Air Spade

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I apologize for gettin' ya all riled up. Toddppm and Chain Gang understood where I was coming from. I think it's great that you have the opportunity to learn in a classroom environment and people like you are the future of arboriculture. I just had to razz ya 'cause you don't come across as someone who has spent a lot of time holding a chainsaw or dragging brush. And even so, I may be wrong there. I was taught in an environment of ' Watch and learn, but drag that pile of brush to the chipper while you watch'.

Peace :D
 
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i appoligize for over reacting but yes i have done phisical labor and drug pleanty of brush, when its two people taking care of almost 500acres made of two golf courses you learn to do every thing.
 
Wow 2 people! Man I get an Amigo around 10 or 11 when greens and bunkers are finished!

I gotta get something done about that.

Actualy I had 5 guys from 1230 till 3 today. I've been doing bucktorn eradication for the last week and we've been piling it up all over the place. My hands have festering punctures all over the place. One of the other ferrel species in the thicket is english hawthorn! Good thing the honeylocust has not reverted to true G. tricantha;).
 
JPS

Thanks for the link, very interesting.
Sounds like a dirty job using one of these but better then cutting some fiber optics or the like. youch!!
 
Hey I guess its my turn to respond! Sudo Tsuga was my right hand man this summer and hopefully will be my intern next summer ( unless he goes and works for John Paul Sanborn , which he has threatened ) :). I think he is BullS**tting all of you because he is a very hard worker and knows how to operate a saw and I have taught him to also know the scientific and book end of the business. Now he is on his way to get an education in urban tree management and become a certified arborist. Hey Mike whats up and how is school? Mike only has one weakness like alot of us . He also speaks before he thinks:blob2: MIke have you gotten those kakis and loafers dirty yet ? :D John
 
hey thanks john for the back up and hey JPS are you looking for an intern this summer because i dont have anything lined up i'll be more than willing to fill out an app but i'm not sure if i can get a recomendation from my previous employer though.

HA HA HA

no seriously!
 
And you wont need to learn the bosses name all over again either!:D

I'm going to be sending a bullit out through SSA. Is there a chapter at your school? I'll probibly post it on the internet too.

We are still hashing out the budget at this time, not sure yet if these will be a room or not. But we will have a lift, a chipper, a stumper and a whole lotta neet stuff. (Probibly have to wait till next year for the GRCS. But I can always bring the maker in since he works 20 miles away.)
 
I don't want to dilute this thread on the airspde by actually talking about it, but...
There is a local tree company with a home made version. Hardware store parts cost about $20, all it is is a hollow tube, that connects to a big air compressor.
We use a backpack blower and a trowel for root flair excavations and even that works.
 
I got a picture of Pat using it with the red funnel for a deflector. They figure that they get around 90% of the effect of the A/S. I tried it and figure around 75%. I was moving through rootflairs faster.

That all said, if you only do a few a year, $25 is a far cry from $1300.
 
We have been using the A/S for about three years now and are finally getting to a point where it is becoming profitable. The challenge for us has not been the effectiveness of the tool or the initial cost, but operator and education.

As you guys have said, it is dirty work. Noisy, and somewhat tedious. It has been dificult to find a person who wants to stick with it. We have also had to educate ourselves as to what it can and can't do, and what results we can expect. The next challenge has been to educate the client.

We use the A/S primarily for root flare excavations, and evaluation. We have used it to trench irrigation lines, and excavate planting holes in heavily treed areas, and even to blend compost and organic material into compacted soils for bedding plants. The results have been encouraging.

We considered quitting several times, but the response you see after a tree, buried too deeply, has its root flares exposed... It is pretty dramatic. We want to be in the business of caring for trees, not just pruning and removing.

lhampton
 
Lou,

I'm taking a page from Zillmers B&B planting when I do grade remediation and straightening out encircling woody roots and reburing if possible (epicormic roots are being cut if first order are in good shape though).

I am also going out rather far tos make sure that there are no encircling roots in the zone of trunk expantion for many years.

What have y'all been doing about the pit you can develope? It seems that it would not be apreciated by residential customers.
 
The pit that is left has been a big concern for a lot of our clients. One actually demanded that we fill the whole thing back in and rebury his tree again after he paid us to uncover it.

We start with the intial recommendation by explaining that there will most likely be quite a hole left around the base of their tree. Depending on the depth, we can slope it gradually back up to grade, build a retaining wall around it, or if they just can't live with the sight, suggest a pourouse material like river rock or pea gravel. We prefer not to fill at all and explain that even with a larger river rock and certainly with the pea gravel, there is additional maintenance involved in annual cleaning. Have you ever gone to your kids playground that was covered with pea gravel and seen the compaction that results when dirt and silt has been allowed to accumulate? Like cement.

The concern we hear most often is about the standing water that results after a rain or after their irrigation system goes off. We try to explain that this is not a problem because there is a period when the water soaks into the ground and the trunk tissue dries again, unlike when that area was covered with soil and would remain saturated with moisture.

Again it is a problem with education. As we are beginning to get to a point that people are calling us to inquire about root flare excavation, rather than our intiating the process, we hope to have less of a problem.

There have been trees that we have done that I have looked at and :eek: !! We sure did it this time! With only one exception, in three years, I don't know how many trees, results have been positive.

Question... Have you done many Live Oaks? We have seen tangled layers of smaller roots above larger "traditional" root flares. Don't know why we only see it with these and not others. It appears typical for the Live Oaks that we have gone into. Would like to know more.
 
Im saw my first live oak up close this week in SAV, GA so I cannot comment on the species in particular. My feeling is that it being a bottom land plant it is adapted to having layers of silt build up and reglarly colonize the new layers. I have seen this with U. americana and Gleditsia. A. sacchariniuminuminum will put out roots where ever there is regular moisture. I have one that has roots extening from a fissure that takes a few days to drain after a rain. Ive seen hollow trunks that are just a mass of fine roots.
 
The air spade conversation is interesting, but the education debate was HILARIOUS . You boy's is FUNNY!
 
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just to let yall know my studies are doing very well i currently have a 3.1 GPA

and i might be able to waive my internship because of all the things that JPM taught me.:p
 
I am 33 yrs old rockin with a 3.78 GPA (psychology major) but I only went back to school for the fun and the girls. I doubt I'll ever be able to make as much as I do with my tree service. And by the way I have a friend that climbs all day long in shorts.
 

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