AHPP

Google map and streetview link (or at least screengrab) is always helpful btw. Keep location private if you want but the more info we have, the better advice we can give. Soil types, other trees down the street, even local knowledge etc. Someone here probably covers your area.

Someone snarked at me the other week because I offered a fairly firm answer from photos. Of course I wouldn't stake my life offering such advice but nobody's asking us to. If they needed advice they could pin liability to, they'd go and pay for it. But the people asking here don't. They just want a bit of a steer. If we said, "Can't say. Can't see enough. Liability. Consult a local tree surgeon." to every question, there wouldn't be any point in this section of forum existing. It's implied that advice offered here is the best we can give with what we can see. People asking for it aren't going to take it as gospel. Or at least they shouldn't. They don't know which ones of us are right/wrong, experienced/green, clever/thick. The British Stainless Steel Association has a very straightforward caveat on their e-mail signature, that I like and I think applies here. 'Advice and assistance provided without charge are given in good faith but without responsibility.'

It’s a sycamore. It’ll fight back. They haven’t ground very deep. They haven’t ground all the way round. Yes. It’s not the best thing to happen to a tree but you see ones that size growing horizontally out of cliffs and they hang on.

Also inconsequentially to this thread, I changed the name of it to client psychology thread. Partially to get a rise out of Jules but mainly because it’s the right word. You sell goods to customers and services to clients.

From memory, there’s other caselaw about valuable vs valueless trees so I bet the offering back thing isn’t as straightforward as people usually think. Offering conifer hedge clippings back is obviously stupid. I wrote a moot problem about it years ago. Will have a look next time I have the right laptop on.

Not sure if this should be dog thread or chicken thread but here I bally go.

He reads like the landlord. I don’t think it’s that bad either. Small/medium tree, well balanced. Legal side, ask a lawyer. Your tree probably shouldn’t have been on their land. Where it gets muddy (to me anyway because I’ve never properly looked into it) is when they abated the nuisance but did significant damage in the process. Not that there’s any other way. Have you got an insurer or landlord trade association you can ask?

Get that hate good and focused.

Imagine if these people had bicycles all over their properties to trip over as well. Wankers.

There you go.

Mine latches. I must have tried that. Will do consciously next time I need the grab on.

Now that’s a bit of context you left out in the other thread.

He paid last time I worked for him. Decent bloke and wife very reasonable for an equine type.

I broadly speaking agree but Stephen Blair and Gloria seemed to do OK out of it. I'm happy to leave that money on the table for the moment anyway though. It's worth more to me to not participate in the idiocy of expending energy running chip around the world when it can sit quite blamelessly in his garden. I'm actually making £50 more with option 1 btw. I subsidised £50 of the mewp in option 2 because I wanted an easier day.

I'm now trying to actually win more end client (i.e. not subcontract/freelance) work so am going away from my old pricing strategy (really high and IDGAF) to something a bit more normal. I've picked up a few tips from here over the years but I still don't know a lot about client handling and salesmanship. Let's put stuff in one thread. I'll start us off. I quoted a dying weeping ash the other day. 18" DBH, 30' tall maybe but fairly sideways and with a dead top. Quite short top too so a poor tie in point. Nice ish lawn underneath it. Property worth a couple of million in a pretty good part of a very good town. Looking at it with the bloke I was thinking, "He's never going to want dents in that lawn." and gave the spiel that I'd get up it, rizzle it down in little bits etc. Went away and found getting the right cherry picker for it was approaching more hassle than it's worth. Not insurmountable but annoying enough. So I gave him a quote for just flopping it as well. Quote(s) were this: Dying weeping ash on bank Option 1: Fell it on the lawn and fix dents (to a standard that would not impress at the Chelsea flower show but which won’t inconvenience your mower). Brash chipped into laurels. Logs cut and split and left in situ. £540 including VAT. Option 2: Climb/cherry picker it down so nothing on the lawn. It’ll all come down in its own footprint, ground protected with a mat and chip cushion etc. Brash chipped for that then shoveled under laurels. Logs cut and split and left in situ. £780 including VAT. Woke up this morning regretting giving him the choice. I suspect I should have just given him the (lack of) ground damage commensurate with the prestige of the property and that be the end of it. Then he accepted option 1 and I'm already thinking I want to climb it a bit to drop it in a smaller footprint and reduce the groundwork. Plus obvious regret of just being too cheap. So yeah, bollocksed that up. Right. Let's have it. Crap photo but might as well include it. Really does stick out going away from the camera.

I'm still not grabbed by plants. I've got some peas that I can now graze and nascent tomatoes on the vine, which is yes, nice. But it's nice and then move on. Animals are engaging every time. Like when sheep die from maggots crawling out of their arses, or a cow writes a car off, or a horse skitzes at a bit of litter and paralyses someone. Never a dull moment. Possibly my competitive nature too. Plants are generally seen as easier than animals so you can be sure I'm not interested. I get bored easily.

I do broadly agree but sometimes you just need to get something done, now.

I saw a little video the other day of some pressure releasing ones on a full size tracked skidsteer in the states. Those quick grips with the forked jaws look good (and universal) too. Expensive though.

Five minutes in for one major goal.

Where I am is pretty good. Fifteen minute walk to three supermarkets but greenery all around still. I can’t stand close neighbours though and it’s bad business not having space to do things that will save/make me money. In many respects my current abode has been a good house and a good place to learn how to get on with people when you have skin in the game (i.e. property you own that they can torch if you annoy them enough) but in hindsight I still should have bought a buttfucck nowhere steading instead and just been weird to live near (which is what I’m going to do now anyway). “Yes, I’m grazing goats under eucalyptus. Yes, I do intend to burn those tyres in the boiler. No, I won’t put trousers on.” Everyone stay in the towns please.

I’m a bit more rural. Nobody will be feeding these ones. On the roe, good timing. Two just ran down the field in front of me. Probably displaced by someone on the cycle path up the top. Sailor didn’t notice. Too busy fixated on a 40mm long bit of wet stick he’d put on my leg.

How urban are you? I’m actually sat about fifty yards from the foxes now. Considering getting up early for a roe from here tomorrow. Let’s see how the getting up early bit works shall we.

We’re remarkably lucky with foxes etc. There’s a fox den and a badger sett a few hundred metres away. My mate’s been keeping chickens and other stuff here for twenty years with no problem.

The Warrener who used to write for the shooting magazines?