born2trot

Almost everyone wears gloves. They are mandatory in just about every arb/landscape company so I would get used to wearing them. If they are uncomfortable find a pair that are comfortable. If you get caught not wearing gloves by a big utilities company it has severe consequencies not only for you but the company aswell.

I'm seriously wanting one of those Amish horse treadmills.

Horse on the treadmill...

Me chopping the wood...

Tommers cat in the wash.... Sorry! the wife on the washing machine!!

it's all a load of bs!

nothing good can be said about it. just diluted, bland, fake, pop.

it's just awful. really. if any of them were any good, they could 'make it' like other, more credible sh- mongers and work for years to perfect the modern pop sound, which only really appeals to people who are audibly disabled. but they make loads of money and go out with hot models! well worth selling your soul, hey?

i'd rather listen to 2 hours of hendrix smashing his guitar against his amps than hear a single key-change from one of these utter cretins!

Safe to say you don't like it then ? :

I agree though.

chipper,tipper and a stripper:thumbup:

Not necessarily in that order!!

I have an issue with my '08 90 defender heater which basically is burning my left outside leg just below the knee. Switching to windows only is less bad but its still there. Before I start stripping things out I would like to know if this is a common problem of which there is a simple fix or is this unusual because I think it should blow the hot air down into the footwell ?

P.S nothing wrong heat wise with heater, its blows very hot. thanks...

Strimming would be a bit extreme but no weed including jkw survives repeated sustained cropping, simple sharp grass hook or jungle knife if its a small patch so not to spread it.

Seen the last programme of this and must admit it really got me.

Gareth Malone was simply outstanding with the woman and their performance was remarkable. It was inspirational and agree this DESERVES to be no.1

so you can drive though it!!!!

lol!!! I sort of had that coming!!

Looks so out of place, hideous.

Getting fierce now in aberdeenshire, horizontal sleet.

Could just use a less aggressive plough on the tractor

 

An increasing number of farmers worldwide are actually ditching the plough and using minimum tilliage or direct drilling (straight into stubble) in order to keep the land in better shape and reduce the amount of horsepower and diesel needed to grow a crop.

 

This can however result in a greater need for chemical pesticides.

Could use a less aggressive tractor on the plough then i.e horses

Thats interesting what you say about minimum tillage and direct drilling , didn't know that. The thing about using horses ONLY is that there is simply no getting away from the manual handling aspect of it. But i see this as an upside because it means more manual labour especially in this current climate.

If you mow over it often enough it dies. Took about a year mowing once a month. Start early while the shoots are soft.

 

Alec

I agree, no need to let it go to seed.

Just for occasional firewood purposes, also i love to see a dense forest with tracks through, its my perfect woodland!!

Why with tracks ?

I remember reading a report somewhere saying modern ploughing is too aggressive and will have negative impact on the land and it is much kinder to use lighter horse ploughs. Big machinery just doesn't do it for me , sorry

Thanks pecker .. will start preparations tomorrow.

Are you trying to tell me a horse won't pull a 12 furrow reversible?

I want my money back!

I'm certainly not ' rover ' .. Those wiley yanks are breeding 18 hand mules weighing over a ton and probably think nothing of hitching easily a dozen or more together. Now thats alot of horsepower or donkey power!!

now u've been and done the arguement in with those pics haven't u!

 

And i don't even like horses particulary! One advantage of a horse over a tractor is its much tastier to eat when the world runs out of food!!!

 

Problem is i'd rather sit on my space aged tractor than walk behind a horse in the warmer summer months and cold wintery days......but i know which would make me fitter!!!!!

It certainly would make you fitter, because you and your trusty steeds would have to walk 330 miles to plough a 40 acre field!

at the time I thought this was the best boxing match I had ever seen, this was tainted by the injuries suffered by mclellan. This is a very interesting program so far, turns out mclellan's trainer is a nutter, maybe benn should have lost in the 1st round, and mclellan wasn't a very nice person...

