@Wildlife_Mgr

A friend of mine went through the small claims court in order to recover an outstanding debt from a domestic customer. He made a mistake on the initial application and didn't state he wanted to claim costs as he thought the court letter would do the trick. He was wrong and once the process was in motion he was no longer able to claim costs, instead funding the whole thing himself. He eventually won the case and was awarded his money but the defendant still didn't pay. He took her back to court where a court bailiff was instructed to collect the monies owed. The bailiff called my mate up and apologised for him not getting the money in the first place and assured him he would have the money by the end of the week, which he did. It turned out the defendant was the bailiffs daughter.

If you go into a partnership I'd suggest you have each very specific roles within the company whereby you're both not in charge of the same things. For example, one could be in charge and deal with all the grounds maintenance side of things and the other deals with all the tree works, etc. This will want to be drawn up into some form of contract, that way you both know exactly where you stand. I work on my own but when I do need help it's usually from my brother. He gets paid for the work he does and the decisions he makes regards where he's working are his decisions and I'll not go against them. He's responsible for those. Liability insurance is not a legal requirement but what you should ask yourself is could you afford to go to court case if someone made a claim against you? For the price it's well worth it purely for piece of mind if nowt else. Also, most places wont employ you if you don't have some. An accountant isn't a necessity, I don't use one. You can however, run things yourself throughout the year. Keep all your receipts neatly and in order, that way, should you wish, you can take everything to an accountant for them to do your end of year returns. If you have everything neatly in date order it wont be too expensive for an accountant to go through them. If however, you have a bag of receipts, all mixed up you might find you end up with a fair bill cos the accountant will have to go through everything and put things in order.

Ah! Yeah I know Carperby, done plenty of work over that way. You still playing? I've not played sine the 'management' of the club changed. We had a slight, erm... disagreement...

Haha! That obvious?

Whoa Russell! That just seems so brutal, although I know it'll look great in no time.

Figured I better introduce myself here as I've already made a couple of posts. My name's Mark and I'm the owner of Yorkshire Wildlife Management. We're based near Richmond, North Yorkshire and offer wildlife management to (mainly) agricultural customers throughout the area. As well as providing rat, rabbit, squirrel, mole, stoat, crow, deer, and fox control we are looking to offer our customers (and new ones) other services such as tree planting and hedge laying.

I'm looking at doing the HCC Diploma in Arboriculture. I like the idea of distance learning as it generally doesn't get in the way of other commitments .

In short, no. As the name suggests (Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease), it only affects rabbits.

I first started to notice VHD in 2001 after t'foot and mouth had come to an end and we could get back on t'land. I visited a farm one night and had a scan round a 20 acre wheat field, there were rabbits everywhere! The following night nothing and subsequent nights the same. VHD was the only thing I could think of in order to wipe out a population in 24 hours. It only really seems to affect adult rabbits, young bunnies tend to have some sort of immunity?..

Great thread this! Thoroughly enjoying looking at everyones work and drooling over the skill levels people have. It's just wetted my appetite more to get out there and do it myself!

Sounds like a plan!

I used to get that when trapping moles, until they saw how many I was pulling out, now they just ask me to do their fields

I'm already a member, cheers! There was a course listed on there a couple of weeks back but it was in Bedfordshire which is a little too far to travel. I've just noticed Philip Rowell is holding some courses in Barnsley which isn't too far from me. Has anyone done one of his courses? I did contact a place near York but I've not heard anything back from them.

Cheers for that! It's certainly something to look in to.

I'm just wondering if anyone did a hedge laying course prior to laying a hedge? I'm looking to offer the service as part of my wildlife management business but wondered if there were any recommended courses? Any info would be greatly appreciated.