daltontrees

Cheeky! Maybe just call it 'big up'?

Love it! Here's the diagram from the 1948 article I saw, where he calls it incongruity. He gives + and - incongruity scores.

A few cherries surveyed last week. I don't officially know how to describe this. The graft scion is much bigger in diameterr than the stock. It's not 'incompatibility', the graft has endured for perhaps 40 years and is compatible. I saw an article from 1948 that suggested the term might be 'graft incongruity' with this form being 'positive'. Anyone got a snappier or authoritative name?

Deodar needles are significantly longer (2 inches) than Lebanon (barely an inch). Can't tell from the photos, but it looks Deodar-y to me.

Another clarification for arbs. You use the word 'arboriculturist' twice here but the context of the two uses is very different. Yes "an inspection by an expert arboriculturalist was only necessary if there was something revealed by the informal inspection which suggested that a more detailed inspection was required", but please note that the arboriculturist that you then mention as not being liable was in reality a tree worker who had not been brought in to inspect the tree - despite the pursuer's best efforts to implicate the innocent contractor by saying he had a 'duty to warn', the court said he was not implicated. As such, he was not there in the capacity of an inspecting arboriculturist. Otherwise it would be like blaming someone who fixed your car radio for faling to warn you that your tyres were bald and holding him to blame for your high-speed blowout on the motorway.

It's interesting what you have taken from Khan. Generally it seems more relevant to your subsequent posting about roots and encroachment, as it was a subsidence case of 'nuisance' rahter than a dangerous tree 'negligence' case (although admittedly the two Ns are both siblings of the Duty of Care family). That said, the pursuers were found liable for a substantial amount of contributory negligence for the subsidence damage, for not giving notice to the tree owner and a chance to remedy the problem. I'm not convinced that Khan made any substantive new law on the higher standard arising from subjective knowledge, since the judge was preambling from the findings in a much higher court (House of Lords) in Baker v Quantum Clothing, where a fuller debate can be seen and from which it is perhaps clearer that the higher standard is the kind of thing that might be expected of an employer rather than one that could be used to advantage by a neighbour. In Khan there seemed in the end no relevance to the commentary, since the defendant had no knowledge, not even general knowledge, of the relationship between trees and subsidence. Khan remains an important case, though, cementing the inevitable outcome for the law that damage from nuisance roots carries liability that goes beyond the duty holder's need for casual lay observation. The court was thankfully careful to caution against seeing the duty as strict liability, clarifying that there must also be reasonable foreseeability. It seems to set up a need for routine specialist advice to be sought by tree owners to foresee that which the ordinary man with ordinary tree knowledge could not possibly do. It was a brave subject to try and cover succinctly. I'm just pitching in that Khan wasn't really a dangerous tree case and that even the generalities relatin to negligence and duty of care that can be drawn from it are hard-won and not that conclusive.

Thanks.

22/04/16. Fact #192. Some info on UK case law, trespassing roots, and subsidence. Could you please elaborate on what you mean by "assuming removal is done with reasonable care"?

For sure SULE is a useful concept but it refers to both contribution (useful) and risk (safe), the former is only loosely referred to in the BS and is (in terms of targets) impossible to assess until the detailed design layout is known. As such it is potentially misleading in 5837 surveys. For me it's simple. The BS is literally a Standard, and all that is needed is to apply it as it is written, rather than how others interpret it. One doesn't need to be loquacious to see that 'Estimated Remaining Contribution' means the estimated length of time that a tree will continue to contribute its current amenity.

I remember seeing these same pictures 4 years ago. The bids of £8k, £10k, £20k and £30k are all marked "private listing - bidders' identities protected" and were all put in within 2 minutes of each other. Chancer.

I don't find it that hard. AS 10 Bears says the 20+ expectancy is the key. It's hard to justify movign a tree between band C based on quality if the life expectancy is clear. Here's te crucial bit, though. I wouldn't use SULE (Sorry Mr Bears) because it'sa not in teh BS, but the BS uses both ERLE adn more usefully ERC. Estimted Remaining Contribution doesn't mean accounting for the dog days of a tree as it struggles on as the regenerating multistemmed sprouty remains of a knackered and fallen over tree, it means 'contribution' which very clearly relates to contributing amenity that one only needs to estimate how long it will be in substantially the form and size is is at assessment. So you can ignore actual biological ife expectancy and concentrate on what it's all about, amenity. And if you think about it, this also is a measure of quality, and if a tree can be expected to be in serious decline in 10 or 15 years due to what is now just the irrecoverable beginnings of decay or environmental factors, it shouldn't be B even if it is doing quite well visually.

If there's nothing or no-one to be hit when it fails, leave it be. Any pruning will just reduce its ability to resist the spread of decay and would possibly have minimal effect on reducing the weight. Re-mulch it, as Macca suggests, this is often the best gift to a tree.

I'd say that's a sailing rope. I bought one very cheap poff some liar a few years ago who called it a lowering rope. It pulls out puffs all the time, immensely strong and stretchable but hopeless in a tree environment. It's now a towrope.

There was a Courth of Session case a few years ago where someone got really badly hurt when a car swerved and hit him, the driver said he swerved because a sheet of ply flew off a hoarding in a strong wind right in front of him (which it did). The court had to consider whehte the hoarding had been adequately designed and built (which it was) or else the owner of the site would have been found partly responsible for the injury. The details of the case are irrelevant but it highlights the risk of skimping on the spec.But if anyone wants to know, the driver was found to have greatly understated the speed he was doing, and if he hadn't been speeding he could have avoided injuring the pedestrian.

