mdvaden

The list has been tweaked and edited as I look for the right descriptive words too. Even moved online seminars to a paragraph instead. All the while, I noticed that two parts remained relatively unchanged: the two forums at the top of the list. The two best forums are consistent for quality and what to expect.

You are welcome, and apparenlty interested. It even spread to forums where I had not posted. Not just yours of course. I can see from the stats where it pops up on the net. So yeah, I guess it did take off pretty good. That's expected when so many folks visit Tree Buzz and Arb Talk throughout each day.

How do you like New Zealand? I can't recall ever reading a negative that I can remember.

No shame for telling the truth. I spent 15 solid years using substances for recreation. So if I visit a website, and part of it exudes that kind of feel from my end, its honest to say so. Puberty didn't seem like the exact way to describe it. And the context shows the comment is not about all users. So there may be an edit later. In the meantime, maybe thicken your skin. Its only one rating at one website, not the inside page of Rolling Stone or Newsweek. Actually, if it were possible to ascertain all the facts, and we were betting men, I say that you would loose the wager if you told me that nobody was stoned or partially drunk when posting on the TH forum. If it makes you feel better, a new description can eventually occur. Just haven't found the paragraph yet that explains the flavor of the forum more effectively yet. But better phrases are always available with time.

That one came to mind earlier this morning. It's likely to be added, but will end up quite a ways down the list. The site is not easy to navigate and very small text. From the home page, they drop people into a page with a bitsy link and a ton of Google ads. The ads are fine, but the content and link should be prominent. I noticed that the last posted question from about 4 days ago on the 18th, still has not been replied too. And that's been the nature of that forum for about 6 years running.

From you ... no. Because the page bases the rating on age appropriateness too. So if you missed that, it may not be a surprise.

Not sure if Rush Limbaugh happens to get broadcast over there, since he is USA based. But his Stand-in said that a big cloud of Cow Flatulant drifted over and merged with the volcano cloud. Its a jab at the people over here who were making a big deal out of the beef ranch animal farts going into the atmosphere.

Yeah, the "Arbor" was a typo. I added two versions on the name. One on the site, and one for pronunciation.

So what did I do on Earth Day? Ended up making something practical: a rating page of arborist forums and tree forums. It really coincided though. It was planned for this week anyway. Actually, Arb Talk was an "A" rating at first, but its one of two that I upgraded to an A+. Aborist & Tree Forum Review and Ratings. It may take a few months for this new page to move up in the SERPs (search engine results), but I'm hoping for it to rank well and help steer more folks to the better tree information sources. Ones that professionals, or all ages, can utilize. I tossed in a couple of secondary sites, because there are some tree geeks on garden forums that are pretty knowledgeable even if their heads are a bit big to hold up sometimes.

The man called back and was hoping to get at least a couple of cuts for some branches that seemed broken. I put him in touch with my arborist friend who climbs, and he's going to examine the whole tree top in detail while doing a few cuts. That will provide a good basis for estimates of anything else needed.

Just making sure we are following the context that eventual cabling won't be added above the damage to a weakened remnant, but below it on the main leaders, after the damage remnant is cut off the top of one stem.

View up trunk from below.

Here is a rough idea in a drawing. The falling piece represents what has already broken off.

There are two co-dominant things going on. One is the main stems, from head height all the way up. The other is the smaller one, where one of those stems did a "V" up near it's top. That's where it broke. A cabling / bracing if done, would actually be between the two main stems, and well below the topping cut. Since redwood resists decay so well, this tree seemed to be a good candidate for a topping remedy. Because it makes no sense to leave a huge weakened section just sitting up there. It can definitely be cut off a lot cleaner than letting it tear off, that's for sure.

