Trailoftears

V.good comment!likewise I come in with wet muddy boots,then change in the bedroom which results in a generous amount of hedge clippings/sawdust+fag ends.Then have a wash,which results in a dirty sink/dirtied towel.This is where she usually rugby tackles me to the floor and makes mad passionate love to me (not).I think she originally fancied a bit of ruff when she met me-BUT THERE are limits 😳

My Dad too was an arborist too,he had a long rope plus a clip,he seemed to encourage my Mum onto a long ladder and shout at her a lot after handing her a rusty bowsaw via a bamboo cane ( he tended to stay on the ground mostly).

Quite shocked to see fr jones go,and relieved I didnt have a big order in the pipeline too!Totally agree with the previous answer,l&s are superb and always there.Not used skyland too much,but always really helpful.

Perhaps a plus one for landscapers,I do work for a couple of the more enlightened customers in my roster who are more than happy to encourage and aid me in growing the best herb of all-we usually strike a 50/50 deal.The industry is not without its perks in fairness...

Its a can of worms really,and I didnt start this topic to be divisive-but thats good fun too 😁 My main point is we should ALL be paid/valued more given the weather conditions we all tend to have to endure+the skills+the dangerous conditions/ignorant home owners (talk about p.r.skills 🙄),not to mention the HUGE investments needed in plant/m.c's needed to carry out work/safely and efficiently too.

So most people on the street could apply herbicide accurately and safely,grow vegetables commercially and efficientally-and organically too plus maintain lawn/improve turf areas as well,design and plant out landscape schemes on a large scale etc?You must meet a lot of skilled people on the streets you walk thru tbh 🤔

Thank God-I dont look like him (yet) 💅

Another thing (he says warming to his theme),I considered this when I was younger-and it sounded (vaguely) attractive at the time.The deal?You go and work for some bucolic overweight elderly Tory with a large Estate but a small wallet,in return you get a small,probably damp hovel on his estate with obv.a smaller wage given your 'free' house.All very well until you fall out of one of his trees/become ill.Then not only do you lose your job,but also your home with your wife and kids possibly,who said serfdom is Dead!?

It amuses me that the Arborists on here obviously see themselves as the 'aristocracy' of the Horticultural World given their extremely 'narrow' knowledge of the Environment,but of course-I 'get' that.If you've invested in tens of thousands of pounds in various heavy equipment and gain many contracts both privately and re: local authorities particuraly given the the ash problems-which one presumes is all good for Arboriculturists.However,I find it really distasteful that they seem to regard landscapers as a 'lower' form of life-particularly given landscapers breadth of environmental knowledge puts most 'tree cutters' to shame-am I being provocative?Damn right! 😁

Frankly,I think you big your own gig up here-can you plant appropriate plants in a suitable environment,do you know what are the suitable temperatures to germinate say hundreds of seeds at,do you know which seeds MUST have dark/light in order to germinate at?Do you know at which point in the season is the optimum time to divide herb.perenialls up?how would you propagate poppies?Do you know what double dormancy means re: sowing tree seeds?When and how would you take rose cuttings-and is it worth it?What soil conditions/acidity levels/would you think would suit young lavender plants,What density/spacing would you advise a client to plant a hawthorn/beech/laurel hedge at+timing? Best time to prune Cherries given their propensity to canker.Herbicide doseage rates for var.weeds?Effective eradication methods for bramble eradication,tricks for effective germination of primula/magnolia seeds?Best methods for grafting/budding/layering var rhodies/shrubs.Trees?What a VERY narrow version of the World we live in,and frankly an easy way of making a living in a dynamic environment of trees/grass/shrubs/herbaceous plants/wild flowers/marginal plants/soft/hard fruits etc,etc,-piece of piss tbh....

Frankly,I think you big your own gig up here-can you plant appropriate plants in a suitable environment,do you know what are the suitable temperatures to germinate say hundreds of seeds at,do you know which seeds MUST have dark/light in order to germinate at?Do you know at which point in the season is the optimum time to divide herb.perenialls up?how would you propagate poppies?Do you know what double dormancy means re: sowing tree seeds?When and how would you take rose cuttings-and is it worth it?What soil conditions/acidity levels/would you think would suit young lavender plants,What density/spacing would you advise a client to plant a hawthorn/beech/laurel hedge at+timing? Best time to prune Cherries given their propensity to canker.Herbicide doseage rates for var.weeds?Effective eradication methods for bramble eradication,tricks for effective germination of primula/magnolia seeds?Best methods for grafting/budding/layering var rhodies/shrubs.Trees?What a VERY narrow version of the World we live in,and frankly an easy way of making a living in a dynamic environment of trees/grass/shrubs/herbaceous plants/wild flowers/marginal plants/soft/hard fruits etc,etc,-piece of piss tbh....

