Answered for Sheridan, Hamilton County.
NWS Indianapolis logs 30 tornadoes in Hamilton County from 1950-2025. The Palm Sunday outbreak of April 11, 1965 produced the county's deadliest, an F4 with 6 killed, 30 injured and $25M damage; an F3 followed on November 26, 1965. Two tornadoes hit on November 22, 1992, an EF2 struck Arcadia on April 11, 2007, and an EF1 hit Home Place on April 2, 2025. The June 29, 2023 derecho crossed central Indiana with gusts near 70 mph. Black Walnut holds up better than most under it. Removing a black walnut around Sheridan runs roughly $400–$1,900, and in Maple Run, Sheridan Estates and Spicewood Garden Apartments (rental complex) access is usually what decides where in that range you land.
Community Park is singled out in the town's comprehensive plan for its numerous old-growth trees, and the pre-1970 residential grid around it carries matching full-size shade trees. New subdivisions plant only from the UDO's approved street-tree list — columnar Norway and hedge maples, black gum, disease-resistant Asian elm hybrids, European and American hornbeam, male "Autumn Gold" ginkgo and golden rain tree — a list that pointedly contains no ash and no Callery pear.
The comprehensive plan, citing the 2007-2011 American Community Survey, puts the median year built at 1969, so the in-town core is mid-century and older and its shade trees are well over the rooflines. A permit spike in 2005-2007 and newer platting at Maple Run mean the edges of town carry nursery stock under 25 years old.
Prune it dormant or in late summer, and stay off it from late February through April — walnut bleeds so heavily in spring that sap runs from the wound before the cut is finished. The bleeding does not kill the tree, but it soaks everything below and it is the reason a casual spring cleanup on a walnut turns into a complaint about the patio furniture.
No permit is required for a homeowner to take down a tree on a private lot. Sheridan's tree rules sit in the 2025 Unified Development Ordinance and apply at development time: tree preservation plans must accompany site plans, no disturbance is allowed inside the critical root zone of a preserved tree, protective barriers must stand at the dripline through construction, and if a tree designated for preservation dies within five years of project completion the owner must replace it with equal preservation value within 180 days.
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14706 Harvest Dr, Carmel, IN 46032
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4621 E 146th St, Carmel, IN 46033
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Distance measured from Sheridan.