How'd it go today?

[biggun]

Been stuck indoors (within reason) for over 2 weeks now with quarantine. Everyone else in the family tested positive for covid. Not me though, negative everytime so far. The 11 day period is up Thursday so a bit of work then or Friday and then off to a cabin boarding at the weekend.

The missus is working from home though today so we made some coffee and went for a wander down to the beach area, about 400m from my gaff.

Stunning day, still water, fresh but not crazy cold, blue skies and a pleasant time watching a bird fishing in the fjord. Must have had 4 or 5 successful dives. It might have been a guillemot but not 100% on that.

Very peaceful though.

 

[Mrs.B]

My wife says she has an old lady crush on me.

Old Lady Crush! Is that really a thing? I'm probably guilty of it. I've met a lot of younger than me treemen and there are some I really like. They represent the best of mankind. Strong, kind, intelligent, and self assured. Old ladies appreciate all that. I also like how they smell. Tree guys would come to my window at the bank to cash their checks and I could tell what trees they had been working in. The saw chips are a bonus.

 

[flushcut]

Old Lady Crush! Is that really a thing? I'm probably guilty of it. I've met a lot of younger than me treemen and there are some I really like. They represent the best of mankind. Strong, kind, intelligent, and self assured. Old ladies appreciate all that. I also like how they smell. Tree guys would come to my window at the bank to cash their checks and I could tell what trees they had been working in. The saw chips are a bonus.

I don’t know if it’s really a thing but my wife likes to harass me about it.

 

[lxskllr]

Fantastic day. Got to go up in my new saddle, and that thing's like a lazyboy on a rope. Started with a sore back, and still have a sore back, but it isn't a smidge worse than when I started. Completely cleared one of the pines. Got about 100'. There's still a few dead branches higher up, but I completely devined it aside from a few small trunk hugging poison ivy vines. The vines were the main objective, and the deadwooding to pretty it up a bit more, and I was there anyway.

Used Pat's knee ascender, and it worked great. Small steps are golden. When I was with Pat, I was trying to take huge steps. He told me that, but I have to work through things on my own without being observed. Only a couple minor problems. Had to drop down once to retie my hitch cause it was too long, and later, I went horizontal when a stub I was sitting on broke. Not a big deal, but it got my attention O.O

Still have things to work on, but I'm getting the method refined, and there's plenty more trees to go, as well as the two I left half finished.

 

[flushcut]

Those trees look close enough to traverse from tree to tree. May your feet never touch the ground.

 

[lxskllr]

I was thinking that when I was up there, but wasn't prepared mentally, or with gear. I might try that next time :^)

 

[flushcut]

Looks like an awesome spot to practice.

 

[treebilly]

Pushed a lot of snow for truck access today. I could barely keep ahead of the guys. Froze my ass off. Then found out that three of us are going to the CraneManInc class at the end of March. There might be a fourth if they can get me the CEU’s for volunteering to assist rather than do the actual training. Either way I’ll be there.

 

[flushcut]

Sounds like a sweet deal!

 

[pantheraba]

X-ray work today...delivered a new generator to a big county health TB dept. Downtown Atlanta -- threaded this alley as many hundreds of college students swarmed around the truck changing classes. Working with traffic in the big city gets interesting.

 

[lxskllr]

By "gets interesting", you mean "sucks hairy mooselips"(got that from someone here :^D ), right?

 

[Burnham]

That great phrase came from Stumper originally...I use it from time to time .

 

[flushcut]

I don’t miss working in the city one bit. Every time I go back I just say to myself “I’m glad I moved”

 

[pigwot]

"Old Lady Crush" is real. I help out a lot of the elderly in the neighborhood. Karen was mad at me and I said something like, "I better watch out, 'cause if you throw me out I'll have no where to go", and her immediate retort was, "Yeah right! All those old ladies will be fighting over who gets to take you in!"

 

[treebilly]

Pushing more snow for access. Nice little cotton weed removal for the RR this morning. I’ll be headed to a ROW clearing this afternoon to push more snow in preparation for tomorrow.

Well I got the snow pushed off but I don’t think we will be getting trucks off of well lane. I broke through the ice in quite a few areas. It’s not deep but we can’t disturb the ground very much. That means no getting stuck. With negative temps tonight it might freeze solid. We shall see.

 

[stikine]

Hella sunset tonight.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Got our well pump and pipe cleaned, working and back in the ground this AM. But less than 50% volume. So new pump is ordered. But tanks are filling up again after buying 6500 gallons of water and using some of it.
Solar pump will go in the ground when we get more daylight.
Crane guy called and said he could get to the job by noon instead of 2pm. So we ran over there and craned a tree out of a back yard in short order. Levi helped mostly on the dingo. Lady kept the chips and the fire wood. Out by 3:00. Expected I would be out till dark. Sweet.

 

[lxskllr]

Another pine down. Before...



After...



Didn't try a traverse. I forgot my main stuff to do it. I stuffed some throwline and a weight in my pocket, but just didn't feel like it. Not digging the knut, or maybe it was the flex; dunno... The hitch required more attention than I'd like. RIT's next, then back to beeline before I sort them all according to preference.

 

[stikine]

Are those white pines or something else? Do the vines come off pretty easy or is it a pita?

 

[Bermy]

Did some hedge trimming today, a shrub I can never remember the name of...but holeee, when it's chipped talk about stink of almonds! Chipped down wind, then had to rake it out a bit and I got a snotfull of the aroma, headache all afternoon.
Small grey fuzzy leaf, little pinky red flowers...

 

[lxskllr]

Those are white pines. It can be easy or a PITA, but even the easy ones tend to the PITA side. It's bittersweet, and you can sometimes grab a leader and start pulling, and you'll get a big mess of crap drop down on your head, and get tangled in everything. That's the easy part. The ones that are more entangled, it's go up a few feet. cut them off, and go up some more. Writing it out, both ways are easy and a PITA about equally. The first way you get a shitstorm raining down on your head, but you get a lot at one time. The second way is cleaner, but takes more cutting.

These vines tend to catch on everything, even when dead. They get bent crooks that just want to get hung up on stuff. I was marveling about that today. Pulled my rope down, and was coiling it up, and I still managed to get it tangled in vines that were laying below the tree. Dunno if that's an evolutionary trait. I suspect it is. It's kinda setup to be a self building scaffold that supports itself as it climbs.

edit:
Pushed to a preference, I think I prefer the shitstorm. It's more work I think, but satisfying getting a big clump at one time. It's also a little dangerous. You have to pay attention to what you're pulling on. It would be easy to drag a big branch down on your head.

 

[FireFighterZero]

Could you mark the one you removed?

I can't see it.

 

[lxskllr]

None removed. Just devined and deadwooded. It's the one with the line in it. I might start some snag removal tomorrow. I'll see how I feel when I get up, and if I feel like taking my 362 in. Supposed to snow tomorrow, so the day will likely be mine,

 

[FireFighterZero]

I was confused.

When you said "down" I assumed you meant cut down.

Thanks.

 

[cory]

Did some hedge trimming today, a shrub I can never remember the name of...

This app rocks:

Posting up here on MB's thread what could be, imo, one of the most useful apps a tree pro can have.

It's a plant ID photo app that works 3 seconds after you take a pic of the plant in question.

It's mad fun to use it more or less all day long, OTJ, at the park, at home etc.

So great to get clarity on all those plants you were hazy on re ID.

And confirm those you were pretty sure but not positive you knew.

If y'all already knew about this, well dang I'm late to the party.

But if this is new to ya, It be a game changer.

Enjoy.

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