Spotted Owl
ArboristSite Guru
Tree removal for home owners, he is an armchair quarterback engenier(sp) guy, she is great friendly and good looking and willing to knowingly keep her husband quiet and back, the kind of customer you dream of.
What happens when you have 36" of an 084 burried in a 46"dbh fir. Nothin but a good time with chips fly'in. Face goes in good. So you ask what's next? Start in the back cut. Everything is smooth so you go ahead on'er. Then abt 3/4 of the way thru the back cut SNAP at WOT and the chain snaps in 2 places when you hang up on a RR spike just out of sight, 2"s of bark covering it and you didn't notice.
You tip your hat just enough, just fast enough to deflect the chain from forehead/eye level. Can't explain how you are that fast other than sometimes your gut just tells ya to duck and cover. The hat brim get a heck of a gouge and rip and you just catch that chunck of chain flying, just off to the side and between the corner of your mouth and nose.
What are the results. A nice HOLE in your face that you can split the blood thru from the inside. Also a pretty good split in the gum line on the inside.
The home owner freaks out and the owners wife passes out right there when you get off the ground and she see's the blood gushing from your face and mouth.
Then what do you hear? The wife says to the husband, "I thought that you pulled all those spikes out of the tree so they wouldn't kill it. Didn't you tell him that there may have been something in the tree that could have been a problem?" Then you hear the owner quietly tell her to "shut up so he doesn't hear you."
What does the owner here from you? After you have chewed your own tounge off from hearing what you heard so you don't kill him he hears this. You knew there was spikes in this tree and didn't say anything? Mister that just cost you a $1000 extra and the price just went up to $5500 as per the contract agreement for finding material in the tree, and for the job now becoming a hazard removal. Cash by the time the job is done. When he started to argue I just stared at him and then spit blood through my lip onto his brand new shinney drive way. He said nothing. Then my son pulled me to the truck to look at my lip and gaze pack it best we could. She left just as we were getteing back to work.
Job done total cost $6500 cash for one tree. Easy drop, no clean up, nothing to worry about to start with. Turned into a nightmare that I don't wish to run into again. I had my boy(13) with me today and I am very glad that he was there. He kept me from loosing it, and kept my focus were it needed to be. To finish it had to be face bored to abt where the spike and turned into a semi block/snipe face, and bored from either side to miss the spike. 9 wedges burried in that thing cause of the way it wound up needing to be cut. Lots O fiber pull
She got back just in time to see and film the tree falling. We cleaned up our gear and got everything loaded. She said she would like to pay the bill, so I wrote it up as stated above. She then handed me $7500. When I counted it and looked at her she said to be quiet cause it came from his personal slush fund she wasn't supposed to know about and smiled. She then handed my son $1000 and said the same thing again with a big smile. She appologized again and said that she should have said something but he told he had already told us so she didn't.
Damn what a day. My boy thinks he should go with me everytime now. When we got in the truck he said he "thought that I was gonna do sumthin stupid to that guy."
Bottom line take care in what you are doing cause you never know what may happen and when.
BE DAMN CAREFULL OUT THERE
Owl
What happens when you have 36" of an 084 burried in a 46"dbh fir. Nothin but a good time with chips fly'in. Face goes in good. So you ask what's next? Start in the back cut. Everything is smooth so you go ahead on'er. Then abt 3/4 of the way thru the back cut SNAP at WOT and the chain snaps in 2 places when you hang up on a RR spike just out of sight, 2"s of bark covering it and you didn't notice.
You tip your hat just enough, just fast enough to deflect the chain from forehead/eye level. Can't explain how you are that fast other than sometimes your gut just tells ya to duck and cover. The hat brim get a heck of a gouge and rip and you just catch that chunck of chain flying, just off to the side and between the corner of your mouth and nose.
What are the results. A nice HOLE in your face that you can split the blood thru from the inside. Also a pretty good split in the gum line on the inside.
The home owner freaks out and the owners wife passes out right there when you get off the ground and she see's the blood gushing from your face and mouth.
Then what do you hear? The wife says to the husband, "I thought that you pulled all those spikes out of the tree so they wouldn't kill it. Didn't you tell him that there may have been something in the tree that could have been a problem?" Then you hear the owner quietly tell her to "shut up so he doesn't hear you."
What does the owner here from you? After you have chewed your own tounge off from hearing what you heard so you don't kill him he hears this. You knew there was spikes in this tree and didn't say anything? Mister that just cost you a $1000 extra and the price just went up to $5500 as per the contract agreement for finding material in the tree, and for the job now becoming a hazard removal. Cash by the time the job is done. When he started to argue I just stared at him and then spit blood through my lip onto his brand new shinney drive way. He said nothing. Then my son pulled me to the truck to look at my lip and gaze pack it best we could. She left just as we were getteing back to work.
Job done total cost $6500 cash for one tree. Easy drop, no clean up, nothing to worry about to start with. Turned into a nightmare that I don't wish to run into again. I had my boy(13) with me today and I am very glad that he was there. He kept me from loosing it, and kept my focus were it needed to be. To finish it had to be face bored to abt where the spike and turned into a semi block/snipe face, and bored from either side to miss the spike. 9 wedges burried in that thing cause of the way it wound up needing to be cut. Lots O fiber pull
She got back just in time to see and film the tree falling. We cleaned up our gear and got everything loaded. She said she would like to pay the bill, so I wrote it up as stated above. She then handed me $7500. When I counted it and looked at her she said to be quiet cause it came from his personal slush fund she wasn't supposed to know about and smiled. She then handed my son $1000 and said the same thing again with a big smile. She appologized again and said that she should have said something but he told he had already told us so she didn't.
Damn what a day. My boy thinks he should go with me everytime now. When we got in the truck he said he "thought that I was gonna do sumthin stupid to that guy."
Bottom line take care in what you are doing cause you never know what may happen and when.
BE DAMN CAREFULL OUT THERE
Owl