Felling a tree in your garden in France: do you need permission?

The question is almost always asked the wrong way round: “am I allowed to cut a tree on my own land?” Yes, it is your property, and the Civil Code does not ask your permission to remove a tree planted on your plot. But planning law and environmental law sit on top of it, and they create cases where the tree, although on your plot, is no longer entirely yours: it is protected, either because the commune decided so, or because the place is protected, or the species is, or because it shelters animals that are.

So there is no national answer of the “above so many centimetres you need a permit” kind. The thresholds you read online, often a trunk circumference, are local rules written into a commune’s local urban plan (plan local d’urbanisme, or PLU) or its regulations, and they apply only there. The right approach is to ask three questions, in order, before the chainsaw comes out or a quote is signed.

• Where is the tree? In a protected woodland (espace boisé classé), in a listed or registered site, near a historic monument, in an avenue of trees along a road: each case has its own procedure.
• What status does the PLU give it? A tree can be flagged there as a landscape feature to protect, in which case its removal must be declared.
• What condition is it in, and who lives in it? A dead or dangerous tree falls under an exception, a tree with nesting birds under a ban, and a tree in a rented home under the owner’s prior consent.
• If the answer to any of these is “yes”, the procedure comes before the cut, not after: no after-the-fact paperwork undoes a cut already made.

Here is the list of situations in which cutting a tree is no longer free. None is exotic: in an area as rich in heritage, vines and wooded land as the northern Vaucluse, the Drôme provençale, the Gard along the Rhône and the neighbouring Ardèche, you run into them more often than you would think. The table gives the procedure; the paragraphs below explain what lies behind each line.

Protected woodland (EBC): the protection people most often overlook

A local urban plan may classify as protected woodland “woods, forests and parks to be kept, protected or created, whether or not they fall under the forestry regime, enclosed or not, attached to dwellings or not”. The classification can also cover isolated trees, hedges, hedge networks and avenue plantings. In practice, a housing-estate garden planted with large oaks or Aleppo pines may be listed under it in the zoning, and its owner sometimes does not know, because nobody ever showed them the plan.

The consequence is clear: in a protected woodland, cutting and felling are subject to prior declaration, including in a private garden. The classification has a second consequence that people notice too late: in principle it forbids any change of land use likely to compromise the conservation of the woodland. A swimming pool, garage or extension that requires removing a classified tree can therefore be refused for that reason alone, before anyone examines its height or footprint.

Landscape features flagged in the PLU

More discreet than protected woodland, the flagging of a remarkable tree, a row of plane trees or a hedge as landscape heritage can be read in the PLU regulations and on its graphic documents. Its effect is the same: a prior declaration before felling. That is why the tree at the bottom of the garden, the one the whole neighbourhood knows, is often the first one concerned: it is flagged because it is seen, and protected for the same reason.

No national database says, parcel by parcel, which trees are protected. The information exists nonetheless, and it is public: it sits in the commune’s local urban plan, which anyone can consult without an appointment. The check takes half an hour if you go about it in the right order.

1. 1Locate your parcel on the Géoportail de l’urbanisme (geoportail-urbanisme.gouv.fr) or on your commune’s website: you read the PLU zoning, the protected woodlands (a pattern of small green circles) and the protected features.
2. 2Read the regulations for the zone where the parcel lies. They say whether felling is subject to declaration, whether they set a size threshold, and whether they require replanting.
3. 3Check whether the parcel is in a registered or classified site, or within a historic monument’s perimeter. The town hall knows, and the Ministry of Culture’s heritage maps show it too.
4. 4Call the planning department, and confirm the address, the kind of tree and what you want to do. Put the question in one sentence: “Is this tree subject to prior declaration before felling?” The answer is yes or no.

The text that subjects cutting in a protected woodland to declaration itself provides for exceptions. The main one concerns the removal of dangerous trees, wind-blown trees (chablis) and dead wood: the owner does not have to declare what they remove for safety reasons. A chablis is a tree blown over or broken by wind, snow or an accident, and Provence sees some every year, since the mistral and autumn storms hit trees already weakened by drought.

This exception must be handled with care, because it is for you to prove, if asked, that the tree really was dangerous. “It was in my way” is not a safety reason, and “it leaned a little” is not always one either. What counts as proof is kept before the cut, not after.

