Florida

That 60-foot Slash Pine in your Haile Plantation backyard looked solid through all of last summer. Then Hurricane Helene pushed through Alachua County in September 2024 — and by morning, the tree was leaning hard toward your fence, with a Fusiform Rust gall splitting open near the base that you’d never noticed before. That’s not

You call three companies, get three different numbers, and none of them explain why. Here’s the piece most homeowners miss: tree removal costs Clearwater FL residents pay aren’t set by the tree alone — they’re shaped by whether that tree needs a city permit before anyone can touch it. Clearwater’s Tree Protection Ordinance requires a