c/arborists

Watching video playback showed me I was climbing like a grandma

I sent GoPro footage of myself on a removal to my old crew lead in Portland, and he said "you're swinging your whole body up every step, use your legs or you'll burn out by lunch." I spent two weekends reworking my footlock technique with shorter, faster steps and it cut my ascent time on a 60 foot Doug fir from maybe 8 minutes down to under 4. Has anyone else filmed themselves and found a basic habit they could fix, or is it just me that needed that awkward wake-up call?

That removal job taught me to trust my gut over the foreman

Three summers ago on a job in Portland, the foreman insisted we drop a 60 foot dying oak right between two fences, and I said it needed rigging lines. He waved me off at 7am, so I set up a single guide rope anyway, and halfway through the trunk split and swung hard toward the neighbor's shed. We got lucky, but that could've turned into a lawsuit, so has anyone else had a supervisor overrule their calls and how did you handle it without getting fired?

Found a cheap trick for dead ash stumps in Ohio

Been fighting ash stumps that keep resprouting for like 2 years now, tried drilling holes and pouring stump killer but that barely did anything. A guy I met on a job in Cleveland said to cut it flush, then cover the cut with a thick layer of black plastic and weigh it down with bricks, left mine 8 weeks and it finally stopped growing. Anyone else use the plastic method or do you just grind everything out?

That old timer's ladder trick in Austin saved my back today

Had a 70 year old climber named Gus show me how he sets his extension ladder on uneven ground using just a scrap 2x4 and a hinge pin. No fancy levelers, just wedged it under one foot and it sat rock solid. We were working a big live oak off Lamar Blvd and I spent 20 minutes fighting the grade before he walked over and fixed it in under a minute. Has anyone else picked up a simple rig trick from an older hand that you use every job now?

The pruner I borrowed changed how I see my cuts

Last month I used my buddy's bypass pruner on a big maple job in Portland and the clean cuts healed up way faster than the ones from my old anvil style. The difference showed in about 3 weeks when new growth pushed out on the pruned branches while the others stayed dormant. Has anyone else switched tools and seen the tree respond that quick?

Hit 500 tree inspections this year, here's what surprised me

I do residential tree assessments on the side and just counted my logs. 500 inspections in 11 months, mostly in the Portland metro area. The shocker was how many maples had root girdling that nobody caught, maybe 40 percent of them. I started carrying a small air spade to check root flares on every job now. Has anyone else tracked their inspection numbers and found a pattern like this?

The cable lacing mistake I made for 12 years

I was doing removals with a 150 foot rope and always tied my friction hitch with a triple wrap. Last month a climber from Portland, Oregon watched me and asked why I wasn't using a Blake's hitch with a longer tail. He showed me how my knot was binding up on descents and causing extra wear on the rope. Has anyone else been running the same knot for years only to find out there's a safer, smoother way?

Skeptical about tree growth regulators, 4 years later I was wrong

Back in 2021 I had a client in Portland with a silver maple that was tearing up their driveway. Arborist I respect said to try PGRs. I figured it was snake oil, just charge them for injections and hope for the best. 4 years later that maple has slowed way down, roots stopped buckling the concrete, and the canopy looks healthier than before. Turns out the science was there all along, I just had to see it on my own jobs. Anyone else come around on stuff they used to shrug off?

The 3-week transformation of a dead stump into a bird condo

I had this big oak stump in the backyard that I kept putting off grinding down. 2 months ago I finally got around to it, but the guy I hired only got halfway before his machine broke. So I left the rest. Last week I looked out and there are woodpecker holes all over it, a family of chickadees nesting in the top, and some kind of vine growing up the side. It went from an eyesore to the most popular spot in the yard. Has anyone else just left a stump and let nature do the decorating?

The tree service quote I laughed at turned out to be the smart one

Three years ago I got a bid for $4,800 to remove a dying oak near my garage, and I went with the cheaper guy who just topped it. Last month that same oak dropped a limb through my fence, and the arborist who did the removal explained how the cheap cut left a stub that rotted inward. Have any of you had to eat a lowball quote like that before deciding to pay for proper pruning skills?

Tried the bucket truck trick on a 40 foot maple, ended up dangling like a piñata

So last week I had this big maple near a fence line. I figured instead of climbing it like normal, I'd use the boom to reach the top and tie off from there. Worked GREAT for about 20 minutes. Then the hydraulic line blew and the bucket stopped responding. I was stuck up there, swaying in the wind, with my chainsaw still running in the holder. My ground guy had to call a buddy with a crane to come get me. Two hours and 350 bucks later I finally touched dirt. Lesson learned: check those hoses before you commit your whole afternoon to floating. Has anyone else had a bucket fail mid-job? How did you get down without calling in an airlift?

Surprised by how much weight a single oak limb can carry

I was reading through an old extension service bulletin last week, the one from Penn State about tree hazards, and it said a mature oak limb can hold over 2,000 pounds of snow before it gives. That number threw me because I always figured the branch would break much sooner with that kind of load. It makes me wonder about all the pruning decisions I make in winter, especially in my clients' yards here in Erie. Has anyone else seen those weight tables and adjusted how they estimate risk on big deciduous trees?

