u/Which_Performer9773

Hi All- Our community of 200 units successfully recalled our entire Board of the past decade and even got a new management company. But there are still many challenges ahead to get a grip on our costs and rising HOA dues. One of the areas that we can possibly cut is the Landscaping. No one thinks they do a good job. Problem is, when I suggested we homeowners volunteer to do landscaping for at least one year to see how it turns out and put the savings towards building our Reserves, a couple homeowners got upset saying it would lower property values. However, with an empty Treasury and half are rented out (we will try to impose a rental cap but it takes major voting), your condo is not worth much to the banks anyway who refuse most loans on our community. Have you done your own landscaping successfully (we will keep a dedicated certified arborist which is a separate thing)? I assume you made volunteers sign a legal waiver about accidents or damage to landscaping tools. Or is this a bad idea with a lot of legal implications??

Dear Tree Experts & Lovers- attached are photos of a mature eucalyptus tree who suffered meadow voles chewing at its trunk because the overgrowth got so bad over decades. The damage is probably about 60% around the bottom, but no part of the trunk sounds hollow yet. The condo complex couldn’t afford for arborists to do air excavation so I manually did it myself over a couple days. I found three different weed roots girdling various main structural roots and snipped those carefully. I cannot seem to expose her entire root flare because she’s on a steep slope and her backside is so deep into the ground, all I know is that past 6 inches down, all I see is old heartwood not knowing where the structural roots are down there. No fungi is growing anywhere around her and she sounds rock solid. Is there anything else I can do other than once a month deep watering with a Eucalyptus Care Kit amending the soil? It seems dangerous to try getting to her backside root flare to see what really happened—it might stress her out to dig that deep and any old girdling might become a structural concern if removed. I felt so sad around her the last week which is the only reason I started to investigate and discovered such a large wound!

[CA][Condo] - Experience with Volunteer Landscaping?

Saving Rough Barked Eucalyptus