Stupid mistakes you've made doing tree work

[arbogrunt]

1. Topped out my anchor point in a big Lombardy pop 20 odd years ago. Luckily, it got caught on a stub, I always climb 2 Krabs and they locked off. Lessons?....don't let the customer talk you into doing 2 days work for one day's money....take frequent short breaks, in shade, when when working in hot weather.

2. Last cut on a Friday syndrome - anchored in to the same pollard head as I was lowering from. Cut a piece too big and ripped out the lowering pulley...leaving my life line in the remaining part of the fork. We were working over grave stones and a spiked iron railing fence☠️
The piece sailed past my ear, followed by the lowering pulley and 50% on the anchor point, just missing the groundie lowering on the Hobbs. The groundie on the tag line never let go off the rope and was dragged through several tombstones without hitting any. How to take out a 3 man crew with one piece of wood!.
Lesson - don't rush to chase light by risking rigging failure by overloading.
Never use the same anchor point for your lifeline and lowering pulley...if you to, do it in several small pieces [emoji15]

[Mark Wileman]

Took out a BT wire today, rigged a couple of big sections beforehand so told the guy on the ground to let them run a bit. He then let the smaller section right above the BT line run... as in free-fall, straight through it. Oops. Luckily we know the client really well and attached it back to the house easily. My fault for not briefing properly!

[oldwoodcutter]

About 100 years ago we’d just finished clearing some trees from behind an old house, and as I was knocking for payment the old dear came out and asked if we could just cut down an old wooden linen line post before we go.
We’d been walking round this ivy covered post all day, as I got on one knee to do a 5 second cut, a sheet of sparks came off my chain, yep, the ‘wooden ‘ post was something resembling a piece of track rail lurking deep behind all the coiled ivy.

[Aicchalmers]

14 minutes ago, oldwoodcutter said:

About 100 years ago

[stihlmadasever]

On 22/11/2017 at 21:04, tony_t3d said:

 

 

This guy is making quite a lot... Very lucky.

I do however like his ingenuity of using a dog lead as a chainsaw lanyard

 

Is that 200 even sharp???

Looks to be throwin more dust than chip.

Least of his worries.. 

Edited November 28, 2017 by stihlmadasever

[Will Heal]

About 100 years ago we’d just finished clearing some trees from behind an old house, and as I was knocking for payment the old dear came out and asked if we could just cut down an old wooden linen line post before we go.
We’d been walking round this ivy covered post all day, as I got on one knee to do a 5 second cut, a sheet of sparks came off my chain, yep, the ‘wooden ‘ post was something resembling a piece of track rail lurking deep behind all the coiled ivy.

I know you pain mate, have done that to an ivy covered concrete post

[billpierce]

Be a pretty good laugh if you were and old dear...wonder how many tree surgeon she's got with that one

[Boggle4137]

Ive been on a team pollarding some street trees for the last few weeks. Im always tempted to grab any branches that land in the road asap even though we have guys stopping traffic. I once didnt look up to see if the climber had finished cutting, i heard the saw run and started walking away mid way though picking up a huge branch, however i heard one of the lads scream at me to get out of the way. I ran and a branch about 5in thick and about 10ft long missed me...... Moral of the story, look up and dont rush if it can wait.

[IronMike]

I think the most stupid mistake I ever made in my tree work career was showing some panache for hedge cutting........

[Will Heal]

I think the most stupid mistake I ever made in my tree work career was showing some panache for hedge cutting........[emoji3]

Does your boss send you to all of the hedgecutting jobs?
I got that