CurSedVoyce
California Hillbilly
Awesome job Scott. Always a relief when sketchy ones get done safe with out incident. 
How'd it go today?
- Thread starter MasterBlaster
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woodworkingboy
TreeHouser
Second the motion on Scott's success. I feel born again after the sketchy ones.
PCTREE
Treehouser
Nice work Scott, always nice to pull off the sketchy ones.
Looked at this lil job today, everything hauled and stump ground
Picture doesn't do it justice, that is 8' across at stump.....
Looked at this lil job today, everything hauled and stump ground
Picture doesn't do it justice, that is 8' across at stump.....
CurSedVoyce
California Hillbilly
You just get all the pretty ones Paul 
MasterBlaster
Administrator Emeritus
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #31,981
I've always wanted to blast all the dirt off one of those and then bury it upside as a weird piece of art.
PCTREE
Treehouser
tree is about 20' tall at its tallest point.
MB I considered taking my pressure washer and blasting all the dirt off and then loading the stump with a crane. As it is we have to right it with a crane and then grind stump. Huge stump. There are 3 other BIG trees down as well. Im thinking of bidding $8000 to clean them all up, wood and chips stay onsite as home owner is certain they are worth a fortune as saw logs
MB I considered taking my pressure washer and blasting all the dirt off and then loading the stump with a crane. As it is we have to right it with a crane and then grind stump. Huge stump. There are 3 other BIG trees down as well. Im thinking of bidding $8000 to clean them all up, wood and chips stay onsite as home owner is certain they are worth a fortune as saw logs
I did a small job in the AM...polesaw and fiskars pruner from the ground, end weight reduction of a Poincianana inside a chicken yard, old restored coop, at least I could stand on the roof...all debris piled and left on site, easy peasy.
Anyway, two hrs and a bit, charged 2.5, at $75...HO couldn't believe I'd done it for so little...what am I supposed to do, that's how long it took, that's my charge...I don't pad or inflate the work...oh well!
BTW, they are rather wealthy...retired NY defence lawyer, super nice people, I did 4 Norfolk Pines for them a month ago, came in under budget, happy people, they've passed on my details to others in the neighborhood, got two bids in for trees down the street...
Anyway, two hrs and a bit, charged 2.5, at $75...HO couldn't believe I'd done it for so little...what am I supposed to do, that's how long it took, that's my charge...I don't pad or inflate the work...oh well!
BTW, they are rather wealthy...retired NY defence lawyer, super nice people, I did 4 Norfolk Pines for them a month ago, came in under budget, happy people, they've passed on my details to others in the neighborhood, got two bids in for trees down the street...
tree is about 20' tall at its tallest point.
I suppose I should have asked how tall it WAS....looked like a rather big one.
SoonerFan
TreeHouser
SouthSoundTree
Treehouser
Got the call to put a 38" x 85' grand fir on the ground, as it 'died this last winter' and was leaning toward the entrance building, 60' away. Thought it wasn't going to be too big or stressful. Turned out to be 40-some inches by 150' doug-fir with a definitive lean right toward the building, amongst a bunch of other tall trees, narrow across the hinge direction compared to the other direction. Put a 5/8" DB retainer line on it at 50' (tree dwarfed the bucket truck) pre-tensioned with a MA, left a 4", wedges started moving it. Called for the pull. Went right to the lay. Thankfully, the hinge was solid wood, with just the first hint of laminated root rot. I'd drilled it with an 18" drill bit and it looked solid.
A heart pumper! Hope to get pics from my phone.
Tomorrow, some dead, dead trees uphill from a shop to put on the ground. They probably 'just died this last winter, too'.
A heart pumper! Hope to get pics from my phone.
Tomorrow, some dead, dead trees uphill from a shop to put on the ground. They probably 'just died this last winter, too'.
Burnham
Woods walker
" Went right to the lay"
Best feeling in the world
I made someone happy today.
After work we went to my place to pick cherries. There is heavy rain forecast for tomorrow, so they'll probably split.So we wanted to pick all of the ripe ones that we could today.
Afterwards we were sitting with a cold drink and Richard and I told Martin, the apprentice, that if he wanted to, we would hire him on as a permanent part of the team when he finishes his apprenticeship.
The way his face lit up was priceless.
So in a 1½ we'll have an extra logger/arbo and have to go find a new apprentice.
Best feeling in the world
I made someone happy today.
After work we went to my place to pick cherries. There is heavy rain forecast for tomorrow, so they'll probably split.So we wanted to pick all of the ripe ones that we could today.
Afterwards we were sitting with a cold drink and Richard and I told Martin, the apprentice, that if he wanted to, we would hire him on as a permanent part of the team when he finishes his apprenticeship.
The way his face lit up was priceless.
So in a 1½ we'll have an extra logger/arbo and have to go find a new apprentice.
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Burnham
Woods walker
Cheers for Martin. Excellent!
SkwerI
Treehouser
Excellent, Stig. He must be pretty good to meet your standards.
woodworkingboy
TreeHouser
No initiation rite for Martin after he becomes a man? Aren't there any smelly bogs or anything around to toss him into? Something bad to remember when completing an apprenticeship was pretty common.
