Every summer the south-easter turns Cape Town’s dry hillsides into a fire risk, and the trees in and around your garden decide a lot of what happens when a fire reaches your boundary. This guide covers fire risk and trees in Cape Town: which ones add fuel, which are invasive aliens that can and often should come out, and which ones you must not touch without a licence.
We are a tree felling company, not a fire consultancy, so we stay with what we know: recognising trees that carry fire, taking them down safely and clearing everything away afterwards.
Why trees matter when a fire comes
Fynbos burns, and it is meant to. It is adapted to fire and recovers from it. The trouble comes from what has been planted or spread among it: pines, gums, Port Jackson and rooikrans. These grow taller and denser than the vegetation they replaced, so there is far more material to burn.
Gums shed long strips of bark and oily leaves, pines hold resin and needles, and thickets of Port Jackson and rooikrans give a fire a continuous ladder from the ground into the canopy. A fire that would have crept through low shrubland can climb into those trees and throw embers a long way downwind. Embers landing on a roof, in a gutter or in thatch are a common way houses catch alight, so the trees near the house matter most.
Invasive alien does not mean protected
These two ideas get mixed up, so it is worth being clear. Pine, gum (eucalyptus), wattle, Port Jackson and rooikrans are invasive alien trees. They are not protected, many are covered by national regulations on invasive species, and landowners are expected to control them. Removing them is ordinary work for our team.
Protected trees are a separate, short list under the National Forests Act. The ones you are most likely to meet in a Cape Town garden are milkwood and real yellowwood. Being indigenous does not make a tree protected: only listed species are.
Separately, the National Veld and Forest Fire Act expects owners of land where veld fires can occur to prepare and maintain firebreaks on their boundaries. If you are not sure whether that applies to your property, the City of Cape Town’s fire and rescue service can tell you.
Which trees to look at first
Not every tree on your property is a problem. When we walk a site with a fire-conscious owner, these are the ones that stand out:
- Dead or dying trees close to buildings. Dry standing wood ignites easily and burns for a long time.
- Pines and gums near the house. The ones on the side the summer south-easter blows from matter most.
- Port Jackson and rooikrans thickets along boundaries. They create one unbroken fuel bed from soil to treetop.
- Palms with a skirt of dead fronds. Dry fronds catch and hold embers. Regular palm cleaning removes that fuel, and our team climbs the palm to do it.
- Branches over the roof or touching thatch. They give a fire a bridge straight into the building.
- Large trees dropping dry litter into gutters. Leaves and bark pile up quietly through summer and catch embers easily.
Taking trees out close to the house
The trees that worry owners most tend to stand near the house, on sloping ground or hard against a wall. That is common on mountainside properties around Constantia and on smallholdings and wine farms near Stellenbosch, where tall gums and pines were often planted decades ago for shade and shelter.
A big tree like that cannot simply be dropped. We climb it, rig it with ropes and take it down in sections, lowering each piece under control so the roof, walls and neighbouring plants are not damaged. It is slower than felling in the open, but it is the only safe way to work next to a building.
If a tree has already been scorched in a fire, keep people and cars away from underneath it. Burnt trees can look sound and still drop heavy limbs without warning.
Do not leave the fuel behind
A felled gum left in log piles and brush heaps is still fuel, just rearranged. Our quotes include clearing the site and taking the waste away, and the same team can remove other piled-up garden material through our garden refuse removal service.
Stumps need a decision too. Gums and Port Jackson resprout from the stump, so a cleared patch can be thick with regrowth within a season or two. Stump grinding takes the stump below ground and removes what would have resprouted. Seed already in the soil will still germinate, particularly after Port Jackson and rooikrans, so pull the seedlings while they are small and the job stays done.
A simple yearly rhythm
Fire preparation is easier when it follows the seasons rather than waiting for the first smoke on the mountain.
- Autumn: walk your boundary after the first rains and list dead wood, thickets, palm skirts and branches over the roof.
- Winter: have the high-risk trees taken down while the ground is damp and fire danger is low. Weak trees also come down in cold fronts, so this is the right moment to deal with them.
- Spring: pull alien seedlings and regrowth, and clear the winter’s fallen debris.
- Summer: keep gutters, roof valleys and the ground around the house free of dry leaves and bark.
To get a quote, WhatsApp a photo of the tree to 071 799 1993 at wa.me/27717991993, or use our contact page. We will visit, look at the tree and the access, and give you a free written quote.