Commercial Tree/hedge planting.

[daveindales]

Just read your update. If it's just tree planting and nothing else, you should be able to get in at least a thousand a day in reasonable going. When I was a lad we were planting around that a day and were screefing them too.

[Gollum]

Hey Gollum that's well impressive. I love the scale of the job. Was it solo? No machinery involved in the planting? How long did it take you? What kind of tree/s? Someone else's land I take it?

 

No machinery for planting. team of 5, marking out, planting, caning and guarding.

6 days.

[Goaty]

I did 100 metres in a day, rough going in unprepared sites matted with grass, when I worked for a landscaper. Bare root 2ft with canes and spirals. No one else did so I got sent on my own.

[Hill-Billy]

Goaty, you sound like the man for the job. Can I sub-contract this job to you?

If I could still get a £1000/day for the job so much the better. I could pay you handsomely and keep a few quid for myself. So what if there is a recession on. Expand, expand I say. Throw money at it and wait for the rewards to flow back in....And back to reality and the original question...what was it? oh yes. Is it worth doing this kind of backbreaking work for a fist full of dollar. Pounds I mean. All that fresh air, danger-free exercise:001_tt2:....Get me back in the trees!

[G'day Spruce]

Finished a hedge planting job just before christmas, 2 men, 850 meters in 2 and a half days, double row, 5 plants per meter, no guards, whips (black, hawthorn, crab, beech) and container grown gorse. Half was easy planting the other half was strewn with stone....!!! I'd say £120 a day per man is a fair price.

[Hill-Billy]

Finished a hedge planting job just before christmas' date=' 2 men, 850 meters in 2 and a half days, double row, 5 plants per meter, no guards, whips (black, hawthorn, crab, beech) and container grown gorse. Half was easy planting the other half was strewn with stone....!!! I'd say £120 a day per man is a fair price.[/quote']

 

Are you talking only about setting day rates here(To the customer: "It takes as long as it reasonably takes)? whereas a commercial job/business customer is only interested in a 'total price for the job' all in/inclusive. The tricky part is gauging how many days a job will take if you are planting on a steep slope or in severe weather conditions or difficulties of maintaining a steady supply of tree canes down the line as you go, heavily stony soil who knows, an old tree stump or underground pipe-work and so on. Am I being too picky? Don't want to learn from my own bitter experience if I can learn form someone else's s:biggrin:urely

[G'day Spruce]

Severe weather, all I'll say is don't bother if the ground is frozen, otherwise crack on. That 850 m was planted in torrential rain and high winds..!!

 

If the ground is bad you just have to work with what you've got, tree stump - get the whips in as close to either side as you can, what else can you do?? Underground pipework in my experience, no pipework should really be that close to the surface unless a farmer has put pipes in for troughs!!!

 

To make it easy, get some decent planting bags (paper round bags work well) or Stanton Hope have some planting accessories, a decent planting spade/spear is worth it's weight too.

 

It's always worth walking the area to be planted and have a good prod around...

[Hill-Billy]

Severe weather' date=' all I'll say is don't bother if the ground is frozen, otherwise crack on. That 850 m was planted in torrential rain and high winds..!!

 

If the ground is bad you just have to work with what you've got, tree stump - get the whips in as close to either side as you can, what else can you do?? Underground pipework in my experience, no pipework should really be that close to the surface unless a farmer has put pipes in for troughs!!!

 

To make it easy, get some decent planting bags (paper round bags work well) or Stanton Hope have some planting accessories, a decent planting spade/spear is worth it's weight too.

 

It's always worth walking the area to be planted and have a good prod around...[/quote']

 

Thanks for all your help guys. It's been a real insight. Of course there's no substitute for actually doing the job - gaining valuable experience:thumbup:!

[raker]

Did this by hand a few years ago.A mate, whos a farmer got some kind of hedging grant.6000 mixed plants,canes and guards.

We used a scafold pole for weight with a spade blade welded onto it to cut the slots to put the roots and canes in, then press around with feet.Curl the guard round.

You really need a system for fast progress and using the pole made the slowest bit,making the hole, a breeze.Bang it into the ground, pull it back and forth, theres your slot.

There was three of us alternating jobs and we finished quite a few days faster than expected.Otherwise i dont remember length of time or cost.It was about seven years ago.

What i do know is that now its a very thick set of hedges with not many dead plants.

[hedgesparrow]

Did this by hand a few years ago.A mate, whos a farmer got some kind of hedging grant.6000 mixed plants,canes and guards.

We used a scafold pole for weight with a spade blade welded onto it to cut the slots to put the roots and canes in, then press around with feet.Curl the guard round.

You really need a system for fast progress and using the pole made the slowest bit,making the hole, a breeze.Bang it into the ground, pull it back and forth, theres your slot.

There was three of us alternating jobs and we finished quite a few days faster than expected.Otherwise i dont remember length of time or cost.It was about seven years ago.

What i do know is that now its a very thick set of hedges with not many dead plants.

good tool newcastle shovel with a scaffold pole lwelded to it as you say the weight drives it in ground bit of a wiggle in with wip and press back with foot