Tree service in Winter Park is different from the rest of the Orlando area for one reason: the city treats its canopy as a public asset, even the parts growing in private yards. Before anyone cuts, it helps to know what is protected, what has to be replanted, and how the city's own electric utility fits in.
No crew from this website will show up at your door. Tree Service Orlando FL is only a phone line, free to call at (689) 407-5379 around the clock. Mention Winter Park and what is wrong with the tree, and an automated assistant hands your call to an independent, locally owned company that serves the city. You agree the price and the work with that company directly.
Winter Park's canopy was planted all at once, and is aging all at once
Winter Park describes itself with three things: a chain of lakes, brick streets and an extensive tree canopy. The city counts more than 75,000 trees on public and private property, with more than 25,000 standing in city rights of way. About 19 miles of its 100-plus miles of streets are still brick.
Many of the oaks over those streets are laurel oaks planted after World War II. The city's forestry staff have described a laurel oak's natural urban life span as 40 to 60 years, which puts much of that generation past its prime. As they decline, laurel oaks go through what arborists call retrenchment: interiors hollow out and limbs break in storms. Hurricane Charley in 2004 and the storms that followed did real damage to the canopy.
The city has been replacing them steadily. From 2015 to early 2021, the city reported, it removed 2,172 trees, mostly laurel oaks, and planted 2,186, and in 2019 alone it bought 300 live oaks. Winter Park homeowners with a big laurel oak over the house are watching the same clock.
Winter Park's tree rules, in plain terms
From the tree ordinance the City Commission adopted on October 17, 2024, and the city's permit page. Confirm the details for your lot with Urban Forestry before work starts.
| The tree | Permit? | Replacement if removed |
|---|---|---|
| Under 6 inches in diameter at breast height | No, unless it is a required replacement tree | None |
| Palms, fruit trees, cherry laurels, listed invasive species | No, these are exempt | None |
| A tree that fell from a storm or decay | No, these are exempt | None |
| Protected tree, 6 to 18 inches | Yes, $35 residential | One canopy tree, at least 3 inches caliper |
| Protected tree, 19 inches or more | Yes, $35 residential | Two canopy trees |
| Landmark: live oak or bald cypress, 30 inches or more, fair to excellent condition | Yes | Six replacement trees |
Replacement trees must be Florida No. 1 grade. If they are not planted within 30 days, the city bills for the inches owed plus a $150 administrative fee, and each extra caliper inch planted cuts the tree trust fund payment by $110. Appeals go to the Tree Preservation Board, which costs $100. Applications go through the city's permitting self-service portal, and staff inspect the tree in person.
Where state law overrides the city
Florida Statute 163.045 applies inside Winter Park too. On a single-family home lot, the city cannot require a notice, permit, fee or replanting when the owner has documentation from an ISA certified arborist or Florida licensed landscape architect that the tree poses an unacceptable risk. The statute defines that strictly: the assessment has to follow the ISA's tree risk assessment best practices, and removal has to be the only practical way to bring the risk below moderate.
That is a high bar, and it is meant to be. A healthy live oak that drops leaves on the pool is not an unacceptable risk. A laurel oak with a hollow trunk leaning over a bedroom may be. If the company you are connected with believes a tree qualifies, ask who will sign the assessment and ask for a copy. If it does not qualify, ask the company to handle the city permit and to include replacement trees or the trust fund payment in its quote, so the cost does not surprise you later.
A city that owns its power lines, and is burying them
Winter Park voters chose in 2003 to take over the electric system from Progress Energy, and the city began running its own utility in 2005. It has been moving lines underground ever since and says it has a plan to underground the entire system by 2030. By 2025, local reporting put the share of underground lines at 81 percent.
That changes tree work in two ways. Fewer limbs tangle with overhead wires, but more cables run beneath yards and parkways. Stump grinding, root pruning and replanting all involve digging, so the company should call 811 to have buried lines located before it grinds or plants. Where overhead primary lines remain, the city handles clearance at its published zone clearance rates. For an outage call 1-877-811-8700, and request trimming of trees in electric lines through the city's request system.
After a storm or a freeze in Winter Park
After Hurricane Milton
In October 2024 the city's hauler picked up bagged, containerized and bundled debris under 50 pounds a piece, up to 15 items, about 3 cubic yards, per collection. The city told residents to pile vegetative debris separately along the curb and not to stack it against trees, poles, hydrants or meters, or in the street. The city also warned that contract debris crews were helping harder-hit areas and that recovery resources were extremely limited.
