A bit of fun.

[Tom D]

Forestry is much harder, because the ground is uneven, and you're usually on a slope. I've been messing about in an urban woodland for the last two weeks and thats as close to the forest as I'd like to get.

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

I have to say, I have always done forestry and just moved into tree surgery. Forestry is definatly harder work physicly but tree surgery is alot harder on H&S and paper work, working with the public, is it ever worth the hassel?

 

Ditto this; I find Forestry work i.e. dogging in the woods all day is physically harder but mentally much less hassle, no H&S crap to think about, stupid customers, irritating complainers. I also think that ones body gets tuned to what one does regularly so I find stacking timber with pulp tongs much easier than dragging brash through a garden to the chipper. Maybe it's just me but I would personally choose forestry everytime plus I'm not a climber and the latter doesn't interest me (ropes and all that). Hand cutting of commmercial timber is dying fast though and I haven't cut softwood thinnings since the late 90s due to harvester monopoly. Hardwood thinnings is good if there's no crap to cut out aswell, drive to the wood, self-select cut, cross cut 2 paces, stack to the butt, pulp up the brash to knee height for the forwarder and off you go; simple. Tree surgery means organising times, driveways to clear, paperwork, chippers etc etc.

 

There used to be a ficticious conversation between a cutter and a surgeon that went like: Surgeon - "ha, you only know how to fell trees from the bottom!"; cutter replies "yeah and you've never done a hard days work in your life mate" ! When I started in timber harvesting it was in Haldon forest, Exeter working for B&L Forestry of Launceston, piece work on larch; £2 per sawlog, £1 for bars and rails and length had to be exact. Hardwoods was less acurate but if you didn't cut 20 tons a day you didn't get paid.

 

Forestry just seems to flow better in my experience... Soz for the ramble.

[Highland Forestry]

Ditto this; I find Forestry work i.e. dogging in the woods all day is physically harder but mentally much less hassle, no H&S crap to think about, stupid customers, irritating complainers. I also think that ones body gets tuned to what one does regularly so I find stacking timber with pulp tongs much easier than dragging brash through a garden to the chipper. Maybe it's just me but I would personally choose forestry everytime plus I'm not a climber and the latter doesn't interest me (ropes and all that). Hand cutting of commmercial timber is dying fast though and I haven't cut softwood thinnings since the late 90s due to harvester monopoly. Hardwood thinnings is good if there's no crap to cut out aswell, drive to the wood, self-select cut, cross cut 2 paces, stack to the butt, pulp up the brash to knee height for the forwarder and off you go; simple. Tree surgery means organising times, driveways to clear, paperwork, chippers etc etc.

 

There used to be a ficticious conversation between a cutter and a surgeon that went like: Surgeon - "ha, you only know how to fell trees from the bottom!"; cutter replies "yeah and you've never done a hard days work in your life mate" ! When I started in timber harvesting it was in Haldon forest, Exeter working for B&L Forestry of Launceston, piece work on larch; £2 per sawlog, £1 for bars and rails and length had to be exact. Hardwoods was less acurate but if you didn't cut 20 tons a day you didn't get paid.

 

Forestry just seems to flow better in my experience... Soz for the ramble.

 

 

 

Erm - in my experience there is a hell of alot more paperwork involved in modern foresty contracting than there is in arboricultural work.

There is a cross-over when it's commercial as the paperwork is similar on both sides of the industry BUT there is a big big big difference between professional contracting and domestic arb. How many domestic customers ask you to fill in a PQQ before quoting? and then ask for a guaranteed quote, and then a contractor questionaire, then copies of all tickets, insurance, risk assessments, method statements, local environment risk assessment, COSH assessment, FEPA record for pesticides...

The one thing with forestry is that the jobs can be alot longer than arb jobs, ie, first thinnings could be a month or more or a variable density habitat thinning could be three weeks or brashing could be two months for a harvester.

The paperwork for both is the same but the arb jobs comercially are done in days rather than weeks.

 

For me, forestry is a lot harder than arb, especially as the gaffer - the paperwork, stress, cash-flow, organisation, chasing contracts etc

 

Having said that, if you work for someone full-time as a cutter in the wood you work hard and get paid at the end of the week, no paperwork to think about and nobody hassling you it must be a much better job.

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

 

Having said that, if you work for someone full-time as a cutter in the wood you work hard and get paid at the end of the week, no paperwork to think about and nobody hassling you it must be a much better job.

 

This is what I'm getting at; the whole contractual side of it is for the timber co not me. Granted I've valued and purchased standing timber, but British forestry, southern softwood market especially isn't the game it used to be. Cutting in a softwood plantation or clean hardwood thinnings is, to me anyway, far less grief than arb work; a whole winter of it dawn 'til dusk can be knackering tho. Softwood felling is pretty much non-existant now tho except on extreme slopes and big timber. Buttressing in front of a harvester is so easy; I love it!