• Dated photographs of the whole tree, of the base (fungi, cavity, lifted roots) and of the crown (dead branches, split limbs).
• A written opinion from a professional who examined the tree on site and who describes the defect found, rather than a simple verbal promise to come and fell it.
• The letter or email warning the town hall before the works, especially if the tree overhangs a public road or a building.
• Photographs of the job, with the logs and the stump, showing dead, hollow or split wood.

When the diagnosis concludes that the tree can no longer be kept, felling is prepared on a written quote, with the wood removed: Tree felling and stump removal.

Even with no planning protection at all, a tree can be untouchable at certain times. Article L. 411-1 of the Environmental Code forbids destroying or removing the eggs and nests of protected species, damaging them or intentionally disturbing them. Most common garden birds, tits, robins, finches, sparrows, are protected, along with their nests while occupied. Bats, which shelter in the cavities of old trees, are too.

The reference calendar people quote, March to the end of July, is that of the breeding peak in our region. It is not a rule that makes felling legal on 1 August and illegal on 31 July: what counts is whether a nest is really occupied. In practice, trees are felled between autumn and the end of winter, when vegetation is dormant and birds are not brooding, which also happens to be the period when the job is safest and least tiring for the neighbouring tree.

The same calendar applies to pruning, and the article details the best months tree by tree: When to prune a tree in France: the calendar by species.

If you find a nest or a roost while cutting

Stop, photograph, and postpone the cut on the part concerned. A serious professional observes the tree before climbing for exactly this reason, and will tell you if the job has to be moved. A quote that promises to fell “tomorrow” a tree in the middle of the brooding season without having looked at the crown protects neither the tree nor you.

Before the administrative question, there is the question of who has the right to decide. The tree belongs to whoever owns the ground, and the decision to fell it follows that rule, with a few situations where people easily go wrong.

The neighbour’s tree that bothers you: it is not for you to cut it

A branch that extends onto your land can be required to be cut, but you cannot prune yourself on the other side of the boundary: the tree’s owner remains the decision-maker, and whoever cuts someone else’s tree without agreement may have to make good the damage. Planting distances, two metres for a tree taller than two metres, half a metre for the others, are the starting point for the discussion, and a tree planted too close can be challenged.

The distances, the remedies and how to write to the neighbour are detailed in the article devoted to this subject: Neighbour’s tree or hedge on the boundary: your rights.

When the tree’s status requires a prior declaration, the procedure is modest: a form, a plan, some photographs. It is filed at the town hall, or online when the commune offers electronic filing, which is more and more the case. The longest part is not the file, it is the wait that follows.

1. 1Collect the prior declaration form at the town hall or on service-public.fr, and state the address, the parcel and the nature of the works: cutting or felling of trees.
2. 2Attach a location plan, a site plan on which you mark the tree or trees concerned, and at least one photograph showing the tree in its surroundings.
3. 3Explain the reason for felling: disease, danger, building project, interference with the roof. A precise reason backed by photographs is processed faster.
4. 4Wait for the answer before cutting: processing generally takes one month, two when the architect of the Bâtiments de France is consulted, and the town hall states the exact time in the acknowledgement of receipt.
5. 5Keep the decision. It may come with an obligation to replant, with a specified species and number.

Replanting: a consequence people leave out of the calculation

A favourable decision may require replanting, and a PLU regulation can set a ratio of trees to replant for each tree removed. It is not a penalty: it is the commune’s way of maintaining the green cover. A serious felling quote knows this, and can offer the planting of a species suited to the drought and wind of the Rhône corridor.

Online you find fine amounts that differ enormously from one site to another, from a few hundred euros to several hundred thousand. We show none: they cannot be verified here, they depend on the text applied, the area concerned and the judge’s decision, and a wrongly quoted figure mostly serves to frighten. What can be said with certainty are the three consequences that come up in every case.

• A breach of planning rules, recorded by a sworn officer of the commune, who draws up a report and sends it to the prosecutor.
• The obligation to restore the site: replant equivalent trees at your own expense, sometimes with specimens that will take decades to reach the size of the one that disappeared.
• Harm to protected species, if the cut destroyed an occupied nest or a roost, which falls under the Environmental Code and engages the liability of whoever gave the order as well as whoever cut.

One point deserves emphasis for anyone hiring a contractor: a private owner who orders a forbidden cut cannot hide behind the contractor. The planning procedure is the landowner’s, not the person carrying out the work. A conscientious professional will ask you the question before quoting, and one who never asks protects neither you nor themselves.

