My Gehl and Spider Lift at work

[Koa Man]

Here are some pictures from work today. I screwed up by not taking my camera up with me after lunch. While I was up on the lift, a photographer brought 2 girls out to the beach and did some topless and a few nude photos. They were there for only a few minutes and I regretted every single one of them for not having my camera. At the same time, I did not want to go down and get the camera as I was enjoying the show too much and did not want to miss anything.

I also started my son-in-law, Brandon, climbing coconut palms and he is doing well. He is not afraid of heights and here he is on a 70 footer.

[Koa Man]

Here are a few more photos. I am on the lift. I am trying to avoid climbing palms as much as possible. I also have my Gehl hauling trash cans.

[MasterBlaster]

That's one spiffy piece of equipment! :D

[vharrison]

Nice shots, Koa! Beautiful property, is that zorsia turf?

[Paul B]

Koa, do those palms get to bonking the bucket in the wind? looks like they would get to moving pretty good up there.

ps.
Mental note to Koa Man "ALWAYS bring camera up in lift from now on please." :)

[roller]

Nice kit KOA,the lift is most definatly the tool for them palms...

[Koa Man]

Gigi,
The lawn is centipede grass cut very low.

Paul B,
I have done some palms with the lift on very windy days and I put the bucket right up against the trunk. That helps steading the top and it hasn't been a problem of it banging into the bucket. Little bumps at most. I really wish I had a lift with about 90 ft. of reach so I could get all of the palms without climbing. The 105 ft., 32 inch wide ReachMaster would be nice, but at over $200K, I can't afford it.

As far as the camera goes, you can be sure I will never forget it as long as I am working the beach. I keep kicking myself about it, but if I did bring the lift down, run to the truck and go back up, the photo session would have been over. They were there only about 5 minutes. We are going back today to do more trees, I will have the camera at all times.

[Thor's Hammer]

Nice job Koa. How do you find the lift in terms of productivity compared to a climber? Faster ? slower?

[Koa Man]

Thor,
The lift is way faster on certain jobs, like light pruning trees and if doing several palms that can be done without moving the lift. On palms it would be hard to beat a good climber if the lift needed to be moved to each tree. The advantage is you don't get as tired and you don't care if it is windy. All the climbers I know do not like to climb palms when it is windy.

[Buzz]

How do you access a palm like those from the ground Koa ??

[lumberjack]

Spikes I believe, Matt.

[tntree]

Man!, I want your sales territory, . . . I never did like to climb pecker poles around here, & them 70' palms look way to spindly for me.
Would you consider that cake work?

[Koa Man]

How do you access a palm like those from the ground Koa ??

We just use spikes if we cannot get a lift to the tree.

tnttree,
Coconut trimming is about the simplest type of trimming to teach someone. If you are in the tree business in Hawaii, you are going to have to do coconuts if you want to work steady.

[Koa Man]

Here are some photos of Royal palms that I trimmed with the spider lift today.
Had some tight 90* turns but the lift negotiated them with no difficulty. One photo I have included is of a dead bird I found after I pulled open the skirt of a frond I removed. I don't know how it got in there, but apparently it couldn't get back out and starved to death. The 2nd photo is a palm before trimming, the 3rd is the same one after. 4th pictures shows the tight turns around the pool and the last picture is the path from the parking lot to where the trees are. Only a narrow access lift will be able to get to them. Previously the trees were done by someone else with long extension ladders, but 3 of the eight trees are already at the point where a 40 ft. ladder would be needed.

[Rotax Robert]

That is some cool stuff.

[Old Monkey]

Cool pictures Wesley despite the lack of nudity. I have climbed only a handful of those tall spindly palms. I never felt very secure in them. I kept telling myself that they get beat to heck in hurricanes and don't fall over or break in half, I'll be OK. They just feel so different from trees.

[stehansen]

I tell myself the same thing as I'm waving around.

[sotc]

you over sized lawn mowers:D

[Old Monkey]

Don't make me sit on you Willie.

[Reddog]

Koa,
Neat pictures, so different from what I am use too.



Don't make me sit on you Willie.

OM, Once you run him down it will be easy. But those spindly ones can be hard to get your hands on. :D

[sotc]

darn tootin!

[stehansen]

you over sized lawn mowers:D

I'm moving to Australia.

[Bounce]

I heard a rumor that the State of Hawaii is about to pass a law requiring that all palm tree pruning be done without spikes. This sounds a little crazy to me since so much of this kind of work is done with spikes, but my source insisted it was true. Does anybody know for sure? If so Koaman, I bet you and your spider lift will be in high demand!

[Koa Man]

With my 50 ft. lift, I can reach about 50% of all the palms we do. Some are too tall, others are not accessible with the lift. I wish Hawaii would pass such a law, but I doubt it. If they did, then the cost of trimming cocos would go up tremendously, people will have to start putting in wider gates and I imagine we will also have a lot of removals. I seriously doubt that the average homeowner with only 1-3 palms will like to spend $150 each to get them trimmed every 6 months when a removal would run about $300-600 each, depending on size.

I love palm removals, they are fast and easy. We can generally get a 60 footer down to the ground in an hour piecing it out. Much quicker if we can drop it in 10 ft. sections.

If such a law was passed, my 50 ft. lift would be for sale and a 75 ft. lift would be on order.

[MasterBlaster]

OR people would just stop having them trimmed or removed altogether.

[Frans]

wonder what the statistics are of tourists getting killed from falling coconuts?

[Paul B]

I bet they keep that on the down low at the PD. ;)

"Some web pages say as many as 150 people each year are killed by coconuts, however it turned out there is very little factual data concerning coconut related fatalities, mainly because no one is keeping track of them."

one link I found..

[Koa Man]

I have heard of only 2 fatalities by falling coconuts in Hawaii since I started in the tree business a little over 20 years ago. One tourist who did not get killed, did get a fractured shoulder about 10 years ago.