Root Cause was founded by ISA certified arborist and professional tree care specialist, Brian Holers. Brian and his team provide an array of tree protection services in the Seattle area, including tree protection during construction, sidewalk repair, root pruning, porous paving, trenching, and habitat restoration.
At Root Cause LLC, we like to become involved with our customers’ trees from the beginning. In addition to providing traditional above ground tree work, such as pruning and removals, we help our commercial and residential customers plan and install systems with adequate rooting space for trees. Our motto is, poor planning leads to poor planting.
Construction sites require special tree protections. While excavation in root zones is often deadly, even simple and repeated foot and equipment traffic in root zones also creates a host of problems for trees. Root Cause performs a variety of services using compressed air for low-impact excavation in root zones, to prevent soil and root damage during construction, and to repair damaged soils. Utility, construction, and landscape professionals utilize Root Cause for numerous purposes, including when tree roots damage sidewalks and other hardscapes.
Root Cause’s air technology allows Brian and his staff to trench through root zones without damaging or cutting tree roots and to properly protect trees during construction. Landscaping is often the last phase of construction; Root Cause works with landscape architects to plan adequate rooting space for trees and amend existing soil onsite utilizing air, saving our clients costly soil removal and replacement. When plantings are to be added to the root zone of an existing tree, our air excavation technology enables us to amend soil for planting without causing damage to tree roots in the same area.
About Brian Holers, Founder of
Root Cause
Brian Holers is the Northwest’s go-to root guy. He has worked as an ISA Certified Arborist since 1996 and established his first successful business, Emerald Tree Service, in 1995 and provided above ground tree care before selling it in 2005. Brian likes to use the phrase “Life is hard for city trees.” The growth of any city is always a burden on nature and surrounding habitats, but here at Root Cause we are focused on creating more symbiosis between the city and nature.
Brian was raised in Louisiana and moved to Seattle after he graduated from Louisiana State University in 1989, and has written two novels set in his native Louisiana. Growing up, he was always curious about trees, and realized it could be a profession when a family friend paid him to climb a tree and cut down some branches.
Brian lives in the suburbs of Seattle with doodle Rexy and tuxedo cat Roxy, and spends his summer evenings playing baseball in the Puget Sound Senior Baseball League. He has one grown son, Benjamin, who studies business at Chapman University in Orange, California.
His favorite tree is the European Linden that shades his home office.