What is QAL?
We are on the backside of the wave here...not many trees left alive if they haven't been treated at this point.
I think it is a wonderful opportunity to expand plant health business. There are equipment purchases that can be justified for EAB, that will be useful in other areas of the business. Trunk injected Tree-Age and soil-applied imidacloprid are the ways to go in my experience. Safari bark sprays are nice and quick to apply, but that is an expensive chemical, and it is not more effective than imidacloprid. If you soil inject that, it is almost as quick as bark sprayed Safari. If you don't want to use chemicals, then I guess that leaves that out for...but telling everybody their only choice is removal is as bad as telling them to treat everything. Offer GOOD information (which sounds that is like what you already strive to do), and let them make the decision.
Generally, I have felt like I tried to talk clients out of treating their trees. Not that I didn't want the business, but I wanted them to be well aware of all of the downsides:
*No guarantee that it will work (some companies do offer that, but most of those amount to little promise...besides, Tree-Age (for example), hasn't been on the market for long enough to say that it will work in 10+ years...EAB has only been known for 11-12 years, so there is no research to say that treatments will work for 15 years...sure, we can assume, but if it is not backed by good research, I am not putting my reputation on the line...so I am upfront - no guarantee).
*You will have to treat perpetually. Again, that is probably not entirely true - we should at least be able to scale back treatment intensity...but I want a client to assume perpetuity before they make the decision.
*It is not cheap.
*Not every tree is worth saving. There are some that are too far infested. There are others that were crappy trees before EAB ever showed up...why would you invest in keeping those around?
You can take EAB out of an infested tree...but not if it there is much infestation. If you stand back and the top/center of the tree is very thin it is gone. Even if you slow it down, the tree has lost apical dominance.
There are some lawn guys treating. Some have done OK...others will probably loose the trees because they have not treated properly. There may be a few hacks treating trees, but I guess those are different clients than I deal with, so I haven't run across too many.
There have been some guys that popped up doing removals that probably were not around before EAB...but how much of that was a factory working being laid off so he declares himself a tree expert as he picks up his chainsaw and beer. I turned away a lot of big removal jobs because I focus on pruning/care rather than removals...made me contemplate more than once starting a crew just to knock out removals. In hind sight, if we geared up to do that early on, it probably would have worked out well...but a couple of low-ballers could really put screws to that, so I do not regret not doing it. If you already do removals, may make sense to upgrade to keep up with increased production depending on how many ash trees you have. We have a lot. Many of the woodlots in the area are better than 50% ash.
If you do removals, take your normal time, realize that dead ash shatters when it touches the ground so add plenty of extra time to rake. Then add another hour into the bid because you underestimated the amount of time it takes to rake. Makes it hard to bid against somebody who doesn't care what the work site looks like when they leave...I am too much of a perfectionist to do that!
I don't know if I really answered your questions...but those are some quick highlights from here!