Your Definition of a Hack

[NickfromWI]

A hack doesn't know there's a right way......and they don't care.

 

[Old Monkey]

Who is a "hack" is a subjective question in my book. I've moved from a big market to a small market. My first day on the job here in Boise, I asked if someone could put a pole pruner on the line. "Pole pruner? I think we had one of those, once. The climber broke it so we didn't get another." To me it was like getting an office job and finding out they'd never heard of a stapler! I have tried to modify trimming and safety behaviors here as best I can. If you are so principled that you'll walk off a job before you'll do X,Y or Z, you'll lose your opportunity to turn things toward the better. Same with customers. Improving methods of tree care is a process, don't alienate people, bring them along with you. Prove that you can do a good pruning job in the same amount of time that someone else takes to brutalize a tree. Convince customers that tree maintenance is cheaper over the long run than doing overly hard trims.

 

[MasterBlaster]

A hack doesn't know there's a right way......and they don't care.

HEY! I said that!

 

[alanarbor]

A hack in my book is someone who:

1. Does not care about safety
2. Does not care about quality
3. Does not care about (or for) trees
4. Does not care about (or for) their clients
5. Cares about money more than any of the above

Note this has little to do with the size or quality of the equipment. I've known excellent arborists who only had a pickup truck, and I've probably known more hacks with great equipment.

 

[JonnyHart]

Yeah, they got more money for good equipment, cause they probably don't have that pesky insurance bill.

 

[Crazy Canuck]

A hack in my book is someone who:

1. Does not care about safety
2. Does not care about quality
3. Does not care about (or for) trees
4. Does not care about (or for) their clients
5. Cares about money more than any of the above

Note this has little to do with the size or quality of the equipment. I've known excellent arborists who only had a pickup truck, and I've probably known more hacks with great equipment.

Thats interesting and I couldn't agree more. I live in a small market (just under 50K households) and that guys that are doing the best work are the guys with the least amount of equipment. I personally just haul everything in my half ton right now, but thats because I've spent my money on broadening my client base, good insurance, etc. Hopefully over the nest three months I'll finally get that bigger truck and a chipper. At least I work in a lot of small towns with the dump never more than a couple miles away and no charge dumping. Now if I could just get them to open for more than a couple of days a week........

 

[a_lopa]

Equipment can be an indicator of the type of work a pro does, but a pro should be able to do good work even with primative tools.

exactly,and have a market edge.after all this is work/buisness.alot of new rigging equipment slows people up considerably,but im sure not telling why.bling

 

[Ekka]

Hey Newb

I wouldn't perhaps consider you a hack but I'd be calling you a "weekend warrior" ... part timers out for a few extra bucks.

I take it that a toolmaker is a tradesman with years of training, we call them an apprenticeship (4 years) to become a tradesman.

Where do you consider yourself as a tree guy?

I must admit I don't like it when you're an arborist with years of training and experience and then along comes a (subsidised by my other job) part-timer and thinks they're in the same ballpark.

 

[TREETX]

Equipment is often more indicative of a business plan than the quality of service.

Many great arborists are poor business men and many great business men know squat about arboriculture....

 

[a_lopa]

:Eye:

 

[alanarbor]

Thats interesting and I couldn't agree more. I live in a small market (just under 50K households) and that guys that are doing the best work are the guys with the least amount of equipment. I personally just haul everything in my half ton right now, but thats because I've spent my money on broadening my client base, good insurance, etc. Hopefully over the nest three months I'll finally get that bigger truck and a chipper. At least I work in a lot of small towns with the dump never more than a couple miles away and no charge dumping. Now if I could just get them to open for more than a couple of days a week........

I guess to follow that up, if you're hauling everything in a pickup truck, then you're naturally going to gravitate towards proper pruning, because you generate less debris, and can handle it all. The hack with the 30yard chip truck and an 18" chipper would just as soon cut it down for the same price. Unfortuately, people often ascribe value to a tree job based on the amount of debris generated.

Let's educate, not defoliate!

 

[newb]

Ekka, Good post. My apperntiship was 5 years, 20 years later Im still learing as the trade evolves. I'm not looking as tree work as a side job, I'm looking at it as a second career. I know that I have alot to learn. Thats one reason I come to this site. I've actually been in the trees cutting for a little over a year. In that time I have progressed alot. I also realized that there are still things I dont have the ability to do. Those jobs I walk away from or hire a climber that has the ability. I have 3 more years in the factory before this will be my full time job, so I consider this my apprentiship. Thanks to everyone for the help, whether you knew you were helping or not.

 

[old dude]

Whats a hack?