If the application did not present evidence that the damage was foreseeable, this is a non-starter for compensation. The evidence would have to show that the damage had not already been done before the appplication date. And be careful, cutting back for telecoms is not exempt, it is only if the site is 'operational land' of the undertaker. All of the aforegoing applies only to England, don't know about Wales or NI, but definitely not Scotland.

Stopped by a balloon! Tough killer, that...

You make a very important distinction, thanks. One could also add that there was no loss, so no claim. There is too I think a £500 de minimus on claims. And some smarty-pants might argue the limb failed because of loss of vitality because of the Meripilus. It'd be a messy case.

On te first point, I didn't mean that one would set out to prove irrecoverable statutory loss, I was trying to anticipate the situation where a claimant hadn't made the case for removing a tree on the grounds of foreseeable damage or loss. I was thinking of a raw negligence claim or a claim where the Council had refused an application and had unilaterally stated that there were no grounds for approving the application. But then, as I have already said, I can't imagine a case for negligence. If someone can, please spell out the circumstances where a Counmcil could be found liable in negligence. On the second point, there might be other reasons for pursuing an appeal, but yes it seems clear enough that if an application was refused because the Council stated that it recognised the potential for damage or loss but decided to refuse becasue it value the tree more highly than the liability for damage or loss. Indeed, in such a case an appeal would probably get nowhere because an Inspector would have no locus to interfere with such a decision. On the third point, yes.

I've seen this referred to on Walnut as the result of canker caused by Nectria galligena (Pirones Tree Maintenance). But I'd like to hear if someone has something more definite for Castanea.

I should have been clearer, I was only referring to statutory compensation. Civil compensation is I expect even more complex than you outlined, not least of all because the TO and the Council have no direct duty of care to the applicant or to his neighbours. I am inclined to think that the first recourse for someone thinking that a refusal was unjust, exposing him to irrecoverable losses through the statutory compensation route, would be a planning appeal. And if the injustice was perpetuated by a dismissal, the next step would be judicial review. The OP's question has been asked before, namely could an applicant apply and get a refusal every year, just to be covered by the compensation rules. And the answer has to be yes as long as on each and every application the foreseeability of loss or damage is demonstrated. And it all comes down to that word 'foreseeable'. The courts have clarified that it does not mean imaginable, nor does it have to mean inevitable. It is easy to find tree situations where damage is foreseeable and for that foreseeability to remain for many years without incident.

I'm coming late to this one but I feel I have to comment anyway. The question of negligence by a Council is irrelevant to the compensation liability. If the Council makes a decision to refuse, and foreseeable damage occurs, the Council is liable for compensation whether it made the decision to refuse competently or negligently. councils can and do decided to take the risk of compensation in the interest of keeping the amenity provided by the tree. If you think the refusal is negligent, appeal it. If you think the risk is imminent and serious, proceed to reduce it under exemption. But if it's just in the middle somewhere, don't appeal, don't use the exemption and don't worry about it.

Sorry David, but I have to defend my professional reputation against this petulant nonsense. I believe I answered the OP's question way back and again a couple of days ago.

Yep, as I thought, you're a disgrace to professionalism. And I'd rather come right out and say that and risk being censured on Arbtalk than not say it. Would you care to tell me who told you on the street that I'm cheap? And whether the 'very cheap' cheap strap line is theirs or yours? Bet you haven't the integrity to do so! I am in my view anyway very very efficient, I organise big surveys with military precision and exercise them with a ruthless systematic approach. If I win jobs it is nothing to do with your pathetic inmplication that i dont do them properly, it's because I know exactly what to do for every tree before I get there. And when I get there, I do it without distraction, and when I find non-conforming situtions I can adapt to them quickly and reliably because I know how QTRA and risk assessement and duty of care works from first principles. I can motor through big surveys and return a fair professional profit. Don't confuse cheap with low quality. And why should I care about reputational damage to QTRA? That would only happen in the event of me screwing up. Which I won't. Are you going to withdraw the QTRA whip? Oh, that's right, you're just a trainer. If you're profoundly depressed, I'm sure there's solutions for that. Which don't include having a go at one of quantified tree risk assessment's strongest supporters on a public forum.

You are nothing short of personally insulting, and I think you have crossed the line from constructive debate to pathetic personal jibes. And I've never even met you, which is probably just as well. We live in a commercially real world. I have an approach to tree risk assessment that is robust, I have been complimentary about QTRA, but it is not adequate in isolation, it's not me that says that it is clients that recognise its limitations and appreciate getting a bit more from it that some one like me gives them. So much for your what goes on forum stays on forum! You have cast aspersions about me that no-one on Arbtalk who is not a QTRA member can check. And it's libellous because it's untrue. In addition people on the QTRA forum are intimidated to say anythiog agaisnt the aprty line. If you're wondering, thats because of you. But you have now plummeted beneath any respect I might have had for you and again I will leave Arbtalkers to make up their own minds about whether to bother with this. No QTRA user has seen my proposed adaptations and improvements. Not even on the QTRA forum. I don't have any sense of self-importance, I share ideas, I run with good ones and share peers rejection of weak ones. That's as it should be, and it's certainly the Arbtalk way.

OK one tyhong at a time here. I have no interest in wasting Arbtalkers' time turning what should be a mutually beneficial expansion of arboricultural knowledge into a petty slanging match. They can skip the bits they are not interested in. So, on this point, I have always wondered why you come on to Arbtalk other than to promote QTRA. And looking back through your contributions to Arbtalk, I se tha you contribute noting else. People can make up their own minds about your motives.