Got called for consultation yesterday. For a beautiful 32 meter coast redwood with 15 foot dbh trunk. The neighbor wants it gone, and the folks who own it want to keep it. A storm last December broke out part of a codominant stem from about 3/4 of the way up. About 1/4 meter thick where it peeled off. Now ... the main stem is a codominant leader too, down to about 2 meters high. But it could easily be braced up high. What I'm thinking looking at this tree, is that if the upper break left half of the stem up there a bit too weak, and there is risk to let that piece grow taller, wouldn't removal at the break be the remedy? To avoid a 2000 lb. section spearing into the next door yard, or their yard? That would still leave the undamaged stem un-topped. I've heard the mantra before "never top", but seem to find that topping may have to be an alternative sometimes. Do you folks ever say "never"? Or are you more of the mindset "never say never"? This is maybe the only tree I've seen in 8 months, where topping came to mind as the best option to included safety. Guess this could be called "corrective pruning" but in simple terms, it would be topping.

Reminds me of a property that my parents bought back in the 60's about 30 miles from here in North Plains, Oregon. Wish it was still in the family. 80 acres, with Dairy Creek right down the middle. Small house by the main paved road, and field to the tree lined creek, with a river rock bottom. A small log foot bridge to the forested woods on the other side, with a 2 room cabin on the other side.

Very nice. The old "bushes" can seem intimidating sometimes, unless you have a machine. That is a very sharp looking fence.

The little scrollable box at the bottom is interesting. I didn't even see it the first time I looked at the site. A handy way to hide all that text without resorting to putting white text over white background (which would backfire). I found that all that little text down there does help a lot, however its added, whether as size 10 font, or like you have it.

The feedback on many SEO forums threads, is to take links from a wide range of Pageranks. I've got a Pagerank 4 site, and gladly accept links from PR1 or PR2 if they ask. Because their numbers usually go up. This last week, there were at leat four Pagerank 5 websites that reciprocated links with my Pagerank 4, because they recognize that any decent links pointing their direction is a good thing. Especially if there are similar words and vocabulary. One site alone that is of lower rank my not boost my site, but 3 or 4 of them will. Presently, not only is my home page a Pagerank 4, but two or three of my individual sub-pages are also Pagerank 4. Not sure how many Pagerank 3 pages I have, but there's enough. Pagerank 5 is not impossible these days for landscape or tree service companies, but there are hardly any I can think of which are not companies like Davey Tree or some television garden talk show host. The largest landscape contracting companies and tree services in Portland and Seattle area are almost all at Pagerank 4 and below. The #4's are actually very few and far between. A Pagerank 4 today, would have been a Pagerank 5 about 5 years ago. But the number of websites on the internet increased so much numerically, that if inbound links and content remained about the same over that period, the Pagerank 5 sites became Pagerank 4's. Hope that advice is helpful.

Update. In the few days since posting this, my site already jumped from page 2 to page 1 for some keywords. And for other keywords where I was at the bottom of page one, its moved up 2 to 3 spots. Courtesy of about 20 garden, deck and landscape websites who reciprocated links. And exactly why they participate too.

What catches my eye, is that it could do without two photos of the truck on the home page. I'd get rid of the bottom image, and take something of interest from the left side to fill the gap a little bit. Otherwise it looks pretty good. I read recently that Google is now calculating the speed of a site loading into the website rankings. So all those images you have piled on top of the Flash file for the header could make a difference. But if you like eye appeal, that's fine.

It was very cloudy and dark the day of that last shot. You can barely see the climber near the top. Finishing today, it was a much better day. You can't really see it in the second photo, but I already moved my grape between the trunks. Those are going to to become my grape trellis. Big ... yes ??

I've never seen one used in a tree before, but maybe you could try one of those motion detector devices that shoots a blast of water spray. You would probably need to run a 1/2" line of a sturdy water tube up the tree, and anchor the gadget. I don't think I'd use PVC, but would opt for a tube.

The next phase has begun, in the fenced garden area. I don't climb, so my arborist friend came over on Monday to start removing the grand fir and deodar cedar that were planted a bit too close to each other. And the power lines are behind. We're keeping the two Douglas firs near the building. A small storm came through the area, so we put finishing on hold until Friday, tomorrow, if the weather is decent.

Yes, the blocks have the lips. At least over here, that size is referred to as cottage stone. On the building, is can have that "shed" look because of the flat roof. But I wanted to raise it on blocks rather than lay concrete over the tree roots. And I wanted to bypass the building permit hassle too. The 10' height was the limit. All that only left room for a flat roof, with an inch to spare.