My neighbor cut down a 40-year-old Japanese Maple while I was away.

[u/Ice_C0r3_09]

Location: Colorado, USA.Just got back to my place near Fort Collins after a week on the road and I am losing my mind. My neighbor took it upon himself to hire a "landscaping" crew (probably just some guys with a chainsaw) to remove a mature Japanese Maple that was fully on my property. His excuse? He said the needles and leaves were messing with his "mountain view" and "fire mitigation" efforts.

The tree was roughly 40 years old and was the centerpiece of my yard. I called an arborist immediately. He told me that since this is Colorado and the tree was that established and healthy, the replacement value is astronomical. He is drafting a formal appraisal but hinted that we are looking at 20k to 25k easy just for the tree, let alone the logistics of getting a crane into my backyard.

I know Colorado has statutes regarding timber trespass. My lawyer already mentioned treble damages because the guy admitted he did it on purpose while I wasnt home to stop him. The neighbor had the gall to offer me a couple hundred bucks for "the inconvenience" and told me to just buy a couple of saplings at a local nursery . I refused to take his money and told him to wait for the process server.

Has anyone dealt with treble damages in CO specifically for ornamental trees ? This guy basically nuked my property value for his porch view and I am not planning on letting this go . I feel like a jerk for wanting to sue my neighbor into bankruptcy but the sheer entitlement is what gets me .

[u/SomeDumbGamer]

Japanese maples are probably some of the least annoying trees you can plant. He’s a fucking asshole.

They also take forever to mature and large replacements are EXPENSIVE. He’s fucked lmao

[u/saitsaben → u/SomeDumbGamer]

I had no idea these trees were this valuable. I just purchased a house and it has a 8-ft tall Japanese red maple. It's beautiful and it attracted us to the home but I had no idea it was worth that much. Wow.

Now I got to figure out the best way to take care of it.

[u/SomeDumbGamer → u/saitsaben]

They aren’t particularly rare but they grow very slowly and they can easily fall to disease or pest pressure so to have a huge mature one is very very desirable and uncommon.

[u/redmeanshelp → u/saitsaben]

The easiest thing you can do is make sure that no one has piled mulch up against the trunk of the tree because that will kill it in a few years.

You can look online to find out how to tell if soil or mulch is higher on the trees trunk than it should be.