An old town at the south end
Lower Lake was founded in 1858 as Grantville and was once the county seat, until an election fight was settled in Lakeport’s favor in 1870. Its stone jail dates from 1876. The town sits about four and a half miles southwest of the city of Clearlake, with ranch country and hills spreading out to the east and south.
Two fires in two summers
Lower Lake had a hard run. In the summer of 2015 the Rocky Fire, which started on Morgan Valley Road, forced residents of Lower Lake to evacuate and burned about 69,400 acres. A year later, in August 2016, the Clayton Fire started just south of town, everyone in Lower Lake was evacuated, and the fire razed large parts of downtown. About 300 buildings were destroyed.
Many of those places have been rebuilt or sold since. What often stays behind are burned trees on the edges of lots, old foundations under brush, and piles nobody has had the time or the machine to move.
The work that comes up here
This is where the excavator earns its keep. Land clearing takes out dead trees, stumps and brush and grades the ground so it is ready to build or to sell. Log and debris removal hauls off or chips what is left. Standing dead trees near a home or a road come down with tree removal, in pieces if they are too close to fell.
Before each summer, defensible space clearing keeps grass, brush and low limbs back from the house. Burned logs that are still sound do not have to be wasted; some can be milled, and the rest becomes mulch. If you are rebuilding, clear and grade before the builder arrives, so trucks and a foundation crew have room to work.
What R2 Does in Lower Lake
- Tree Removal
- Tree Trimming
- Storm and Emergency Work
- Fire Safety Clearing
- Land Clearing and Grading
- Log and Debris Removal
- Milling and Custom Builds
- Wood Mulch and Compost
Nearby: Clearlake, Hidden Valley Lake, Middletown.