Area trees are unlikely to sustain long-term damage from last week's ice storm

City of Wilmington employee Aaron Eady cuts of tree limbs due to damage from the recent ice storm around Greenfield Lake in Wilmingtonon on Wednesday.

Area trees are unlikely to sustain long-term damage from last week's ice storm, despite the hundreds of broken tree branches still littering sidewalks and streets throughout New Hanover County. But the immediate impact was extremely severe, experts said.

"It's probably the most damage I've ever seen from an ice storm," said Dave Young, owner of Wilmington-based Dave's Tree Removal. "It's rare for us to get anything that does this much as far as ice goes. Hurricanes and that type of thing are what we're used to dealing with. It's a different ball game with the ice."

The majority of affected trees in the Wilmington area were loblolly pines and live oaks, both native to North Carolina. Somewhat ironically, those trees were more likely to be damaged by ice because they're less susceptible to weather fluctuations than other plants.

"We were hardest hit in this area simply because the live oaks don't lose their foliage. They stay green all year round," Young said. "So do the pine trees, obviously. The trees with the foliage were the ones damaged, because there was more area for the ice to accumulate - and the more ice, the more weight, the more damage the trees sustained."

The long-term impact is dependent on the individual tree, Young said. The prognosis is dire in some cases, where broken limbs tore out chunks of trunks or caused the entire tree to topple - but in most instances, the tree should survive.

"Where the limbs broke out and did more damage than to just that limb, those spots are going to dry out because they're not protected," Young said. "For the most part the live oaks are very tough. It's really a tree-by-tree judgment call as to whether they should be taken down or whether they can sustain the damage and keep going."

The brunt of tree damage in Wilmington occurred in the Forest Hills area, where limbs snapped off dozens of large, old trees. The shower of branches had the added side effect of snapping power lines, knocking electricity out for thousands of customers throughout the city. At several points last Thursday, New Hanover County had more Duke Energy Progress customers without power than any other place in North and South Carolina.

Many of those residents didn't see their electricity restored until late Saturday, a cautionary tale for property owners who have strongly protested the utility's routine tree trimmings throughout the Wilmington area.

For several years, the utility has been removing potentially problematic trees and bushes from areas surrounding its transmission towers and lines meaning that any vegetation that could at some point grow taller than 12 feet can end up on the chopping block. The cuts are meant to prevent this type of outage, where limbs can fall and damage power lines.

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Area trees are unlikely to sustain long-term damage from last week's ice storm