Joe Public - how do you think they see the Arb world?

[codlasher]

When I was involved with a five year tree safety programme I experienced the worst of motorised vehicle drivers anger. Working on the road sides is not nice.

 

Our little team were looked upon with;

Disgust.

How can they cut that lovely tree down.

Anger.

Those lads cutting that tree have made me late. Why is it taking so long?

Sadness;

Look they are destroying birds nests!

 

I'll ignore the traffic lights and drive on through.

I'll run them over.

I'll get out of my car/van and threaten them.

I'll hoot the horn for as long as I'm waiting.

I'll be abusive.

My cycling/walking group will just look the other way as we ride/walk through the closed road.....(there is another thread on that too!)

 

Five years of that and TBH I'm happy not to be doing it now!

codlasher

[Mark Bolam]

Good thread.

 

We need to remember that the majority of the population will never (personally) require the services of an arb.

It still gives me a buzz when customers say stuff like 'I had no idea how technical it was!'

 

( when I fell a small Cherry with a 200T wearing my Levis with Husky braces.)

 

Joke!

[Paul Barton]

In a moment of pondering today, a thought played out through my mind........ "What is Joe Public's understanding of trees and Arboriculture?"

 

Like most of us on here, I come into contact with the public on a daily basis - and often, as a representative of our industry, as a lover of trees, as someone who just loves the job I do, I find myself faced with a blank stare in return, whilst I stand and prattle on about things that, to me, are second nature. Stuff I take for granted.

 

Why is that? We are, supposedly, a green and pleasant island nation, with a very long historic importance of trees, forestry, timber etc.

 

Our roads are lined with them. Our towns and city are surrounded by them. We walk our dogs in woodlands full of them. As kids (some of us) played in them. Our gardens are laden with them. But yet as a populous, Joe Public, generally, seems totally oblivious to anything tree or Arb related.

 

.

Thoughts?

 

 

Sent from my BlackBerry 9700 using Tapatalk

 

Great question Andy. I think many people are passionate about trees - that may be negatively or positively! I get alot of people stopping to talk to me whilst out on surveys...sometimes to moan but often to check that I'm not going to have the trees felled.

 

Just look at the public outcry when the government talked about selling off forestry land a couple of years ago - people do love trees and woodland, they just don't know much about them.

 

I do agree that people also often look amused when I say what I'm doing - less so when I was on the tools doing a 'proper job' of course. I sometimes get the sense that people think inspecting trees is a bit of a mickey mouse job that isn't really essential. Wonder if they'd feel the same if a tree fell on their car?! ...but of course that happens so rarely that most people don't think about tree risk...just as pointed out in the NTSG document.

 

Interested to hear what others think about this...

[Mesterh]

I think the majority see us as a needless expense.

 

Customers are impressed during and after the event but beforehand, well most have no clue as to what's involved so you can't blame them if they think we are grass cutters with chainsaws.

[Mark Bolam]

Sums up the the average Joe Public for me Mesterh.

[TGB]

"...

I'll ignore the traffic lights and drive on through."

•Dangerous driving

 

"I'll run them over."

•Dangerous driving

 

"I'll get out of my car/van and threaten them."

•Road rage

 

"I'll hoot the horn for as long as I'm waiting."

•Simply bad manners and dangerous driving

 

"I'll be abusive."

•Road rage

 

"My cycling/walking group will just look the other way as we ride/walk through the closed road..."

•Driving without due car and attention

All of the above are perpetrated by people who don't care about their driving, nor about the environment in which they find themselves. For these kind of people, it is their belief that the world revolves around them. That they and the nearest & dearest are the only important people on the planet. All others are to be looked down on and if at all possible, the lives of others are to be blighted at every opportunity.

 

These type of people, are as a copper once said to me, as we jointly turfed them off the property after a couple of hours wrangling and talking them down from their stated purpose - that they were going to beat/knife me and my colleagues; were going to damage various parts of the property; and if they or their friends saw us in town, that we better start looking over our shoulders. Most of which was bravado. He, (the copper) said, "Some people are trouble wherever are or go. I just wish they'd stay at home and leave the rest of us in peace."

 

While getting into their vehicles to leave, they shouted they'd come back at night, ram the walls and burn down my place, waving their lighters for effect. I better they regretted those last words and actions. As it got them arrested on mass, for threatening behaviour and their vehicles impounded.

Edited October 25, 2013 by TGB

[RobRainford]

'My friend does trees too'

 

'I used to climb trees as a kid'

 

In my albeit limited experience. It can depend person to person and also their previous experience in dealing with us tree folk. Whether they were legitimate or not.

 

We can be seen as an eye opener on technical jobs but where it's fairly straight forward people don't realise what goes into it. Even 'simple' (to us) jobs take some thinking

 

' why can't you just cut it in the middle of the stem, I want more light' yeah ok let me just clip into that skyhook.

 

As much as people have their opinions and experiences on arbs, I let them from their opinion of me and how I work, show them and explain to them that I'm not just a door knocking tree looper. Hence why I have wooden business cards and can explain physiology and why which trees need what. Not because 'it's dangerous and my ladders don't go that high'

 

Everyone apparently knows someone who does trees, but why do they phone us instead? who they have never met or spoken to before?

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

Tbh, I thnk Arb is seen as a bit of a joke. Pouncing about, snipping little bits off trees, been everyone thinks they need hoofing great bits cut off, it's the only way to let more light in, isn't it? Then there's the farmer type group, you don't need all that fancy kit to cut bits off trees, just boiler suit, preferably John Deere, flat cap and wellies is adequate ppe. Then there's all the fuss about disposal, expensive chippers and trucks, you can just light a fire and get rid, can't you? We're seen as tree-huggers, and a hindrance, by the construction industry, who have to suffer us and our little ways to keep the planning depts happy. Not what you want to hear?

 

+1

 

esp for apathetic uk

[Gary Prentice]

I think the majority see us as a needless expense.

 

Customers are impressed during and after the event but beforehand, well most have no clue as to what's involved so you can't blame them if they think we are grass cutters with chainsaws.

 

I think this has always been the situation. Of course everyone knows everything about trees because we're surrounded by them. You cut the bits off that you don't want and they carry on growing, don't they?

 

I don't truly believe that this profession, for that is what we are and should be practising, will receive public recognition anytime soon.

 

This was discussed in the classroom recently. On sites the QS is introduced, the civil engineer, the environmentalist and geologist. Then us, not the arborculturist but the treeman.

 

Whilst 'paddy with his ladder' (with apologies to our Irish contingent) continues to do what the client demands, this won't and can't change. I've read on other posts that what we do isn't rocket science:001_rolleyes: That sort of self opinion is so damaging to ourselves. It doesn't do us any favours.

 

Consider that one of the highest levels in arboriculture, THe RFS Professional Diploma has been established since the 1960s. Little more than three hundred people actually have it, in almost forty years. It's little wonder we are so poorly perceived in joe publics eyes.

[Gary Prentice]

'

 

As much as people have their opinions and experiences on arbs, I let them from their opinion of me and how I work, show them and explain to them that I'm not just a door knocking tree looper. Hence why I have wooden business cards and can explain physiology and why which trees need what. Not because 'it's dangerous and my ladders don't go that high'

 

 

:congrats: