Why are Horticultural professionals SO devalued?

[Mick Dempsey]

9 minutes ago, richyrich said:

 

Back to arb- where I am between Leeds/York there are loads of firms. Recently I was booked in to remove a Beech. Customer wanted stump grinding as well. I got them 3 quotes. A few weeks later got a message to say another firm was doing the job- including grinding. Moral of this- let  the potential customer find their own stump grinder. Don't go out of your way to help them. 

Seems to me you threw that job away, very careless!

 

If they wanted grinding YOU give them a quote, don’t get three others involved, giving the client the names and numbers of 3 other tree firms.

They pinched it right under your nose, and you opened the door!

[AHPP]

1 hour ago, Mike Hill said:

Mick covered it.

 

If you stopped 100 folk in the street,95 of them could do your job.Its common sense and low risk.

 

That's why the pay is low.

 

On the other end of the scale crew on a Red crab boat in the Arctic Ocean make about £5000 a week over a two month season. Common sense job but very high risk.

 

The latter option is available to you after just a one week course and a medical certificate. Time for a change mate?

 

Slightly unfair. If it’s just weeding, grass and hedge cutting, taking machines to the shop if they need servicing and a bit of Googling how to grow plants then yeah, 19/20 could do that well enough.
 

But now say you’re expected to change oil on a petrol ride on and spark plugs and recoils on hedge cutters and take charge of the dynasty dahlias that great great grandfather got from the Galapagos with Darwin. A disappointing proportion of the workforce would start to break/kill things, even with YouTube.

 

Now the stately home, open to public, NT type gig. Managing paid staff and volunteers. Tractor, digger, quad bike mechanics. Sourcing ice for the icehouse, dealing with the events people who are putting fairy lights and a sound system in the orangery, a boy has fallen down a well you didn’t cap. The lady of the house has increasingly wild whims and you can’t satisfy them all. The lady of the house is now Uncle Monty from Withnail and I. Etc etc. How many can hack all that? It’s not 95%. 

[AHPP]

And you can’t think of the workforce as just your immediate contacts and neighbours. There’s a broad and terrifying spectrum of retards out there and they have national insurance numbers. 

[richyrich]

1 hour ago, Mick Dempsey said:

Seems to me you threw that job away, very careless!

 

If they wanted grinding YOU give them a quote, don’t get three others involved, giving the client the names and numbers of 3 other tree firms.

They pinched it right under your nose, and you opened the door!

Perhaps I trusted them too much- done plenty of work for them before. They accepted my quote for the tree- I was just trying to get them best price for stump- no contact details passed on- just WhatsApp to the stump co.s.

I wasn't sub contracting it out- just passing it on. I wouldn't be surprised if it was one of them that did the job though. Next time I won't be so helpful..They were a bit too fussy/impatient about the whole thing..

[Haironyourchest]

9 hours ago, AHPP said:

Slightly unfair. If it’s just weeding, grass and hedge cutting, taking machines to the shop if they need servicing and a bit of Googling how to grow plants then yeah, 19/20 could do that well enough.
 

But now say you’re expected to change oil on a petrol ride on and spark plugs and recoils on hedge cutters and take charge of the dynasty dahlias that great great grandfather got from the Galapagos with Darwin. A disappointing proportion of the workforce would start to break/kill things, even with YouTube.

 

Now the stately home, open to public, NT type gig. Managing paid staff and volunteers. Tractor, digger, quad bike mechanics. Sourcing ice for the icehouse, dealing with the events people who are putting fairy lights and a sound system in the orangery, a boy has fallen down a well you didn’t cap. The lady of the house has increasingly wild whims and you can’t satisfy them all. The lady of the house is now Uncle Monty from Withnail and I. Etc etc. How many can hack all that? It’s not 95%. 

 

Sounds rough... But if the gig includes a paid-up residence in the grounds, you got to consider what that's worth as well. How much would that cost in rent etc? What price the immediate environment? Does the gig include the use of yard space for your own projects, equipment, firewood, etc?

 

How does the stress level of a secure income on a stately estate compare to chasing a hundred different clients?

 

It all needs factoring in.

 

[headgroundsman]

10 hours ago, AHPP said:

Slightly unfair. If it’s just weeding, grass and hedge cutting, taking machines to the shop if they need servicing and a bit of Googling how to grow plants then yeah, 19/20 could do that well enough.
 

But now say you’re expected to change oil on a petrol ride on and spark plugs and recoils on hedge cutters and take charge of the dynasty dahlias that great great grandfather got from the Galapagos with Darwin. A disappointing proportion of the workforce would start to break/kill things, even with YouTube.

