David Humphries

Andy, I posted our job ad here back in mid August. Also placed it at an extortionately expensive Gardening mag & a well known web arb site . Got 45 calls for application packs in total, 15 sent back the packs, of those If I remember rightly, 2 came direct from here. .

Must be Hedera americana, everythings Big that comes from across the pond. .

Phenom, you just have to expand on this little gem, what on earth was the groundie doing so close to an £1200 piece of mechanical beauty with a running chainsaw .

An esteemed member of our merry little group, lays claim to having " the Biggest Piles " He'd posted a few shots to back up his bold statement. Another member dared to suggest staging had taken place, and as such has brought in to question and serious doubt the aforementioned members unequivocal reputation I now have the emperical evidence to prove his inocence and help restore his tarnished image. Also like to say, it's great to see a pro with all the right gear for the job. Keep up the good work Dave, your an inspiration to us all .

Great shots Rupe. Do you have one of Reg's blockdrivers, looks ideal for that situation. .

Sailor boys, tube of vaseline, A senior Mod, hmmm............must be Pimms 'o' clock .

That's not topping, that's a fine example of Topiary .

Clever use of wide angle and your kids wendy house minature blue fork, nice one Dave .

Can't believe you grabbed the trunk @ 1.04 when it hit, what a big girls blouse Never enough post error annalysis, nice one Mr Coates. Great use of the site .

Nothing out of the ordinary knocking around our kids school as of yet. Hope your lad recovers soon John All the best David .

Those Darn Roots, eh ! So much more we need to learn Very interesting post Deano .

Or conversley the non presence. Andy, in your Trees particular case, was it categorically proven that Merip was the active pathogen on the severed roots. Was this asumption based just on the visual of positive Fb identification ? Is it possible that there's possibly something else there, hiding in the wings letting Merip take the blame? Ftr, I'm really not suggesting that Merip is not the casual agent here, but Tree fact is ever developing and we need to be mindful of this, and not ascribe our evidence based upon the fear factor of dogma. . We need to ask ourselves, whether enough science is being used to arive at informed judgement.

Thanks for posting tim, It was nice to put a face to a user name yesterday. All the best in your job search. David

What you can hopefuilly see from this picture is the replanting scheme which is long term and started back in 1988 to replace the lost specimens. .

10 years standing with evidence of Meripilus, four of those years topped. No perceived vascular deteriation and yes, while there is some evidence of white rot present, I think the inference being made and missed here is the adaptive response the Tree is making to the presence of Merip and how aparantly healthy and sound, that this particular part of the tree is. .

Andy, great post thank you out of interest, the tree is quite obviously without leaf, but do you know what the wind force was like when this tree failed? .

Nice looking timber to work with. Were you privy as to why it came down John ? .

I'm of the mind that we should keep on learning and basing our proscriptions on informed opinion not gut feeling and possibly outdated resource. This industry is in desperate need of moving onwards from erring on the side of caution. Trees are assests NOT just nuisances. And indepth investigation is warranted as often as is practicable .

How do you quantify this statement Dave? Where's the evidence to back it up. How do you know that the felled trees would have failed ? .

Matty, you may be right. I would concur with Lee though, that had you been there, you may see the pictoral evidence in a different light with the reality of onsite experience as opposed to off site experience. Just returned from the Meripilus seminar at Wimpole hall. Some very notable experts have suggested that there may well be two ( possibly more) seperate species of Meripilus. One Pathnogenic and One seemingly benign. I will say however, that this info is based on observation, NO scientific study has taken place as yet. If there is some truth to this, just think for a minute ......................how many thousands of mature Beech have we all fellled due to possible ignorance. Ofcourse assess your Risk and Target, but whilst I personally have the inclination and ability, I will go down the route of further investigation before putting on my black cap Hopefully Marcus or Andrew may expand on this from a far more scientific aproach here or in other threads Stay tuned .

Did you envisage something abit more like this would be beneficial, Matty ? Further trial pits were carried out at targets where decay was considered = no decay. .

Coolio No ideaio Get yourself a macro Dean as I sense ripple in the force. We may have a new Fungi Jedi among us .