Albedo

Hi hama This kind of thinking, inclusional / out of the box /holistic, is one of your strengths, and a quality I've seen in you a lot and I admire it, and I'm a trained scientist, sort of, - BSc environmental science. You must catch James Lovelock on telly soon. BBC4 wednesdays 9pm. Last week was some scientist that discovered pulsars, not sure when JL is on but he's coming soon. He is a truly great man, invented the electron detector for GC machine - conventional science, but also thinks like you do and is reponsible for Gaia hypothesis, daisy world etc. Don't miss it or I will be very cross with you:thumbup1:

Much easier and quicker to take a physically fit arborist, and turn him into a keen chap in the job centre:biggrin:

Round 2 --- Ding Ding

I dangle from my own splices, An end to end on my prusic and an eye on me snaphook on me strop. Its all LOLER'd. (sometimes). Wouldn't have it any other way, meaning if they wouldn't LOLER it, I'd still climb on it.

No wuckers mate (this is an Australian way of swearing nicely, a version of 'no worries'. It seems appropriate and is'nt offensive:001_smile:)

I'm not sayin nuffin, did laugh though, nice one chaps

Just for the record, this has been playing on my mind. When I fell out with Rupe over the right / wrong thing in this thread, I wasn't happy at all with the way I conducted myself, and thought I looked a bit of a dick, as hamma pointed out. Was too busy to write an explanation at the time. I read the above question as seeking advice on the official meaning of semi skilled verses skilled, from a local authority pay point of view. I gave my example of how they classed me in this respect when I was a welder in order to try to help out. When I accused Rupe of being wrong, I didn't think that personal opinions were being asked for and that some kind of official definition was being requested. So - it seems that personal opinions are being requested , so belated apology Rupe. My post wasn't my personal opinion; it was my experience in another industry. My personal opinion is that it doesn't matter whether we are called skilled or unskilled; I'm too long in the tooth to really care. I do care about the industry and my work, just don't care what people think. Rupe put this very well somewhere, so whatever he said on this is what I think too.

That worries me that you were asked to do that for your first time. That split and the anticipation of recoil would have had me cacking me pants. Others will disagree but I would have done smaller bits to lessen the recoil, and even thought about high point in another tree. Well done anyway, but don't allow peer pressure to force you do do things against your better judgement. Its your butt mate.

I did the first year of the HND arb at Myerscough in approx 1998 or 9. The second year was a placement somewhere, often overseas then the third year was back at college. It was seriously full on, work wise. A full day of lectures and 2 or 3 assignments to produce all the time. A lot of us worked before college on assignments from 6 in the morning, then after college at night till your head hurt. The only time to learn your weekly ident test, was in the launderete on saturdays. A lot of the modules, like plant biology and soil science were degree level and done with degree students from preston uni. We lived in fear of the third year which was reputed to be even harder. A significant part of the course is climbing and NPTCS, which would make it difficult to offer online along with the extreme work load and the practical weekly idents etc. I had been in treework for a while so didn't have to do the nptcs climbing bits. I decided that, if I was going to work this hard I might as well do a degree, so I used my first year on the HND as an access course to get into lancaster Uni and did a degree in environmental science. Just posting this experience, to let you know that the HND is (or was) full on, and to give an idea why it may not have a distance learning version. Anyone who survived that time who was in my group, let me know how you went on if your'e on arbtalk.

Rupe

I prefer to wrap a leg around the tree steve, this leaves both hands free for working, and is in my view, far more professional.

No real point or axe to grind here Paul. You are already addressing the problem. I think I felt that the language used, i.e AAAC's with more than 5 employees have the AA's attention, maybe because they do bigger contracts. Kind of, by the way, we intend to include you less than 5's too. It just occured to me that we small outfits may constitute a majority. There's no more you can do than you are already doing, but I felt that if this is the case, then its worth bearing in mind. Could be a teaching you to suck eggs situation, but no harm done by 'thinking aloud' aye

Just a point I've had in mind for a while Paul. On co's with less than 5 staff. We talk as if the norm is big co's with lots of staff, like Tree Care in London for example. My impression of the industry is that the bulk of domestic work is done by co's with 2 staff. To me 3 or 4 staff is a big outfit. Perhaps some quantification along these lines might be useful. I.e. are the majority of tree co's in the uk of a size of 3 or less? Or perhaps I've been in my rural/domestic treework bubble too long.

ok Rupe , truce, I got cross with the forum choice of words thing. My use of 'wrong' seems to be the offender. However this Royal Doughnut, would not like his little hissy fit to detract from the above quoted bit. This is a piece of wisdom, that I don't want to steal the limelight from.

Theres about 15 posts in this thread where your'e stating a load of stuff, about skilled or unskilled which is wrong. Your'e playing with words now and I can't be arsed.

innit

I stand corrected Rupe, your oppinion or analogy, may be mistaken. Is that better mate:thumbup1:

Rupe your analogy trades = semi skilled, engineer = skilled is wrong. When I started in a welder fabricator shop, with City and guilds welder Fabricator quals I was classed as semi skilled due to lack of experience. After some years with no more qualifications I would qualify for skilled pay. All the trades are skilled. If some employer classes you as semi skilled, its just a lower pay bracket for those with less time on the tools. Tree surgery, or plumbing, or brick laying are not semi skilled trades, they are skilled trades

When dealing with youngsters I think its useful to give them ways to be valid, in that the way it is now is what he will see and do, and he has to be able to have the today experience be valid. A youngster can’t go back 30 years and work for £1 an hour, or experience how it was then. The treework environment is full of peer pressure, and can be fast and furious. Youngsters need a bit of direction till they get the idea of the way you like things done. They can appear useless when they are just lost and nervous, and needing to feel that they have done something right. How about a bit of motivation too, allow them to see past the brash dragging to the more interesting parts of the job. Remember its all new to them so you have a responsibility to guide them, your’e getting them cheap so you owe them the effort. Remember somebody helped you once, about 25 years ago, now its payback time

In Sean’s zipline thread, Monkeyd has just made the following announcement: Right, the fact that this is my 5000th post, I'm now gonna do something I've been promising myself for a while, and have a wee break from the "talk". So, I bid you all a fond fairwell & adieu No beter way to depart than qoute the great Verbal himself........ "The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. And like that.......poof........ He's gone." It’s burried there and has gone uncommented on. I would just like to thank monkey’d for rekindling my interest in arb with his enthusiasm and knowledge and wish him a speedy return when suitably rested. Bet ya can’t resist a sneaky peak Md.

Thank goodness a voice of reason at last in all the reduction stuff on arbtalk. I'm getting that I can't look at another arbtalk reduction, followed by all the 'good job mate' comments, and the 'someone else would of done it if I hadn't done it' comments. Hama whats the harm in listening to your critics, your'e sooooo stuborn sometimes:001_smile:. Old snake did a good one on a oak the other day, and the poster before him (in general tree pics) did a bit of a haircut prune. Nothing that couldn't be improved on with a bit of advice, but I hung back from doing the advising. Your lime hama will be a big mass of green by the end of the summer with no structure or form in sight.

Cheers for the edit monkeyd (of my swear word). I've just re read the whole thread properly and I see what arb culture's trying to get at, just found it a bit obtuse. As I'm not really contributing to this one you can delete both these posts if you like. I thought I'd be in trouble for that one:biggrin:

so whats yer point mate .

Whilst respecting others, right to do as they think fit. I.E go for AAC if they wish. I have to agree with you. I'm losing the will to live reading all these H&S threads.

Tell me if I'm being nosey, What are the other companies in the group? (SK.Group of companies) Bit of an entrepeneur at work here methinks