Bannock County, ID Landscaping Rules: Tree Removal & Heritage Trees (2026)

Bannock County Code Section 17.24.050 governs performance standards for all new nonresidential construction in the Recreation (REC) zoning district, and its first standard is a tree preservation rule. Existing attractive and healthy trees with a trunk diameter of eight inches or more must be preserved unless they conflict with the proposed building footprint, create a safety hazard, or appear on the planning and zoning department's list of excluded species. Site plans have to be laid out so qualifying trees can be saved wherever that is possible, and any tree removal plan must go to the Planning and Development Services department for review against this standard before removal happens.

If the department finds that a protected tree was removed in violation of the section, the property owner must replant one or two replacement trees, with the planning director deciding the number, and the replacements must meet a minimum size: at least twelve feet in height for conifers or at least two inches of caliper diameter for deciduous trees. The same section layers additional landscaping duties on top of tree preservation: landscaped yards in the REC district must match the dimensional standards of the Residential Suburban district, with at least one canopy tree required for every fifty feet of lot width or length, and where a nonresidential use in the REC district abuts a residential use, a fifty-foot landscaped buffer meeting Sections 17.52.310 and 17.52.320 is required along with screening fences approved by the planning director.

Because Section 17.24.050 applies specifically to new nonresidential construction in the REC district, single-family homes and agricultural land elsewhere in the county are not covered by this particular tree-removal standard.