Swingin round with ropes like monkeys! VS metal and leather!

[MasterBlaster]

056-I spent most of my money on booze, broads and gambling-the rest I just wasted.

Hahahahahaaa!!! I thought I was the only one!

 

[P_woozel]

Kid who are you, are there more like you somewhere? Oh, one more thing, does this river go to Antry? :umpkin:

 

[056kid]

You wanna translate that for me?

 

[Tree Machine]

Woozel, you're not pickin on our willing student, are you?

I have to respect 056 in coming out and tellin us he's a spiker. Here, saying that will get you flamed every time. But he's hangin in there, letting us know he's willing to try new methods, and why he hasn't up til now. Young Dawg is just here like the rest of us, wanting to learn and advance.

Most of us didn't start out having an extensive online panel of teachers shelling out free information just because they cared. 056 has stepped up so he doesn't have to grind through years under his current mentor and live in that technically isolated shell.

I'd like to see this cat making at least $200 a day, getting some top-end gear and maybe thinking about certification or an arboriculture program. I don't think an early talent should have to suffer. This job can be endless joy and 056 clearly wants to fly with the monkeys. We're servin it up on a silver platter, he's hungry. We'd like him to represent our industry well and he wants to come home safe, and intact every night. I think we're working OK together, so far.

 

[Jim1NZ]

056 kid, read Shigo, A.L. (1991). Modern Arboriculture. Shigo & Trees Associates, Durham, New Hampshire, USA, maby you wont get such a hard time.

All i wana say is that i hope your tyed in twice, even if its 2 flip lines, or you wont last till your 18 bro.

 

[Tree Machine]

That's a good reference.

056, when you get into where ascending a rope is as fast as spiking up a tree, you'll get into some basic gear, cool stuff like this fab throwbag from JimNZ's country.

The amount of gear you'll need for conversion to spikeless would be:
1) rope
2) throwbag
3) throwline and stow device
4) bigshot and pole
5) Smurfies

That's pretty much it, if you stay old-school. If you want to move into the future and skip a couple years of learning curve, you'll also need

6) dual handled ascenders and a backup tress cord
7) descent device of your choosing
8) 11 mm rope over a 13

These are not in order. I'd certainly put the smurfies first. Without actually adding numbers, an off the hip guesstimate is 400 or 500 bucks. Seems huge to you, but this is part of a week's income. These are the tools of the trade, and they pay themselves off in security, safety, efficiency and feeling more like a pro. There's a lot to be said for that, how you feel once you're climbing more swiftly and safely and positioning with exactness and precise control. It's big fun.

 

[treeseer]

The amount of gear you'll need for conversion to spikeless would be:
1) rope
2) throwbag
3) throwline and stow device
4) bigshot and pole
5) Smurfies

That's pretty much it, if you stay old-school.

I got 2-4 but rarely need them.
then there are the tools of the Older School of spikeless climbing:
1. 32', or better, 40' Ladder
2. Polesaw

Climb to the top of the ladder, tie in w lanyard.
TIe snap end of rope into monkeyfiist, toss to a good branch. Or if branches are too thick to toss, push up knot with polesaw.
Pull monkeyfist down with poesaw, tie in.
Bodythrust up.
Repeat.

Sounds tedious, but with this method you can beat the majority of climbers who fling their throwballs, on most trees. I've seen the trees in Lynchburg; you do not need the bigshot on most of them. Keep It Simple Stuff.

 

[pmuscato]

Swinging around like monkey's. It boils my blood when people compare me to a monkey. M I alone on this.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I'd rather be compared to a squirrel...

 

[vharrison2]

You crack me up

 

[treeseer]

It boils my blood when people compare me to a monkey.

Their words are like water; let your back be like a duck's.

Monkeys are intelligent and able climbers--I try to thank the idiots who say that, for the compliment. After all they are clueless on technique and fearful of heights, so they should be excused if what they say is not astute.

I'd much rather be likened to a primate than a rodent; mb you got empathy for skwerls now?

 

[MasterBlaster]

Heck ya! I've never seen a squirrel throw feces!

 

[Kneejerk Bombas]

Really we're more like spyders, hanging off a rope and all.

 

[Tree Machine]

I forgot to mention new-school would have spliced end(s) on their climbing and rigging lines. This speeds a lot of ops just by not having to repeatedly tie and untie. Some guys are unfamiliar with a monkey's fist, but to clip a steel biner onto an eye, it becomes an instant, less bulky 'monkey's fist'.

 

[treeseer]

Good point, TM.

Are you gathering your data for the NEWTS meeting in August?

 

[clearance]

About spliced ends-why not tie a rope snap at the very end of your rigging line and one about 2-3' from the end of your climbing line. Snap on, tie a bowline to rappel. Loop around, snap back on the line and lower away branches.

 

[tophopper]

The amount of gear you'll need for conversion to spikeless would be:
1) rope
2) throwbag
3) throwline and stow device
4) bigshot and pole
5) Smurfies

That's pretty much it, if you stay old-school.

When I made the conversion, it was long before the big shot. And I wrapped my throwline around a stick. The good ole days!

Smurfies? gloves I assume. ?

 

[Tom Dunlap]

When I took the crazy sports reporter for KARE 11 [what is his name...???] climbing I gave him a pair of grippy gloves. He looked at them and asked me how many Smurfs they had to skin to make the glvoes. The name stuck.

 

[clearance]

056-climb with spurs if you want to, but climb safe. If you want to learn how to spurless climb, thats great, but get what you need first. Sounds like you do removals mostly, so do I. Removals with spurs are easy no talent or skill jobs I hear. I guess everyone thinks its easy to climb big firs heavily overhanging a 25kv three phase and cut and push big branches away from the line.

 

[Tree Machine]

I was wondering how the Smurfie thing got started. Thanks, Tom.

Smurfies, rubber-palmed cotton gloves, specifically, blue. The green ones arent called smurfies, and they're all called ugly gloves. They make em in red, but it sorta makes you look like you've got two terrible, flowing wrist wounds, if ya know what I mean. The red ones have never caught on in popularity.

Side note on the Smurfies. I was at the TCIA Expo in Baltimore a couple years ago, and had a couple dozen pair of Smurfs in my pack, giving them to any Arboristsite guy I met on the floor. There was a footlock race, and my wife asked me if I was going to do it. "No, I don't think so." and she let me have it, "Why not, ya scared? Huh? Are you wimpin out? What are ya, a Poosie-boy? Huh? you a ????? or what?"

My wife has such a special way with me, ya know?

"You're not gonna climb for my honor and my glory....?"

So I sign up. My turn came up and I put on a pair of smurfies and got geared up. I heard some onlooker say, "I wonder why that guy uses gloves?" I looked over and said, "hey, bubba, this is why." I pulled myself up about ten feet, without using my feet, stopped, looked the guy in the eye and released one hand. As I hung there, feet dangling, holding my full weight with the grip of a single hand I said to all the onlookers, "Just try this with bare hands", and then I slid slowly down the rope, still just the one hand.

The point is, the grip you get is really quite amazing, even on wet rope. Every now and then I'll do a climb without them and I pay in diminished climbing performance and increased pain.