Ice Tears Down Trees Across OKC Metro

The longer this ice sticks around the more likely it is that trees in the metro won't bounce back from the storm and be forced to come down, an Oklahoma City metro arborist said.

A beautiful Bradford Pear tree in Moore was a goner Saturday - split at its base and tearing up the family that planted it.

“My wife came out and was looking around at the ice. She walked back in and we heard the big sound. She came back and there it was,” M.L. Collins said about the split tree in his front yard.

He remembered planting it very well. In April 1995, he took his 3-year-old daughter to go see President Clinton speak after the state was rocked by the Oklahoma City bombing.

“We couldn’t get in so on the way back we decided to do something. And I said well let’s just plant a tree,” Collins said. So they planted a Bradford Pear outside their home. It was the family’s way of honoring the victims. And now 20 years later, their precious memorial was in pieces.

“All that came back, thinking about that. It was really a little special tree to us,” he added.

That little special tree was one of countless covered in ice all over the metro. Images showed arborists a glimpse of the heavy workload ahead.

The Tree Wizard's Certified Arborist Don Menzie said if the tree is young, it’ll likely survive. “A lot of trees that are bent right now, when the ice falls off, they will lift back up a little bit and they will if they’re not broken they will continue to lift up. Maybe it might take them six months to a year, but they could continue to lift back up to where they were,” he explained.

Otherwise strategic trimming is an option. And worst case scenario they'll remove it altogether -- taking away the tree, the memories, but not what it stood for.

“It was beautiful…biggest one in the neighborhood,” said Collins.