arbclimber

As others have said, loose weight and avoid cheap supplements. Carrying less weight is prob the best way to prolong the useful life of joints. Cheap supplements dont contain ingriedients that are easily absorbed so even high doses aren't as effective as the better quality ones.

Easy if its only a semi skilled industry. I think it was Rupe who made an excellent point. If you think about all the skills in the world, and the amazing things surgeons, scientists, engineers and all sorts of others do and divide us all into 3 categories. I too think Tree work is lucky to scrape into the middle one.

One day with 2 people. Nice early start. Home by tea time. £ 300 + the VAT Thats how i'd do it.

Hama, Sorry i'm a bit of a Darwin fan personally. Interesting post though. I think the concept you are talking about is a revision of many other theories and has been brought about by many thinking we need to save ourselves from ourselves. I'm also a little controversial in my thinking of such subjects. As far as humans go I think we have gone past natural selection as we now modify our environment to suit ourselves rather than modifying ourselves to suit our environment. In a true natural selection sense the fat, lazy, stupid and weak should die out allowing the superior to re-populate. Not very politically correct but living in a county where fat lazy chavs survive on benefits supplied by those who do work, whilst popping out chavy kids once every year or so, has caused a downward spiral of the human race, IMO. I do suppose that now we live outside the rules that all other living things live by, some kind of theory that could modify behavior may be the only chance to, in essence save the world from the human race. I think ill leave it at that out of respect for forum rules. Reading it back I sound a bit 'Nazi race cleanser'. I'm not and I hope you see my point.

When accessing a tree have you ever got your rope over a big branch then climbed up and found yourself right under the branch? What you prob did next is a branch roll.

Take the alarm out, what kind of self respecting theif is going to steal a Frontera?

Right then, Going to give myself an 8 for reductions cos i'm a good climber and as i'm tall and skinny I can get right out to the tips where some of you heavier guys would struggle. Dismantles are a bit different, I think I have the basic skills, and I dont use a top handle one handed, especially not when I'm also holding the branch. However, I dont have the experience with dismantles that some of you guys have and only use very limited rigging techniques so ill go for a 6. Tree ID is ok but fungi and disease are a bit of a mystery to me generally if it isn't something common so ill go for a 2. Grand total 5.33. Do I get an extra point for working out the average without a calculator, There was a thread recently where it was asked if vat guys always carry a calculator for quoting, if that was serious my maths skills are def above the arb average.

This thread seems to have turned into a whats the bare minimum I can get away with legally if I dont want to do things properly. To actually cover yourself legally there are many things you have to do. Yeh you can get away with a bare minimum maybe indefinately but surely best to make sure you do everything so you are covered legally. There are many things in our industry that could see you ending up in court, including false advertising. Dont forget although many people see the HSE as giving lots of advice about best practise, many of the laws they uphold are statuatory laws or 'acts of parliament' which are about as legally binding as it gets,for example the 'Health and safety at work act'. Please also consider that even if you work on your own you still have a legal duty of care to anyone around you whilst working including the general public and customers.

Whats wrong with Joop, had some of my finest moments stinking of that stuff.

You could well be right mate:lol:

My opinion is the best actually, so there:001_tt2:

Good on ya mate, theres no right or wrong answer on a thread like this though.

I thought that when i read it. Think those prices are about average to the trade.

At least he phoned back quick. Do you think he knew that the arbtalk community was waiting for his reply:lol:

They come with the ratchet mate, i'm sure of it. If they dont then they should, for the price.

You have 30 mins to work out the force a 12 stone man places on his rig during a fall or i start winching:lol: Make any mistakes and ill get the felling bar:lol:

Hama knows i'm only playing. However i'm sure there will be some kind of retaliation, I would expect no less.

Ian, are you familiar with the phrase, opening a can of worms? I honestly dont know mate, Is there a difference? We have had all sorts of discussions on here about when you can call yourself a tree surgeon and how experienced do you have to be to call yourself an Arb. Then there are the qualifications, are you an arb with only NPTC qualifications. Maybe thats the answer, a tree cutter has all the tickets and an arb has all those plus a recognised academic qualification. Your guess really is as good as mine mate.

No worries mate, I did see your point. I'm a surgeon too, do u want me to fix your leg? nothing a winch and a felling bar wont fix, i'm sure.

I like the way when he's half way up he describes the size of the trunk at that point as 'the size of a normal tree'. Reminds me of customers who phone up expecting a quote over the phone to take down their 'normal size tree'.

I'm, shall I say, less than an expert when it comes to all things Fungal. I'm sure its a facinating subject once you get into it. I just made the assumption that fungi in the uk and most other developed parts of the world was pretty much found, logged and banished to a dusty text book somewhere. You have educated me, many thanks.

George was about a year old in the photo, He's filled out a bit since. I sometimes think spaniels just play dumb so they can get away with more:laugh1:

I personally see Hama happiest as some kind of Fungi hunting Indiana Jones figure battling through a rain forest after finding, a yet to be discovered, fungi derived cure for cancer. As stevie says i'm sure he will have an opinion on my posts when he turns up later.

Quit getting the tread back on topic you. I was just having a chat about dogs.

My mistake then. If opportunities like that are around on home turf then even better. Dont know much about it personally, ill be honest, i'm a do what pays the most, kind of guy.