I hear what your saying,and like myself you are doing ok,but the point I was trying to make is the youngsters of today will not get to the (relatively) heights we have got to...

I'm not having a go at ANY charities in fairness-AND I note with interest I've had a few FIERCE responses from (presumably private employers),Who are ENGRAGED at the idea of paying their staff decent money for a bloody hard job-but they would be angry of course-cheap labour is their lifeblood....

Its nice to see the Employers union of 'the lazy fekkers' should all be happy to work for a bowl of rice plus a new pair of boots once a year are alive and well on the forum

So we all should become couriers/mcDonalds employers you think?Suprise me,you flog your staff for fekk all!

You sound like an employer ...

Being abused is not.

Of course,in an ideal World,we shoud be unionised,but given our generally isolated roles that probably isnt going to happen.But really,to be expected to do our jobs @say £10 an hour is worse than insulting-Given the weather/physical demands and danger of many of the tasks faced and expected of us.

This is a rant basically! I've been s.employed for what?40 odd years now,and without bigging myself up, I'm pretty damn good at what I do.That is to say-a multi discplined trade.When I look at the wages offered for horti roles-the wages offered-at best,are frankly insulting.For instance,a typical N.Trust job will ask for say,Chainsaw cert,herbicide cert.Public facing skills,the ability to run and maintain a fleet of various horticultural machines,the ability to organise and train up trainee gardeners.Plus budgetry skills/competence too.Nothing wrong with that,but given the demands,these are £40,000+jobs all day long.BUT not in Horticulture-we are supposed to take on roles like this for £22,000-if you are lucky!This offends me so deeply.Is it because Gardeners are seen as 'thick'? It angers me,in that say the National Trust are hoping they will be able to get multi disciplinary professionals on the cheap-i.e at half the salaries they should actually be earning.Whilst I understand the N.T. have a finite amount of resources-the wages offered in my profession deeply offend me.As an example,as a S.E. gardener,I make somewhere around the £40,000 mark a year,its hard work and I often have to do 6 days a week to get my schedule done.Its bloody hard work-easy money it AINT.My point is we Are ALL worth this sort of wage level. Dont let the 'employers' tell you any different! Will the guys and Girls in suits back at the office mow soaking wet lawns on a Monday morn/get down on hands and knees to weed a border/fell a dubious ash tree/drain a ride-on mowers sump-etc,etc?Nope,cuz they have an extremely limited skill set-unlike most of us used and abused in this sector.

Its in its own way,q.fascinating,you cant help admiring how these hugely successful plants adapt and evolve to what ever the environment and Human intervention throws at them.I've walked thru a low lying woodland area next to a ditch close to riversides and made a mental note to deal with them asp given the population is heavy/2' high.Next time the whole area is full of river debris after a sudden spate and their population is trashed/flattened.A week on,they slowly struggle back up/re-generate nodally.

I notice with dealing with Himalayan Balsam over the same riverside areas over several years-both hand-pulling the bigger individuals and sometimes b/cutting both large and small plants that not only can it flower at the usual heights,say 2-4' high.But over time it starts to flower at really low heights-4-6" hiding in coarse riverside grass.So really hard to track given its flowering under the grass population.N.R.W. did make an attempt to control it in my area a few years ago.Suffice to say,that didnt go well.I have visions of well-meaning volunteers sobbing amongst thickets of gorse and wanting to go home!

When you say stem inject it,do you mean every single stem in a large stand of say 60 stems?At what height do you inject each stem-down close to the rhizome mass say?It seems to have much the same internal discrete nodal system as bamboo.Do these 'boxed off' nodal areas inhibit internal travel at all?🤔

From past experience I find these cheaper stihl homeowner/farmer chainsaws are a lottery really.Bought a 170-horrid little saw,,bought a 180c-still serving me well after doing things it was never designed for 12 years later. Bought a 250 some years ago-went back to the dealer 4 times under warranty-they couldnt fix it/I couldnt fix it-worst saw I've ever bought.On the other hand I've rarely had issues with their pro saws-or indeed the 'vintage' old farmer saws they used to sell-the older 0 prefix saws seem bulletproof.

Bit of a negative thought tbh,but depending on the useage you've had over 7 years plus the cost to replace/repair ratio assuming you may have to pay for a main dealer diag./repair.Assuming you've had good value out of it.May be worth buying a new unit and keeping all the known good parts off it?These small budget homeowner saws tend not to be Stihl's finest tech/durable items to be brutally honest.If you've had 7 odd years of decent graft out of one of these units-you've done ok frankly.

Himalayan Balsalm!A very old friend!Pulls up really easily-then it dawns on you there's 700+individuals ranging from 3" up to 5'+ in front of you!Throw it on the ground in the damp,and it will root from its nodes.I've dumped barrow fulls on tarps in the past,even then,the top layer slowly rears back up growing on its fallen comrades!Plus that explosive seed dispersal action too-a worthy adversary.