Tree Men Be Here

[pigwot]

Couldn't pass this up - Six men taking apart a maple tree from over a house down the road. Their trucks say "Ed Stanley - Home Improvements" In the picture you see them in action:

Foreman is on the upper roof directing, one fellow on ladder (not tied in) with electric stick saw, one fellow holding the base of the ladder, one fellow lowering pieces with what appeared to be clothesline rope, and two on the ground carrying the brush.

I stopped over and asked the apparent 'boss' if they had any stronger ropes, a saddle, and PPE. His response was, "Someone just left to get our saddle". I offered my card and said if they'd like a lesson on how to do tree work safely to give me a call.

 

[Cobleskill]

Looks like a recipe for disaster.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Ohhh boy...

So if someone went to go get the saddle.. There were 6 bodies on that job
Oh I bet the HO saved all kinds of money

Nice of you to offer lessons

 

[squisher]

Lol, I guess the 'improvements' come after the damage. Sad.

 

[SkwerI]

Why in the world would you want to work for someone like that?
I'm all for helping people out and spreading knowledge, but if somebody is willing to put together a crew to do that, then he has obviously already decided that he doesn't need any help from some fancy schmancy arborist. The only thing that will ever change his mind is when either he or one of his men end up like that photographer dude in the video last week with the broken leg. But God seems to look over drunks and fools, so the vast majority of them escape unscathed.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I work with idiots like that all the time. It's quite the skill to develop!

 

[sotc]

Id stop and watch if I had the time

 

[squisher]

I wonder what's with the big(ish) rounds in the bottom left corner of the pic?

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Somebody send a landscaper to help that yard out....

 

[pigwot]

Why in the world would you want to work for someone like that?

I won't work "for or with" the likes of them. I will advise and counsel as to proper and safe tree care/removal.
If they get the small stuff down and are at a loss as to finishing,
and IF they call they'll get a quote for the remaining part of the removal and the homeowner will have to agree to contract with and pay me directly.
If I do the job they will be spectators. I will also give them step-by-step verbal descriptions of minimal safety AND training requirements and
give them the local ISA contact info. Crazy as it sounds, in Delaware any contractor can do tree work under a general liability insurance coverage
as long as it doesn't amount to greater than 25% of their gross income. Until that changes, the state insurance commissioner tacitly approves of such shenanigans.

I don't want to see anyone hurt or killed. I have stepped in to save folks from their own limited knowledge base more than a couple times.
My favorite was a fellow who took on a clearing job for a new house site, thinking he could do it from the ground with one of those cable saws you throw over a limb!
Any time someone is injured in a tree it hurts all of us, as the common person doesn't distinguish between yahoos and professionals.

 

[pigwot]

I wonder what's with the big(ish) rounds in the bottom left corner of the pic?

Those are two of about eight rounds for seating for the children at Margaret's Home Day Care next door to where they are taking the maple down.
Margaret had some trees removed years ago, and others cabled so her yard would be safe for day care.
Her original rounds for sitting upon had rotted away and she left me a message asking for more. I delivered the ones you see in the photo from a job around the corner.
There are several heights, so even the little ones can sit comfortably while they are in the back yard. I shot the pic from two yards away, so Margaret's yard is in there, too.

 

[Bounce]

I love to see these kinds of guys out there, just makin' me look GOOD!

 

[SkwerI]

Any time someone is injured in a tree it hurts all of us, as the common person doesn't distinguish between yahoos and professionals.

Unfortunately the yahoos don't distinguish between the yahoos and the professionals either.

And as much as I hate to say it (because most government entities are the epitome of inefficiency), you are correct that some sort of standards need to be brought into place in order to filter out some of the worst yahoos. I hate it because I started out as one of those yahoos, and I have seen several local attempts at creating legislation that have all failed miserably. Laws that actually discourage people from maintaining their trees or removing dangerous trees because the red tape and expense are prohibitive. It's less hassle to let the trees rot and crumble. If there's a way to make the situation worse, then the government will find a way to legislate it.

What I like better is letting the yahoos pay the price for their lack of common sense. If a grown adult actually thinks that the method pictured above is a reasonable method of tree trimming then he should be allowed to pay the price for his willful ignorance.

 

[squisher]

Those are two of about eight rounds for seating for the children at Margaret's Home Day Care next door to where they are taking the maple down.

Cool. Around here you don't sit on rounds unless they are wellllllll cured. Of course we are dominated by the pitch producing softwoods.

 

[pigwot]

yep, we are blessed with ash, oak, maple, sweet gum, elm, walnut, hickory, beech, birch, and many other less-staining rounds for seating out here

 

[MasterBlaster]

I'd have paid admission to watch then tackle rigging out the stem.

 

[Bermy]

Yet another example of why some people don't understand why their landscapers can't do everything including the bigger trees, if they finish the job with no incidents then HO's feel justified in hiring them and they feel justified in doing the work.
We know they are a hair's breadth from disaster and that we could do the job more quickly and safely, but we don't get the chance whan yahoos like that get a look in.
I hope it's a removal, not a prune job!

 

[SouthSoundTree]

Git 'er done!

 

[NeTree]

And the sad part is, they'll get away with it. For awhile.

 

[FJR]

Yup, it will catch up to them.

 

[Old Monkey]

Pigwot, good for you. Offering to show those folks a safer way or bale them out if they get in a pinch. I have stopped by similar scenes and offered to show them a better way. I will teach anyone, I do not care if they are a competitor. I hate to see hack work and I don't want anyone to get hurt unnecessarily. Folks that I have helped in the past have referred work to me later. Helping other tree guys out where ever they fall on the ladder of skill, has always benefitted me.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Maybe Carl could have explained this to them......

In statistics, risk is often mapped to the probability of some event seen as undesirable. Usually, the probability of that event and some assessment of its expected harm must be combined into a believable scenario (an outcome), which combines the set of risk, regret and reward probabilities into an expected value for that outcome. (See also Expected utility.)

Thus, in statistical decision theory, the risk function of an estimator δ(x) for a parameter θ, calculated from some observables x, is defined as the expectation value of the loss function L

 

[tntree]

If that guy wasn't scared up there, he certainly is a fool.
Think I would listen to about anybody who had an Idea how to do it easier than that.
I would have liked to see them do the stem also.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I love it when I break out my porty and they're all agog & agape. Ha!

 

[OTGBOSTON]

Unfortunately the yahoos don't distinguish between the yahoos and the professionals either.

said the professional yahoo...