Certified Arborist for Castle Rock · Removal, Pruning & Treatment
Pruning, removal, stump grinding and ash treatment across Castle Rock. The Town’s own emerald ash borer page still tells residents the pest has not been discovered in Douglas County — it was confirmed in Parker in August 2026, and the page has not caught up.
EAB has not been found in Castle Rock. That is still true, and it is the reason this is a good year to make a calm decision instead of an expensive one.
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Fetched this week, the Town of Castle Rock’s emerald ash borer page reads: “Although EAB has not yet been discovered in Douglas County, it has been identified and confirmed in a small area of Arapahoe County, within the City of Littleton.” Its timeline stops at June 2023.
That was accurate when it was written. It is not accurate now. Emerald ash borer was found in a Parker front yard in July 2026 and confirmed by Colorado State University entomologists in August — the first confirmed detection in Douglas County. Parker is roughly fifteen miles from Castle Rock.
None of this means the beetle is in Castle Rock. It is not, and we are not going to tell you otherwise to sell you a treatment. What it means is that the Town’s own advice — learn about it, prepare, and consider your options before the pest arrives — just got considerably more urgent than the page implies.
No. Emerald ash borer has not been confirmed in Castle Rock. It was confirmed in Douglas County for the first time in Parker in August 2026, roughly fifteen miles away, after being found in a front yard in July. The Town of Castle Rock’s own emerald ash borer page has not been updated to reflect the Parker detection and still states that EAB has not been discovered in Douglas County.
At 6,224 feet, on 17.6 inches of annual precipitation, in the Colorado Foothills life zone, Castle Rock grows a different set of trees with a different set of problems.
The signature tree of the foothills zone and the one that carries the wildfire conversation. Ponderosa under drought stress becomes attractive to boring beetles, and the first honest sign is usually pitch tubes on the trunk rather than anything in the canopy. Timing matters more than product on pine pests.
Scrub oak is native, tough and almost impossible to kill, which is why people stop thinking about it. From a fire standpoint it is a continuous ladder fuel that grows straight into the crowns above it, and Castle Rock Fire’s programme exists largely because of it.
With a median build year of 2007, most of Castle Rock’s landscape trees went in with the house. They are at the age where structural pruning still changes the outcome and where the species mistakes of 2005 become visible. This is the cheapest decade of a tree’s life to get right.
Nearly every complaint people have about tree companies comes down to the same thing: something happened that the homeowner never agreed to. These five exist so that cannot happen here.
These are the Town of Castle Rock’s own words about home ignition zones. We are quoting them because they are specific, they are free, and most of the work they describe is pruning and removal rather than anything exotic.
Castle Rock Fire Marshal Bart Chambers on the basics: “The basics: clear around that 5-foot perimeter of your home. Take it to rock or bare mineral soil.” And on pacing: “This is a marathon, not a sprint.” We do the pruning and removal side of that work. We do not sell a wildfire package and we are not a mitigation certifier.
Castle Rock’s ColoradoScape ordinance, 2022-025, applies to homes permitted for construction after 1 January 2023: no turf in the front yard, and no more than 500 square feet in the back. New landscapes get a watering exemption — daily watering of new sod for 21 days, and 30 days for seed or other plant materials.
For trees that is mostly good news and one real trap. The good news is that turf and trees compete for the same water in the same root zone, and a yard without a thirsty front lawn has more to give the canopy. The trap is that rock mulch over landscape fabric, installed badly, bakes a root zone and starves it of air.
Castle Rock Water’s summer schedule runs every third day between 8 PM and 8 AM from 1 June to 31 August, with customers assigned a square, circle or diamond by the last digit of their address. Some Founders Village streets are on a different schedule. Whatever your symbol, a young tree wants a slow soak at the drip line, not a sprinkler cycle.
★★★★★
“He could definitely have sold me on unnecessary work… My invoice was for the quoted amount and no more. UPDATE almost a year later and my silver maple is thriving. Those iron injections really worked!”
— Wendy B. · Verified Google Review
★★★★★
“I had a branch hanging down, about ten feet above the sidewalk and a couple os Spruce trees in back which needed their lower branches removed. Rob, Jack, and Jesse came at the appointed time, did the work, cleaned up and were on their way… Ironwood Earthcare has taken care of our trees for years.”
— Phil W. · Verified Google Review
★★★★★
“Derek… refused to try to upsell me on treatments I didn’t need but had been quoted as necessary by two other companies. He also was not afraid to let me know I could check with an independent source as to whether his assessment was correct compared to the others.”
— Michael H. · Verified Google Review
No. It has not been confirmed in Castle Rock. It was confirmed in Douglas County for the first time in Parker, found July 2026 and confirmed August 2026, roughly fifteen miles away. The Town of Castle Rock’s own EAB page has not been updated and still says the pest has not been discovered in the county — that page is now out of date.
That is a genuine judgement call and it depends on the individual tree, not on the news. Trunk injection protects a healthy ash for roughly two years per treatment, so starting early means paying for several rounds before there is anything to protect against. For a large, healthy, well-placed ash that is often worth it. For a mediocre specimen it usually is not, and the better answer is to plan a replacement now while you have time to choose.
We could not verify a Town tree-removal permit or arborist licensing requirement, so we will not tell you there is one. The Town does run a Landscape Professional Registration programme, and we were unable to load that page to check what it covers — worth a call to the Town before you book anything. The constraint far more Castle Rock homeowners actually run into is HOA covenants.
Yes. The county’s wildfire mitigation cost-share matches 50% of the cost, up to $25,000 per homeowner in the wildland-urban interface, and up to $7,500 for community chipping or slash pickup. It requires two estimates from approved contractors. Its first 2026 round funded more than 72 properties. We do pruning and removal, we are not a mitigation certifier, and we will point you at the county programme rather than quote around it.
Ordinance 2022-025 requires no turf in the front yard and no more than 500 square feet in the back for homes permitted after 1 January 2023. It affects trees indirectly and mostly for the better, because turf and trees compete for the same water. The one thing to watch is rock mulch installed over fabric right up to a trunk, which bakes and suffocates a root zone.
Castle Rock Water’s summer schedule is every third day between 8 PM and 8 AM from 1 June to 31 August, by a square, circle or diamond assigned from the last digit of your address. Some Founders Village streets are on a different schedule and are notified each year. Confirm your own symbol with Castle Rock Water — and remember that a deep soak at the drip line does more for a tree than any sprinkler cycle.
One ISA Certified Arborist behind all six, and one written quote if you need more than one of them.
Tree Removal · Tree Trimming & Pruning · Stump Grinding · Pest & Disease Control · Tree Injections · Lawn Fertilization & Weed Control
Aurora · Denver · Centennial · Parker · Highlands Ranch · Englewood · Littleton · Greenwood Village
An ISA Certified Arborist will identify your ash, assess the pines and the oak at your wildland edge, and tell you honestly what is worth doing this year and what can wait.
312 Norfolk St, Unit A, Aurora, CO 80011 · Monday to Friday, 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM · Serving Castle Rock and the Denver metro since 2003