Tried a pole saw on a palm and got a coconut shower

Ran a 10 foot pole saw through a queen palm in Austin yesterday thinking it'd be clean. The frond dropped, snagged the boot, and dumped about 14 coconuts on my head. Lesson learned, always shake the skirt first, has anyone else gotten ambushed by palm debris?

My mentor swore by wound dressings, and I'm starting to think he was wrong

He told me back in 2019 to always paint pruning cuts on oaks in Madison, but after 5 years of watching those sealed wounds hold moisture and rot from the inside, I'm wondering if leaving them bare is actually the better call, has anyone else given up on dressing cuts entirely?

The homeowner in Ohio who made me rethink how I quote removals

I had a job about two months ago in Dayton, trimming a big silver maple that was hanging over this lady's garage. She was real nice, offered me lemonade and everything. After I gave her my price, she looked at the estimate and said, that seems like a lot for a tree that looks fine to me. I tried to explain the weight and the drop zone, but she just kept looking at the ladder in my truck. It hit me that she had zero idea what goes into a removal vs a trim. She thought I was just going to climb up and saw a few branches. I walked her through the gear, the rigging, the cleanup, and she finally got it. But it stuck with me because I never ask if a customer has seen a real tree job before. I just assume they trust the number. Now I always ask if they've had tree work done before I even start talking price. Has anyone else run into that gap where folks think it's just a chainsaw and a truck?

A homeowner in Asheville corrected my pruning cuts and honestly, she was right

She pointed out I was leaving stubs on her red maple and showed me the branch collar method on a YouTube video from her phone, so now I carry a folding saw and cut flush to the bark ridge on every job, has anyone else had a customer teach them something they should've known?

Couldn't get a stump out until I tried the water trick

Pulled a 4 foot oak stump in Austin last week and my 20 ton jack just kept sinking into the dirt, so I drilled holes, filled em with water, and let it sit overnight. Next morning the whole thing came out like a loose tooth, has anyone else had that work or did I just get lucky with the soil?

That 3 foot root flare took me 4 days of digging

Ngl, I spent a full Monday through Thursday on a single red oak in Portland, trying to find the actual root flare under 8 inches of fill dirt and old mulch. Finally broke out the air spade on day 3 and solved it in 2 hours. Has anyone else wasted time hand digging when you should just rent the spade from the start?

Is a groundie with chainsaw skills a liability or an asset? That kid in Austin changed my mind

That 2019 maple in Boulder taught me to trust the rope grab

I was removing a big silver maple off Mapleton Ave last spring and the rope grab slipped on a wet line during a takedown. Nearly swung into a fence at 20 feet. Now I always wipe the rope dry and check the grab teeth before every climb, no matter how rushed the client makes me feel. Anyone else had a close call that changed their rigging habits?

Spent $450 on a used stump grinder that turned out to be a money pit

Bought it off a guy in Fresno last spring. Said it was low hours, just needed a carb clean. Got it home and the hydro pump went out on the second job. Then the belt shredded. Then the teeth were worn to nubs and cost $80 to replace. I couldve rented a grinder for 3 weekends with that cash. Has anyone else gotten burned buying used equipment off marketplace? Im sticking to rental or new from now on.

Climbing spikes or bucket truck for a sick oak in a tight backyard, I chose wrong

Honestly, last Tuesday I had a 60 foot oak with a big dead limb over a shed in Portland. The backyard had maybe 8 feet of clearance on each side, so the bucket truck was a no go unless I wanted to rip up the owner's new paver patio. I decided to climb with my spikes, figured it would be faster than rigging a rope from the neighbor's fence. Big mistake, that tree was softer than I thought and the spikes tore up the bark something awful, plus the limb came down and took a section of gutter with it. Owner was cool about it, just said 'at least you didn't hit the shed,' but I spent 3 hours patching wounds and cleaning gutters. Has anyone else gambled on spikes in a tight spot and ended up wishing they'd just craned it in? What's your call when access is that cramped?

Got told my crown reduction cuts were all wrong last month

A guy from the local ISA chapter watched me prune a red oak and said I was leaving too many stubs, like half-inch nubs all over. He showed me how to cut flush to the branch collar instead and now my trees heal way cleaner. Has anyone else had to unlearn bad habits from old-timers who did it a different way?

Switched to a 3-step pruning cut on a big oak last month and saved my shoulder

I had this big red oak near Dayton that needed a heavy limb taken off, maybe 8 inches thick. My old method of just cutting from the top left me fighting the weight and nearly twisted my back. I tried the 3-step cut I saw in a workshop video, cut a notch underneath first then the top cut a few inches out. The limb dropped clean without tearing the bark and I didn't have to wrestle it at all. Took maybe 20 minutes total instead of the usual hour-long tug of war. Anyone else switch up their cut technique and notice a big difference in strain?

That leaning oak taught me something about root crowns last Tuesday

I was out on a job in Greenfield last week, this big red oak was leaning bad and I figured it was a root issue. Dug down about 8 inches and found the root crown was buried 3 inches deeper than it should be, had been that way for years. Anyone else come across trees planted way too deep from the get go?