Byron Bay Tree Services

Alex Nowell started in the tree services industry in 1996 and spent better than two decades running a removal business before going after the credentials that let him do this end of the work. He holds a Diploma of Arboriculture at AQF Level 5, is ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualified, is a registered Quantified Tree Risk Assessment user, and belongs to Arboriculture Australia, the International Society of Arboriculture and the Queensland Arboricultural Association. He is managing director of Byron Bay Tree Services, the consulting arboriculture practice we have run out of Broken Head, just south of Byron Bay, since 2002. His interest in trees goes back to studying bonsai at twelve.

We do not cut trees. What we produce is written work that has to stand up in front of somebody: a council assessor, an insurer, a magistrate. We are engaged by local councils and government agencies, by developers, architects and civil contractors, by insurance companies, the SES, RMS and National Parks, and by private landowners who want a straight answer about one tree in their own yard. The practice covers Byron Bay and the wider Byron Shire, south through Ballina and Lismore, north to Tweed Heads and over the border to the Gold Coast, taking in northern NSW and southeast Queensland.

On a development site the sequence usually opens with a preliminary arboricultural assessment: every tree identified and mapped, a call on which ones are suitable for retention, then Tree Protection Zone calculations and Structural Root Zone identification, so you know where machinery cannot go while the plans can still be changed. From there the arboricultural impact assessment works through what the proposed build actually does to those trees and sets out a tree protection plan referencing AS 4970-2009. Our development application reports are written to line up with what your council asks for, which is often what separates an approval from a request for further information three weeks later.

Where the question is safety, a detailed risk assessment is built on TRAQ, QTRA or VALID rather than on a walk past and an opinion. We look at structural defects, the cracks, decay and cavities, at root plate stability, and at the potential for deadwood or branch failure, and the finding is tied to a recognised method another arborist can follow. Tree surveys and audits apply the same discipline across a whole site, recording tree identification, health and condition, with tree pest and disease diagnosis where something has clearly gone wrong. We also act as expert witness in matters running under the Trees (Disputes Between Neighbours) Act 2006 in the Land and Environment Court, and we prepare tree reports for the coroner.

What you end up holding is a document that says what the tree is, what the risk amounts to, and what ought to happen next, written in terms a council officer or a court will accept. Ring 0402 364 852 or send us an email with the address, the tree and the decision you are trying to make, and we will tell you which report answers it and what it involves.