Would You Do It Again? - Forestry

lxskllr

Treehouser
Joined
Jul 21, 2019
Messages
13,047
Location
MD USA
Is everyone happy with their career choice? Acknowledging work sometimes sucks, in hindsight would you pick forestry again over other realistic career choices? Or hell, even Jim. You happy with farming?

I enjoy the little treework I get to do, and would like to do more, but I wonder about doing it every single day for decades on end. I'm pretty happy with surveying. I've done a lot cool stuff, seen a lot of cool things, and for the most part, I get rewarded by having a concrete(sometimes literally) monument to my effort. Downside is I'm responsible for the destruction of farms and wildlands, and also get to see shitty crackerboxes on sterile acreage put up as a monument to my efforts.

Going back in time, I think I might pick surveying again, but start forestry earlier as a hobby. Surveying is the known quantity, and it's alright. Doing more treework would be cool, and easing into it would make it easier to ease out if the repetition made it un-fun.
 
Back in 1983 when I fell out of a tree and busted my back, I was faced with the fact of maybe never being able to return to logging/arborism.
In fact, I was out of it for a few years, doing other jobs.
Also in the 10 years I travelled and worked my way around the World, I probably did 50 different jobs.

None of those ever seemed anything but a step down from logging/arb.

The day I was able to return to it, was probably the happiest day of my life, on par with the day I found my Swiss girl again.

Today, at the age of 63, I must admit that my body is ready for the wrecking yard, I'm totally worn out.
The last 5 years with disease, near death and one friggin' accident after the other sure hasn't helped.
I don't want to retire, but I fear that I may be forced to, because I simply can't do the work any more.

Would I rather have done something different..........Hell, no!

I love and have always loved my work.
I've always told my apprentices, that if you go into this for the money, you'll be sorely disappointed, it has to be for love.
 
Great post, Stig.

I want to put part of that post in the Quote thread because it speaks volumes and is powerful and it is expressed poetically with the 'wrecking yard' reference., unless you don't want it highlighted. "Today, at the age of 63, I must admit that my body is ready for the wrecking yard, I'm totally worn out."

Yes I would do it again. Would hopefully do a lot of things wiser, especially re employees. And probably buy a crane, which would lead to more, larger equipment which would lead to more net income and probably less wear and tear on the body.
 
Cory, anything I post on the open forum, you can do with what you want.

I would have done one thing differently.
Gotten in on the harvester thing instead of fighting and hating them.
They won anyway, might as well have had a piece of that.
Wouldn't have been me running them, but my partner likes machines.
 
Working for the US Forest Service panned out better for me than I ever might have guessed, back over 40 years ago now. No regrets.
 
I was a logger for a few years. Mostly propper old growth,everything else is a huge step down to be quite honest. Old growth and Yarders with big spans take some beating.

My boss used to tell us "take plenty of pictures boys,because this is the last of it". Now you have a generation of loggers who have spent their entire careers pulling levers.

I liked that I have travelled doing Arb work,I would reccomend my career to anyone but with the caveat of getting another trade behind you first.
 
Stig, even though you are beat up for workin, do you feel like you have enough health left to enjoy retirement?
 
As you may remember me commenting in other threads, I feel that I never (well rarely) had to go to work. I have enjoyed most everything I have done in the past 56 years since I chose forestry as a career. As always, I would change a few things if I did it over, but it seemed right at the time. Probably one of the highlights was traveling to Zelenograd, RU and visiting with Dmitry (aka Treedoctor on his current website). He was on this site for a while, but I first met him on the bulletin board out of Kernville, CA (Loggers, Arborists and Trees ??). I attended what was we believe was the first unofficial meeting of the Russian society of arboriculture chapter.
 
I’m glad I took the job with DuPont and made tree work a part time thing. I was worried about retirement, and now I can turn down trees that I don’t want to do. If I could’ve gotten a nice municipality gig I might’ve stuck with it.

I love the work way too much to stop, and hope I’m able to climb until the day I die. Now I can pick what jobs and days I wish to do it.

I don’t miss having to work in shitty weather or with addicts and thieves.
 
Stig, even though you are beat up for workin, do you feel like you have enough health left to enjoy retirement?

Cory, once this friggin' leg knits together, I'll be back in the woods, even if I have to crawl out there.

As for retirement, I have a wonderful wife.
That alone will make retirement joyfull.
 
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #11
That's kind of what prompted this thread Jonny. A thread I read elsewhere about mid life change got me thinking about my choices. I think one of my problems is I don't want to do anything, and I want to do everything. I tend to get bored easily, and even crappy work isn't so bad if I'm doing it for my own use. Treework is the closest thing so far where I think "I could maybe do this all the time". Subsistence farming with some acreage is probably more my speed. Get to do a little bit of everything, and nothing is making you do it aside from the need to survive.
 
I have thought it could be fun to tour around doing tree work with you guys: different climates, trees, equipment and ways of getting it done.

I do tree work for the fun of it, but at the same time I like people to be paid for what skills, effort, and risk they have over some other common jobs.

I do wonder sometimes how much tree work will affect my body in later years. Joint problems would sure suck.
 
Can't help but fall in love with good outdoors work. Locally speaking, for myself, logging and arbo work was never steady enough to rely on, and I had to be versed in a number of trade-skills to keep the paychecks coming. Commercial fishing, metal fabrication and later publishing filled in the gaps.

I grew up in times of great opportunity. Good paying jobs were plentiful.
 
It's been a good run for me and I've seen and done things many folks will never see or do. From staying in remote field camps, flying in helicopters/float planes, boating, running large sale prep crews, wildland firefighting all over the country, and a host of other assignments, it would be hard to call it dull. I've especially enjoyed training & mentoring younger employees. Has it all been fun...hell no, but the years have seemed to fly by. I wish I had more photos from the early days but it just wasn't very convenient back then to drag a 35mm camera around all the time, particularly in a rain forest.
 
I wish I had more photos from the early days but it just wasn't very convenient back then to drag a 35mm camera around all the time, particularly in a rain forest.

Tell that to Gerry! jk!
 
I would only wish I started sooner. If someone had told me as a kid I could make money climbing trees...
But I took what life landed on my plate and made it work on chance and perserverence. And with a little help from my friends here.
No regrets.
 
It sounds like you have an excellent crew and an excellent biz and your wife does most or all of the appts. What burns you out?
 
Back
Top