We did that at the job interview, Jay.
We told him : " So you want to be a climber, kid. We'd better find out if you can climb then. Job interview is 100 feet up in that beech tree!"
Then we put him in a harness and had him SRT 100 feet up where one of us met him. Everything was run triple safety, like we do when we're doing treeclimbing events for kids and adults for the Forest service.
We sat for an hour or so and talked things over, then had him move around the canopy a bit, rapelled down and told him he had an apprenticeship and our respect.
He just loved that.
He loved it even more when I send him all the pictures I took of him up that tree, so he could show his classmates how a REAL interview is done.
His apprenticeship isn't cmpleted before sometime 2014, we just wanted him to know he had a job afterwards.
In his class, only 4 out of 23 got an apprenticeship, the rest will be what is called " School apprentices", which translates to " No one will hire you".
Nobody will take on apprentices to teach these days.
The government is trying to entice companies to take apprentices by making it mandatory, if you want to bid on government contact. The big Metro project in Copenhagen is only open for bids from companies that are " socially responsible" ( Have apprentices). I think the next time the State Forestry Service put out a logging contract, we'll see the same there.
Jobs in manual logging are scarce as hens teeth here, these days.
Martin got lucky ( Because he is damned good at this work!) and he knows it.
Hence the giant smile when we told him
We told him : " So you want to be a climber, kid. We'd better find out if you can climb then. Job interview is 100 feet up in that beech tree!"
Then we put him in a harness and had him SRT 100 feet up where one of us met him. Everything was run triple safety, like we do when we're doing treeclimbing events for kids and adults for the Forest service.
We sat for an hour or so and talked things over, then had him move around the canopy a bit, rapelled down and told him he had an apprenticeship and our respect.
He just loved that.
He loved it even more when I send him all the pictures I took of him up that tree, so he could show his classmates how a REAL interview is done.
His apprenticeship isn't cmpleted before sometime 2014, we just wanted him to know he had a job afterwards.
In his class, only 4 out of 23 got an apprenticeship, the rest will be what is called " School apprentices", which translates to " No one will hire you".
Nobody will take on apprentices to teach these days.
The government is trying to entice companies to take apprentices by making it mandatory, if you want to bid on government contact. The big Metro project in Copenhagen is only open for bids from companies that are " socially responsible" ( Have apprentices). I think the next time the State Forestry Service put out a logging contract, we'll see the same there.
Jobs in manual logging are scarce as hens teeth here, these days.
Martin got lucky ( Because he is damned good at this work!) and he knows it.
Hence the giant smile when we told him
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Burnham
Woods walker
Sounds like Martin made a large portion of his own luck. Good for him!
bonner1040
Nick from Ohio
What an opportunity.. So glad he was able to seize it!
squisher
THE CALM ONE!!!!
That is cool. A great opportunity indeed!
sotc
Dormant hero!!
I don't always keep up on this thread cause it is sooo busy but I should, it is a great one
Tucker943
Bamboo Plantation Owner
Today was just another day. Haven't done tree work in a week and a half. I explained how I ended up on a commercial demolition project and sliced my hand open. Project over. Back to tree work Monday and have a good schedule rolling. I haven't said it out loud to my groundman or wife yet, but I cant climb. It's been 7 days since my palm got sliced open, and its not healing fast at all. I couldn't start a saw 2 nights ago. It would have torn my stitches and hand back open. I'm not thrilled about this. I'm thinking I'm going to have to go over my invoices and put light jobs and felling jobs at the front of the line and just try to stall climbing g jobs. I'm going to try and work that angle and evaluate my hand one day at a time.
PCTREE
Treehouser
Man that sux not being able to climb, if it helps you out any when you get back going I could send you up a loaner Wraptor for a while.
I had an awesome day today, my crane guy wanted me to put a tree on the ground for him but he had to set some trusses first. So I got a lay in and hung with the kids, Woody talked me into letting him come to work. I just picked up a helmet communication system similar to DMCs , should have got the same system he got but I wanted to incoperate it into existing hearing protection. They work great except for the fact that the control ends up sticking out too far from the helmet and bumps stuff too much. However I had fun listening to music and talking to Woody as I worked.To cap it all off Woody got to fly the ball..
I had an awesome day today, my crane guy wanted me to put a tree on the ground for him but he had to set some trusses first. So I got a lay in and hung with the kids, Woody talked me into letting him come to work. I just picked up a helmet communication system similar to DMCs , should have got the same system he got but I wanted to incoperate it into existing hearing protection. They work great except for the fact that the control ends up sticking out too far from the helmet and bumps stuff too much. However I had fun listening to music and talking to Woody as I worked.To cap it all off Woody got to fly the ball..
Tucker943
Bamboo Plantation Owner
I appreciate the wraptor offer. For now, I don't want to get carried away and say yes. It's the sum off all things that will hinder climbing. Handling wood, starting saws, pulling myself one way or another with my hands, etc. I'll be ok. I'll bring in a climber if my schedule demands it and I am not healed up enough. I'm not in a bad position, just one that takes some coordinating.
bonner1040
Nick from Ohio
So he can post his pictures....