Once the administrative question is settled, there is the question of the cut itself. Cutting a small garden tree with a saw, on clear ground, is within reach of a careful owner. As soon as the tree is large, leaning, surrounded by buildings or touching a wire, the job changes nature, and it is no longer a matter of courage but of method and equipment.

In farmhouse courtyards, village gardens or housing estates where space is tight, the tree does not fall: it is dismantled, branch after branch, section after section, held by ropes and lowered piece by piece. That is a trade, requiring climbing gear, the right chainsaw and above all the habit of reading a tree before touching it. Every year, serious accidents are caused by private owners who thought they could fell a tree “in a single cut” next to a house.

To entrust the job to someone who knows how, the points to check before signing are detailed here: How to choose a tree surgeon in France: 12 checks.

A felled tree leaves three things behind: a stump, wood, and branches. Each raises a question best settled in the quote rather than after the job.

The stump: remove it or grind it

Stump removal takes out the stump and part of the main roots, which requires a machine and access. Grinding breaks it up on the spot, a few dozen centimetres below ground level, which is enough to replant something else or return the area to lawn. A stump left in place eventually rots and may attract insects; depending on the species it may also resprout. The choice depends on what you want to do with the spot, hence the value of saying so when the quote is prepared.

The wood and branches: never burn them in the garden

Open-air burning of green waste is forbidden to private individuals, and in our region wildfire prevention tightens that rule further for much of the year. What remains is firewood, which needs several months to two years of drying depending on species, shredding on site to mulch beds, or removal to a waste collection centre or recovery platform. A quote that does not say what happens to the wood leaves the question open, and it is often the first cause of disagreement at the end of a job.

The tax credit: felling does not qualify

The question comes up in our readers’ searches: does felling a tree entitle you to a tax credit? No. The tax aid scheme for personal services covers minor gardening done from the ground, not forestry work, pruning at height, felling and stump removal. A site or quote showing “50% tax credit” on a felling is showing an inaccuracy, whoever the contractor is.

The detail of what the scheme covers, and what it excludes, is here: The French gardening tax credit: what qualifies.

We do not publish felling prices: the cost depends on height, access, diameter, closeness to a building or wire, and what happens to the wood, and a figure displayed without seeing the tree is worthless. What you can demand, however, is a written quote that answers everything above. Here are the lines to find in it, and the questions to ask if they are missing.

• The identification of the business: name, address, SIRET number, which you can check in the national business register.
• The description of the tree: species if identified, approximate height, trunk circumference, location on the plot plan.
• The announced method: direct felling if space allows, dismantling in sections with ropes if it does not.
• The mention of the planning procedure: the contractor asks whether the tree is protected, and tells you that this procedure is the owner’s.
• What happens to the stump: left in place, ground or removed, with what that implies for replanting.
• What happens to the wood and branches: removal, shredding on site, wood left in logs for heating.
• The planned date and the nesting season: a spring job must be preceded by observing the tree.
• The payment terms and the validity period of the quote.

A quote that fits on one line, with no description or mention of the wood, is not a quote: it is a promise. Ask for at least two, compare methods rather than amounts, and be wary of anyone who did not look at the tree before pricing.

Around Lapalud, four départements meet: Vaucluse, Drôme, Gard and Ardèche. Each commune has its own local urban plan, or none, and it decides which trees, hedges and woods are protected. A garden in Bollène, Pierrelatte, Pont-Saint-Esprit or Bourg-Saint-Andéol may therefore fall under different rules a few kilometres apart, and heritage sites or the surroundings of monuments add their own layer.

The substance of the rule is the same everywhere; the map of protected trees is specific to each commune. That is why we always ask about the tree’s status before quoting, and why we advise going through the town hall’s planning department rather than relying on a forum or an article, this one included.

• Plane trees, holm oaks and Aleppo pines: frequent species in courtyards and gardens, often large, often flagged in the PLU.
• Boundary cypresses: very common around farmhouses, poorly tolerant of drought, felled more often than you would imagine after a long dry spell.
• Trees near woodland: concerned both by brush-clearing obligations and by cutting rules, which multiplies the procedures.
• Trees along tracks or roads: they belong to the highway, and are not cut without the manager’s agreement.

If your land is near woodland, the obligation to clear brush comes on top of the cutting rules, and the following article explains which applies at what distance: Mandatory brush clearance in France: what the law requires.

When the tree can be kept, suitable pruning is often better than felling, and generally raises no formalities: Tree pruning.