Gowanda is built tight against Cattaraugus Creek with the hills rising immediately behind it, and a few miles upstream the Zoar Valley gorge shows exactly what that water can carve. Redwood Tree service works the village blocks down on the flat and the steep properties above them, where a tree spends its whole life on a slant. Tree removal on a grade calls for rope and patience — the wood taken off in sections and set down, never let go above a roof. Routine trimming, and pruning that takes out the dead upper wood, hold the hillside hardwoods back off the lines that follow the road up. High water and hard wind both visit here, so storm damage cleanup is steady work, and a yard put right after one is a good thing to stand and look at.