After the 2026 freeze
In March 2026 the city added an extra Saturday yard debris pickup because of the volume of landscaping and plants killed by the winter freeze. Freeze damage on tender plants is usually a pruning question, not a removal one. If a tree looks dead after a cold snap, give it time and have it looked at before anyone cuts.
Choosing who works on a Winter Park tree
Because so many trees here are big oaks and so many removals involve a permit, the arborist matters more than usual. Ask the company you are connected with for the ISA certification number of the person assessing the tree, a certificate of general liability insurance sent by its agent, and proof of workers' compensation coverage. Ask for the permit and any replacement trees to be written into the quote. On brick streets, ask how the truck, chipper and any crane will be kept from cracking bricks or compacting the roots of the street trees.
Check the company yourself. Florida has no state license for tree trimming or removal, so ask the company for a certificate of general liability and workers' compensation insurance, and for the ISA certification number of its arborist. You can confirm a certification with the ISA's credential lookup (opens in a new tab).
Not sure whether your tree is protected or a landmark? Call and describe it. The company you are put through to looks at the tree, tells you what the city requires and gives you a price before any work starts.
What Winter Park homeowners call about
Most calls here are about oaks. Healthy live oaks usually need careful pruning, keeping limbs off roofs and clear of the street without stripping the canopy. Declining laurel oaks often lead to removal and a permit. A split limb over the house may call for cabling and bracing, and any doubt about a big tree is a reason to start with an arborist assessment.
Tree Removal
Taking down a dead, leaning or unwanted tree safely, from small yard trees to big laurel oaks near the house, and what a fair quote includes.
Tree Pruning and Oak Tree Care
Structural pruning for young trees and live oaks, the right season to prune oaks in Central Florida, and cuts to avoid.
Tree Cabling and Bracing
Steel cables and rods that support split trunks and heavy limbs, when they help, when removal is safer, and how they are checked.
Arborist Tree Assessment
A certified arborist's look at a tree's health and risk, what the visit costs, and the written report Florida's tree law relies on.
Why Winter Park homeowners call the line
Is it protected, or a landmark?
A tree of 6 inches or more usually needs the city's $35 residential permit, and a big live oak or bald cypress may be a landmark that costs six replacement trees. Describe the trunk size on the call, and the company you are put through to can look at it and tell you which rule applies.
Replacement trees priced in from the start
Replacements not planted within 30 days are billed by the inch plus a $150 fee. The independent company quotes its own price, so you can ask it to write the permit and the replacement trees into that number before you agree to anything.
City cables running under the yard
With most of Winter Park's electric lines now underground, stump grinding and replanting mean digging near buried cable. Say you are in Winter Park when the automated assistant answers, day or night, and ask the company whether it calls 811 before it grinds.
Brick streets and the oaks above them
Trucks, chippers and cranes can crack street bricks and pack down the roots of city street trees. The call is free and you pay only the company you hire, and this site lists what to ask about its insurance and ISA credentials before its truck parks out front.
How a Winter Park call works
- Call any hourAn automated assistant answers (689) 407-5379 and asks what kind of tree work you need.
- Describe the jobGive your name, a callback number, your city or ZIP and what the tree is doing, including anything on a roof, a car or a line.
- Get put throughThe call goes to an independent, locally owned tree service company, which hears a short summary before it picks up.
- Deal with them directlyThat company looks at the tree, quotes, does the work and is paid by you. If it cannot answer, it gets your details to call back.
How this line works: Tree Service Orlando FL is a free phone line, not a tree service company. It does not trim, remove, quote or schedule tree work and holds no license or arborist certification. Calls are transferred to independent, locally owned tree service companies in the Orlando area. Those companies may pay Tree Service Orlando FL a referral fee. You never pay the line. How it works.
Areas near Winter Park
The full list of Orlando-area cities the line answers for:
- All Orlando-area service areas
- Orlando
- Kissimmee
- St. Cloud
- Clermont
- Winter Garden
- Ocoee
- Apopka
- Altamonte Springs
- Longwood
- Lake Mary
- Sanford
- Oviedo
- DeLand