Gentelmen-
I would submit to you that the definition of a hack is one who would tell a potential client an outrageous story about his talents/expeerience and just as big a lie about the clients trees then ask for a big check at the end of a light day of destruction. I know of one guy who each year goes around telling clients that thier pines have pine-beetle and that they spread through the roots. One guy told a client of mine that his tree was dying of beetle but that he could cure the tree with an application of a secret powder to the soil at the base of the tree.Another hack I know of created a giant hatrack out of a healthy pine after telling the client that this would prevent pine-beetle and assurring her that the pine would refoliate in the spring.
Hacks are nothing more than bandits preying on the ignorance and fears of the ill-informed. Anyone who aspires to perform quality tree care regardless of thier background is ok with me and I gladly lend them any helpful information I can to the best of my ability. Doing so only strengthens the industry as a whole.
Old Dude

 

[alanarbor]

I was speaking more towards the previous poster's motivation....yes my logic was flawed, coming out as a blanket statement........consider my balls broken

 

[Manco]

A hack is someone who cuts a tree, it falls on the house, saw gets pinched in the cut, takes the powerhead off of pinched bar and leaves. That was a true story.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Nah, that's a fool.

 

[Crazy Canuck]

Hey Alan how do you know he doesn't just gravitate toward damaging smaller trees? Or delivering refrigerators? Your logic is illogical. People don't gravitate toward proper tree care because they haul brush in a pickup.

I think people who don't know about proper tree climbing usually gravitate toward the ground!

Dan

Your right and your wrong. I don't gravitate towards proper pruning because of the size of my truck. I gravitate towards proper pruning because its proper....

 

[VTMechEng]

First off, as long as your practices are SAFE TO YOUR HEALTH you are on the right track. Now as for proper pruning practices that will take time, research, and learning from another. I was very lucky to have great teachers where I worked that took the time to teach exactly what to cut, why to cut it, and how to cut it correctly. Believe it or not, some 25 to 30 ft trees can be hard to properly prune. I will stress that word "properly" because it can really be hard to figure out which live branches to cut for maximum health and asthetics for years to come. I am in no way saying a 130 ft oak removal is easy because I know it isn't, it is just a different kind of hard and takes different knowladge. Where I worked we had a crew that went on big removals and dead-wooding almost every day and one that did lots of the smaller prunning and lighter removals. Being able to work with both kinds of people will really help round out your climbing skills.

 

[Old Monkey]

I saw a couple of asian guys in Mao jackets(grey quilted worker uniform) working down the street from me once. They were topping acacias. They had an aluminum extension ladder with bent legs that was only standing upright because they had tied it with clothesline rope to the base of a power pole. The "climber" was not wearing a saddle and had no PPE. He was actually tying off branches, that was the only good thing he was doing. His lowering line was that cheap yellow nylon stuff and his "ground guys" were taking wraps on the same power pole that his ladder was tied to. I consider myself a compassionate guy. I was worried these guys were going to get hurt. My first thought was to go down and try to show them a safer way---but I couldn't think of where to begin. I also thought, perhaps a little more knowledge would embolden these fellows into doing something even more hairball. It didn't matter, they didn't speak a lick of english and I don't speak any Cantonese, Mandorin or whatever. My second thought was to call the cops on them. I thought it would be for there own good and maybe their wealthy but stingy client would get the slap on the wrist the disserved. I am so lame-- I couldn't bring myself to do it. I wish I had.

Either I need a sign that pictorially explains, "You are hack and your going to get hurt," or I need a phrase book with it translated into many languages. :alien:

 

[fpyontek]

A hack is someone who cuts a tree, it falls on the house, saw gets pinched in the cut, takes the powerhead off of pinched bar and leaves. That was a true story.

Last year we had a major wind storm. A 36" oak fell from the house of a customer of mine and into the neighbor's trees. Huge tree with root ball half out of ground. The neighbor's 20" trees were bent over the neighbor's roof. If the tree fell, it would not only land on the neighbors roof, but if would crush/remove the rear corner of my customers house. When I get there the neighbor says he hired a big company because he had to be sure this was done right! The NATIONAL(ly) known company pulls up, so I leave. The next morning I get a call from the neighbor. He says "I need your help". When I got there I saw that the bucket operator put a bull line in and started cutting the branch that was supporting the 36" oak. when the saw bound, they packed up and left. I had to come in with a 45 ton crane with 10 sheets of plywood in the neighbors new driveway to remove the 36" oak. The National company had the nerve to not only charge the neighbor $1000.00 , but come back for the bound saw and bull line, (which would have snapped like string). So hacks come in all sizes, reputations, and certifications!

Fred