Giles Hill

Given our avatars, I don't know if that's meant to be ironic. As Peter mentioned before, Inonotus is less aggresssive than some, so it might be a good number of years before it presents a particular hazzard. Also, looking back, you mention the fruiting bodies are evident on the roots and you asked whether it was only present on the roots, or would it be more systemic... That's a good question as trees are able to compartmentalise decay so that it is contained. How succesfully they are able to do this depends on a number of factors including the vigour of the tree. You might well find there is no significant decay of the main stem and that the consultant will need to investigate the roots rather than the stem. Trees can loose some structural roots, without falling over, but again you'll probably need to take some advice as to whether the remaining sound roots are sufficient.

Curvey Burrs, I think we now have a winner for the pretiest clown picture. It's Lee Winger's.

You've identified that the tree is infected with a parasitic wood decay fungi that might make the tree unsafe. The next step is to carry out further investigation to assess the extent of the decay; this will inform what action should be taken. Typically it would be advisable to measure the thickness and extent of remaining sound wood - i.e. wood that has not become rotten / dysfunctional - in the area where the decay is most extensive. If you are not an arboriculturist, it may be necessary to engage a suitably qualified, equipped and experienced arboricultural consultant to carry out the measurements - they will also advise on whether or not the decay presents an immediate danger, whether surgery work should be carried out to reduce the risk and also when the tree should be re-inspected.

I don't know what it's all about, but...

Close then.

Is that Wythenshawe cemetry?

I found this by accident: [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qT8zwlVi3IY]YouTube - Claus Matteck reads...[/ame] Then looked for more and found this: [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFTV_-pR3VI]YouTube - IBYC 2007 Invitation[/ame]

I think the houses may have shrank a little.

If my understanding of Matteck is right, small miserable looking fruit bodies can be an indicator that the fungi has 'eaten' almost everything. Was the tree still alive? I was just wondering if honey fungus would more than likely of killed it before decaying it to that extent? All the question marks mean I'm speculating rather than speaking from experience.

When you first posted this, I did look at my Merip pics because I thought thats what it looks most like in terms of formation and colour... But I don't have any pics of young Merip. You often see fruit bodies on the ground, above where the roots are - It's difficult to guess the context from the pic, whether it's woodland or grass, but might these have been removed, or mown? I was going to suggest going back and looking again in a few weeks, if you can't make a positive ID now.

David, was it sludge rather than soil that was placed around the tree?

Maybe there's some room to up your rates? BTW I noticed that Gmanntpo said he wasn't a consultant. I'm sure he is very professional. EDIT sorry, Gmantpo has already pointed this out...

That was what I meant when I said there are consultants and consultants. BS5837 surveys are fairly straight forward things to do and can be done by a qualified technician calling himself a consultant. The same technician might struggle if he was asked to act as an expert witness representing a client in court.

For sole traders, there are consultants and consultants... If you were desprate to earn more than £500 a day, just employ four or more arboriculturists, charge them out at £62.50 an hour and pay them £35k pa, get a CAD monkey and a secretary. Spend your time getting work in to keep them all going...

As a self employed landscape architect I work (ok sit on my backside in front of a computer / mince about on site) for 10 or more hours a day, but my chargeable work averages out at about 5 hours. I might be doing something wrong, but comparing my turnover to larger companies, it is similar in pro-rata terms - i.e. a company with five landscape architects seems to generate around five times my turnover. I'm sure there are exceptions in both directions, but that's how it seems to be with the companies I've looked at that do similar stuff to me. The 'admin' for me is stuff like amendments, haggling with local authorities, some meetings and various unpaid things you do for regular clients as favours, then there's the proper admin, such as printing, folding lots of paper, writing covering letters, quotes, invoices, paying bills, accounts. I do some work for Mrs Miggins and I charge a fraction of what I would doing the same thing for Lady Miggins or Miggins PLC - I guess that goes under admin too. As for qualifications, the arb ones need as much dedication to pass as the equivalents in other professions, so there should be some parity on fees... Obviously architects get paid more than everyone else. Apart from solicitors.

I agree with you in that case, I just thought it would be more like half a days work for someone local - an hour for travel, an hour on site and a couple of hours for the report. As for whether £500 a day is too much, well it's far from exceptional if you're paying for professional consultant services. Obviously it's £62.50 an hour, for an 8 hour day, which is all very nice if you're clever enough to be charging for every hour you work and pocket the whole lot. Typically though there is a lot of admin and other stuff which you can't charge for, so you either do it yourself, which means you're not earning £60.00, or you pay someone else to do it, which also means you're not earning £60.00. You can still earn a reasonable living though. Give or take, these are the kind of fees that developers would expect to pay for professional services. Arb consultancy has become an essential part of the development process - arb input is as necessary as engineers, architects and landscape architects and therefore it can be charged accordingly. As an outsider looking in, 'proper' tree work seems to be often very poorly paid, compared to any other job where a similar level of skill, is required or danger involved. I know some are able to a earn a decent living at it, but a lot of people seem to accept low pay because they love the work / lifestyle.

Quite right, but with a bit of phoning around I reckon you could find someone competent and qualified who would do it for rather less than £500.00.

Here's some Pholiota from last year on a dead elm or oak stump.

It's rocking mine, I just don't have anything to contribute - apart from thanks for taking the time to post.

It's this big:

http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/fungi-pictures/1880-anyone-fancy-crack-one-2.html Do I win a prize for being observant, or do I get banned for being pedantic?

That's the one. I see where you were going with the liquidambar from that pic you posted. That's the trouble with trying to ID from pics, there's no scale and the angles can be misleading.

The tree was still in the dell in 1993, as this picture shows:

Clue: It looks exactly like a field maple, until you get up close.

No need for that, anything coniferous or ericaceous will have me baffled. I've just about run out of pics, but here's another from Arley arboretum: