Treecreeper1961

I am currently considering some stuff. It is not going all that well as I seem to be really bad at making sense of some things. Can anyone please give me some advice on professional indemnity insurance? There is no doubt P.I. is required for certain work. My question is, what level of cover is needed, or put another way, what level of cover do you guys have? There is a suggestion £250,000 is probably enough for domestic and low level development work. It seems that the majority of claims against arbs. are thrown out and all you generally need to cover is defense costs which don't usually go beyond £10,000. If you are at fault then £250,000 is going to cover quite a bit, perhaps removal of trees on sites, re-structuring of foundations up to a point, damage to a range of property and even injuries up to a point, perhaps even a death. Not likely to cover serious injury, disability and long term loss of earnings. Sorry about the grim and forthright nature of all this but at the end of the day that is what it is all about. Any thoughts appreciated, if you can tell me a figure but don't want to post it a p.m. would be great.

Hi Verena, Tim and co., Happy News Year to you all. I bet failing by 2% makes it even harder to swallow, unlucky:thumbdown:. You did well to get that close, it was a nightmare, a days work I reckon. The Davidia and Monkey Puzzle are not even on the learning list so it's quite inappropriate to specifically criticize you on knowledge about these species in my opinion. Having said that though, from what I can remember they were both young specimens and I was pretty confident as such, and being in good condition, they would have 40 plus years of contribution left. I am not sure what to say about your RPA comments. Showing projected RPA in light of barriers to root morphology seems quite complex to me, if it is going to be accurate. I don't think there was any characteristic present to require showing the RPA as anything other than centered symmetrically around the tree stem, as a circle or square, as stated in the standard. However, the notion that an RPA of one large tree can give protection to smaller trees within a group is one that may or may not be reliable in my opinion. What if the presence of roots from a larger, older tree causes the roots of a younger tree to grow into space beyond this all encompassing RPA? Maybe this will be given consideration in the revised standard. I did not colour code my RPA's, just showed them in pencil as circles. I did find my scale ruler useful for this and wished I had practiced it a lot more. At this point I abandoned the plan and the survey, desperately in search of marks. The recommendation of tree work that I gave was largely centered on removing the large sycamore. I noted several bio mechanical faults and used them to justify this. I was worried about this call afterwards but it is about opinions and backing up those opinions with sound arb. assessments. You could have argued it was too good a specimen to remove but it did have some issues and limited remaining contribution. Removing it was a safety call but it also allowed retention of the younger trees and probably made long term sense. Made reference to BS3998. One of my oral questions was on reasons for crown thinning and this threw me as the revised BS3998 recommends reduction as a superior remedy to thinning for most management objectives. The question 2c was it, 30 marks for 30 measures to reduce damage during construction. I left it very late to tackle this but crammed as much down as I could remember, quoting as many specific controls and as much detail about as I could, including detailed spec. for the fencing. I didn't get thirty points down but perhaps by elaborating on some it was possible to gain more than one mark for each?? I reckon there is a lot of value in training specifically for BS5837 work and I intend to do the one day Treelife course this year if I can. It covers so many aspects. Just out of interest, when doing BS5837 work do you cover all the sections for your clients, survey, AIMs, AIA, TPP, CEZ and all or are there some jobs that just require a survey and the RPA's? The reason I ask is that some people don't know what they wan't or need and some LA's accept the latter while others insist on the full monty. The problem I have is not having access to computer design programs or GPS technology at the moment. How does everyone else cope with these issues? Measuring wheel, scale ruler, pen and paper? Would be interested to know if this is the case with anyone. Sorry to get side tracked. What I have found is even in passing the Tech Cert there are just loads more questions. That is the great thing about it all though, never to be bored again! I do believe I had a bit of luck somewhere and we all need that, but be certain, make your assessments and back them up with industry best practice guidance, they can't say your wrong then. I am sure you two (Verena and Tim) will get it next time, don't be stopped from trying again by the flaws in the system, not even the Abc or AA are perfect, good luck. Remember the words of Ben from Treelife, 'it's a war and battle right to the end, every second and every mark counts' or something like that. Ben

Sorry Treeseer, I am not sure if I have missed something here? Can't see an attached cable job in the attachment, but an Arbor Age article on the subject along with an interesting case of the Thoburn Oak. Don't suppose you can post up the next edition of the mag. to see what the 'Arbor Master' has concluded? I'm guessing it involves cable bracing judging by the red line in the picture. The angles involved seem to give fairly limited support, what do you reckon?

Is it just me or does an increased knowledge of V.T.A. lead to a view of trees that can become complex at times? There has been much said here and else where regarding compression forks, included bark and species prone to such characteristics and their potential failure. Most of us are well aware of these things now but being able to recognise the language is just the beginning. Full translation is something else, if you know what I mean. Sometimes it seems like every beech tree I look at has a compression fork or some kind of included bark complication. 1 How do we go about making a sensible assessment of these trees without a knee jerk reaction? As has been said on this thread, it is not a question of if but of when will these conspicuous unions fail. 2 Well, if that is the case, what about the 80ft beech with multiple potential failure points situated in a high risk zone? A fine tree perhaps, still growing, with no signs of disease or decay, which has already withstood the test of some considerable time. 3 What if this tree is multi-stemmed? Too large by far to attempt formative pruning. If removal or reduction of stems is considered as a preventative measure what about the resulting decay and dysfunction? 4 And how do we predict which of the stems are most at risk of failure? Experience I hear you say! Of course. So far, my experience has shown me that such chatterings are prone to sudden and, as far as the timing is concerned, difficult to predict failure. The conflict I have in my mind is one I guess most are familiar with when they are relatively young in their V.T.A. lives, it's a judgement call and one that may be very unpopular and take many years to be proven as one that should have been made. I have got some photos below, not trees that I am responsible for, but do have connections with, and any comments would be appreciated.

It is a real treat too:thumbup:

I did the 'Bats and Arboriculture' LANTRA course a few years ago and have some good info on disk, if anyone is interested I can dig it out.

I have been told before that if you see bats feeding under lights they are sure to be pips. Do you think that is an accurate generalisation? It seems to be the case where I live, I take my kids to watch them snaffling moths under a street light occasionally.

As you may be thinking, a good compromise is to cut the ivy at 4 or 5 meters or above a union, rather than at ground level. Ivy is tremendously valuable for habitat and wildlife.

You'r a gent as well as a torturer.

I have got a copy of Collins Complete Guide to...., not that you would have guessed, and I don't deserve a prize for that effort. If it suits you o.k. put it in the raffle:thumbup1:

Sly as a fox! Nothing like the original picture. Demonstrates the challenge of identifying fungi at different states of maturity I guess.

Obvious really. Don't know what you lot were playing at.

Tiger Sawgill. The clue from David.

I'd say more like 2.37%

Come on Hamadryad, Warty Knight? Umblicate cap, scaly stipe, white decurrent crowded gills. Collins has it as a woodchip fungi, but could it be?

Fungi are addictive. If you change your name to born2rot I'll change mine to Treerotter.

Really, is there a tarts section? Do you go there often?

How about that then, Melanoleuca verrucipes?

Warty Knight

Oops. Getting desperate.:0

Clitocybe geotropa?

How about the False Chanterelle? No, there's no scales on the stipe in my picture here.

Doesn't have a stipe.

Is it an Agaric of the Kaghan valley in Pakistan?