My this brings back alot of memories. I can remember the genuine needle surrounding this fight and mclellan being portrayed as a real ' bad boy '.

Benn always seemed to be out of a fight but had that vicious one punch equaliser.

All the top guys will say the same thing, that there is no substitute for experience, NO substitute, but you dont half have to pull your socks up to prove you know what your doing to those top guys! which is only fair I think.

 

I know what your saying about a need to put it all down in a decent format for all to use, a hard task as trees and conditions are so varied, each case has its own uniqueness, treework is art as much as science, that will never change, but the science will get better, we can all work on that by talking about our collective experiences and showing photographs of scenarios as many of us do here, thats why we do it, to further the art and science of modern arboriculture. its my only goal, better tree care by better understanding and natural empathy for the organism/s:thumbup1:

And thats nice words to end with .

I have mentioned not doing it in drought several times, and when reducing also, same applies. the only pollard i ever killed was a willow drought stressed I thought being beside a lake would help, but it did not. massive cambium death occurred.

 

Dr David Lonsdale is our finest academic arboriculturist and doesnt stick his neck out for anything less than proven fact and for good reason, he is a consummate pro, and I for one would aspire to be even half the professional he is, not saying you detracted, just my views.

 

He is also very approachable which is a rare thing for such a man, and it speaks volumes of the guy, especialy putting up with a tonka like me at seminars!

Hi Hamadryad,

I have read Dr Lonsdales book and can only but recommend it to anyone interested in Tree hazard management or just trees in general. Superb.

But if we cast back to your original post you stress the need for ' feel' and ' gut instinct' in relation to pollarding . Now for examples sake I'll use a previous post to illustrate where I'm coming from the one where an FC manager is expecting to see a pollarded poplar. What exactly is he expecting to see? A nice dutch style street pollard? A lovely story book type with hollowed centre ? What is the chances the tree is going to die because of the tree being a high risk species ?

Can the said cutter tell the manager he has a nice feeling about it? that its his gut instinct? Or can he give him sound advice based on facts and figures collected by experts.

Hama i'm cetainly not having a dig at Dr lonsdale , on the contrary .. but it would be nice for these guys to collate something which we could all try and impliment with confidence or else trees will just get felled.

Take care 'bt2'

Pollarding is in the US ANSI standards, and also is covered there under "restoration pruning"

 

It's in the BS thing too i am told.

 

What are you expecting from "proven academics"? Few of them climb. Have you read Dr. David Lonsdale's book on tree risk? It's well-mentioned there, as i recall.

 

The ball is rolling; you'll have to go faster than a trot to catch up!

Thanks for the reply ' treeseer '

You seem to imply that we shouldn't listen to ' proven academics ' and seek the assistance of climbers instead but then you refer me to DR David Lonsdale

I have read his book incidently and I can do no better than give you his own words in relation to pollard work...

' The above considerations can be translated into some TENTATIVE guidelines, but THESE ARE BY NO MEANS FULLY TRIED AND TESTED ; nor are they a prescription that can substitute for individual and sensitive management based on local knowledge and on experience with particular species or provenances of trees '.

Doesn't exactly sound like a man willing to put his neck on the line does it?

Another thing which Dr Lonsdale advocates is the importance of drought stress in determining when to pollard ( or if to pollard ! ) something that seems to get lost amongst the friendly banter:001_smile:

I'll try and trot as fast as you yanks!! cheers 'b2t'

Interesting post Hama.

Excuse my ignorance , but is pollarding mentioned anywhere in industry best practise? If it is not then it needs to be , if it is then its being ignored.

It is after all a guideline only and if more of us tree surgeons can learn from experienced hands or education days then it will become a more regular solution. I for one would be interested in a pollarding course run by proven academics.

The ball needs to start rolling.... so roll it

Sawmillers were talking about this the other day and I'm sure they used WD-40 .

Does it have to be a conifer?

Yew a natural understorey species and can be cut hard.

I love crapping in the woods, feels really natural .

Its great youse should all try it.