undisturbed and the roots have water without hunting for it. It needs room for a crown at least as wide as it is tall. A mid-sized suburban lot with a sewer line under the lawn is the opposite on every count. If an owner wants the look closer to the house, the honest advice is a smaller weeping tree, set back using the planting spacing calculator.

UF/IFAS rates the tree susceptible to breakage. The failures happen at the crotch, because the branch collars form poorly, or in the wood itself, which is weak. NC State links the fast growth to the weak wood and notes that limbs crack and break easily under snow and ice. Both fact sheets want early structural pruning: a single leader, branch angles as wide as possible, and heavy limbs taken off before they fail. UF/IFAS also notes that the drooping branches need pruning to keep clearance for people and cars underneath.

On a mature tree that was never trained, cabling a split-prone union is sometimes an option, and cabling and bracing explains when it works. After a storm, use the storm damage assessment to judge what is left, and the risk assessment form to record it.

UF/IFAS lists the pruning requirement as “requires pruning to develop strong structure”, and the work is front-loaded. In the first years, pick one central trunk, keep the branches with the widest angles and remove the tight, upright forks that later split. On an older tree, the jobs are thinning out the heaviest limbs, as NC State recommends, and lifting the curtain enough to walk and mow under it.

Wisconsin's extension service lists willow among the trees that bleed sap when cut in late winter. The bleeding is harmless. The general late-fall-to-winter timing in when to prune trees still applies, so do not let the dripping push the job into summer.

Even with good training, UF/IFAS says weeping willows are usually short-lived, to about 30 years. Its pest and disease list is long: scales, borers, aphids and caterpillars, plus cankers that kill the tree if they girdle the trunk, root rot and crown gall. NC State adds that its litter of leaves, twigs and branches is a problem in a home landscape. So a big willow near a house is usually a tree to plan around, not one to invest in. If it is already in decline, an earlier removal is cheaper than an emergency one, as emergency removal pricing shows.

Every price on this site comes from the same crew-hour model. Three people at the BLS mean of $26.91 an hour, loaded by 1.55, come to $125.13 per crew hour. Add a chip truck and chipper at $45 to $95 an hour, then a 1.6× to 2.1× overhead and margin multiplier on the total. The hours are the variable.

Put your own hours into the tree removal cost calculator, and read what tree removal costs for how the model is built. For the stump, compare grinding and full removal. If you want a tree for the same wet spot, river birch tolerates flooding and clay: see river birch.