 

Now the stately home, open to public, NT type gig. Managing paid staff and volunteers. Tractor, digger, quad bike mechanics. Sourcing ice for the icehouse, dealing with the events people who are putting fairy lights and a sound system in the orangery, a boy has fallen down a well you didn’t cap. The lady of the house has increasingly wild whims and you can’t satisfy them all. The lady of the house is now Uncle Monty from Withnail and I. Etc etc. How many can hack all that? It’s not 95%. 

19/20people might be able to do this work but I bet half do not do a good job or take ages to do it. I am now a gardener from a wheelchair but have more work available than I want or need due to the fact that I know how to do the job well and am quicker and more effective than most able bodied gardeners. Maybe partly because I have had to find ways that work for me and partly because I give 100% towards my work.

[AHPP]

1 hour ago, headgroundsman said:

19/20people might be able to do this work but I bet half do not do a good job or take ages to do it.

I know. I was being generous. 

[Stere]

I think/have found personally  that general gardening ( esp digging weeding trimming hegdes etc ) is  alot more hard work physically than felling trees.

 

 

 

[Trailoftears]

On 24/08/2023 at 06:06, Mick Dempsey said:

Getting back to your first post, horticulture is not arboriculture, they often get lumped together.

Mowing lawns, weeding beds, planting and spraying are low skill tasks, people pay you to do them because they don’t want to do them or haven’t the time to do it themselves, the equipment needed is cheap and often the clients have it themselves for you to use (I know, I’ve done it)

 

Taking down or trimming trees is different, people pay you to do it because they CAN’T do it themselves, there is also risk (both to life and property) and the machinery is expensive and needs to be transported to site, and often large quantities of waste needs to be removed. The jobs are often one-offs (not once a week) so filling the diary is harder.

 

So the money in trees is much higher.

I’ve no interest in the National Trust thing, if you don’t like It, don’t do it.

 

 

 

Frankly,I think you big your own gig up here-can you plant appropriate plants in a suitable environment,do you know what are the suitable temperatures to germinate say hundreds of seeds at,do you know which seeds MUST have dark/light in order to germinate at?Do you know at which point in the season is the optimum time to divide herb.perenialls up?how would you propagate poppies?Do you know what double dormancy means re: sowing tree seeds?When and how would you take rose cuttings-and is it worth it?What soil conditions/acidity levels/would you think would suit young lavender plants,What density/spacing would you advise a client to plant a hawthorn/beech/laurel hedge at+timing?

Best time to prune Cherries given their propensity to canker.Herbicide doseage rates for var.weeds?Effective eradication methods for bramble eradication,tricks for effective germination of primula/magnolia seeds?Best methods for grafting/budding/layering var rhodies/shrubs.Trees?What a VERY narrow version of the World we live in,and frankly an easy way of making a living in a dynamic environment of trees/grass/shrubs/herbaceous plants/wild flowers/marginal plants/soft/hard fruits etc,etc,-piece of piss tbh....

 

[Trailoftears]

On 24/08/2023 at 06:06, Mick Dempsey said:

Getting back to your first post, horticulture is not arboriculture, they often get lumped together.

Mowing lawns, weeding beds, planting and spraying are low skill tasks, people pay you to do them because they don’t want to do them or haven’t the time to do it themselves, the equipment needed is cheap and often the clients have it themselves for you to use (I know, I’ve done it)

 

Taking down or trimming trees is different, people pay you to do it because they CAN’T do it themselves, there is also risk (both to life and property) and the machinery is expensive and needs to be transported to site, and often large quantities of waste needs to be removed. The jobs are often one-offs (not once a week) so filling the diary is harder.

 

So the money in trees is much higher.

I’ve no interest in the National Trust thing, if you don’t like It, don’t do it.

 

 

 

Frankly,I think you big your own gig up here-can you plant appropriate plants in a suitable environment,do you know what are the suitable temperatures to germinate say hundreds of seeds at,do you know which seeds MUST have dark/light in order to germinate at?Do you know at which point in the season is the optimum time to divide herb.perenialls up?how would you propagate poppies?Do you know what double dormancy means re: sowing tree seeds?When and how would you take rose cuttings-and is it worth it?What soil conditions/acidity levels/would you think would suit young lavender plants,What density/spacing would you advise a client to plant a hawthorn/beech/laurel hedge at+timing?

Best time to prune Cherries given their propensity to canker.Herbicide doseage rates for var.weeds?Effective eradication methods for bramble eradication,tricks for effective germination of primula/magnolia seeds?Best methods for grafting/budding/layering var rhodies/shrubs.Trees?What a VERY narrow version of the World we live in,and frankly an easy way of making a living in a dynamic environment of trees/grass/shrubs/herbaceous plants/wild flowers/marginal plants/soft/hard fruits etc,etc,-piece of piss tbh....