Are YOU teaching bad habits? How to stand up a limb

Marc

Those pics of the crane job with MB to me look o.k, although my experience in such areas is limited, all i can go on is what knowledge I have gained from those more experienced than me.

It seems to me there are 2 schools of climbers (and more) those who do everything by best practice and try to keep everything effcient and smooth.

And those who go more for speed and effciency through simply'fying there techniques, which can be sometimes not to best practice but experience has taught them is just as safe.

I have been fortunate to work for one of the most progressive arb firms in the U.k they are one of the un-sung heroes of the arb world over here, the boss used to be on the Arb Association Board and was of the very first N.P.T.C trainers. These days though they concentrate on quality tree care.

When I first started working for them i was always doing, small hand held sections, split level cuts and directional felling cuts on dismantle's.

I was soon taught that its not neccersarily the best way and that one cut is more effcient on me and more productive.
One of the reasoning behind this is wear and tear on the climber, over a climbers career he wil do thousands upon thousnads of cuts, the fewer cuts he can make will result in less wear and tear on his joints ligaments/tendons and back. And be more productive than multiply cuts.

Its all situation dependant though, and depends on the tree your working on etc, thats where experience comes in.

I'm now a firm believe'r in one cut from the top straight through, or like the guy pictured one cut and have the crane pull it off, providing it does'nt load the crane in ways it should'nt, o.k there maybe some unpredictability in the ways the wood fibers will responed, and a little less control, but its down to the climber to make that call.
His positioning looked good being that he was covered on the other side of the tree, ok a second tie in point would of been good, but thats his call to make, i'm a firm believer that none of us want to die and we should make are own risk assements and judgements.

I have seen where guys know best practice and use it with out thinking, sometimes a second tie in point is a bad idea, ""make climbing idiot proof and you will only get idiots climbing""

Its very easy to criticise other people's technique.

As for teaching bad habits! Well if a newbie sees those pics and goes out and copies him, then he is a fool who lacks common sense and should'nt be in tree work. Each to his own, and know your own limitations!!

JohN Dee

Eric, the diagram would be great.

Drano, Marc - A very excellent point that you both have pulled up. Over the years I have built up a safety first attitude and that is no excuse for someone being injured. One of the secrets to that, that me and my father abide by is communication & colmanation.

A tree crew needs to be like clockwork: All the gears oiled, rotating and all doing there job perfectly for the overall output on completion. If you have one gear out of whack or no doing their job the whole clock fails and things get broken.

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Sean Freeman

Hi Marc, through this whole thread you'll see very specific points made about best practice in working in the tree with cranes from a number of different people on this site, myself included.None of us are claiming that we haven't chosen to do things do things that fall well short of best practice, but it is absolutely critical that the choices you make are based on a sound understanding of the potential outcomes of your actions.
Having a clear risk assessment process before the start of each job that everyone signs off on at the beginning of the job, is just one way to ensure that the whole crew understands what the risks are, and how those risks are to be managed on this particular job.

All of us get into habits about the way we work, little rituals if you like. Some of these habits can be good some can be very bad, most of them stem from how we first learnt to do the work we do...who taught us if you like, who we looked up to as we climbed up.

However personal experience in anything is only so good, it is very limited and not the basis on which standards, particularly safety standards are built. Rather the cumulative experience of hundreds of thousands of tree workers and arborists, over decades, across different continents is the basis for the standards of best practice that underpin risk management in our industry and profession. If we choose to work outside(under) those standards we are exposing ourselves and others to greater risk of injury or worse, personally I find that my work environment is dangerous enough.

The original criticism of MB was that he was presenting the images as a how to, without caveat, and that was a mistake on his part. Like all of us MB chooses how he undertakes his jobs, how he makes each cut up in the tree, it is his judgement call each time...he has the saw. However this seems self evident predictability and control are paramount when working with cranes, as a number of others have pointed out one cutting a significant diameter stem and using the crane to pull the piece off vertically snapping the fibres is not a good idea.

I disagree with your comment that using step cuts or directional felling in the tree will over the lifetime of the climber result in greater wear and tear. For me poor climbing technique results in greater wear and tear, rather than the number of times a climber places a chainsaw into the tree.

I would whole heartedly agree that anyone who uses the internet as their sole source of information on anything (let alone anything as important as OH&S in tree work) is not the full quid.

__________________
Sean

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.
- Kahlil Gibran

jim1nz

Marc, It is very easy to criticise other people's technique and by doing this, we find better ways of doing things.

There are plenty of people out there who you might think are idiots but that's life, it is up to us to use our knowledge as professionals to try and improve others methods in anyway we can, even with limitations. I would hate to see a young arborist hurt because i was too worried to question what he was doing.


I agree in that every tree, every situation is different and sometimes a straight top cut may be the best cut. In the photos you have seen i could not agree though. You say your self

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SPEED ALWAYS FOLLOWS TECHNIQUE

jim1nz

Great post Boa

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SPEED ALWAYS FOLLOWS TECHNIQUE

Marc

I'm unaware of those pictures, if they are part of a how to its not something I would follow.
Its easy enough to point out mistakes in his approach from those stills, but to get a better understanding I would like to see a video and actually have input from MB himself.

I'm not saying criticism is bad, but we also need objective opinion about maybe why he is doing it that way.

Its good to see though that some people are'nt afraid to put up pics of there work even if the work is not to best practice (not taking into account that its meant to be some how to guide??) as it can start discussions like this.
Which is covering more than just crane work, of which I have little personal experience.


Jim1nz, i'm not saying anyone is an idiot, i personally do not harbour strong feeling towards anyone, even if they are an idiot, its their perogative, i,e i'm a very tolerant person.

I was merely trying to provoke thought and discussion, my main point being is that in this line of work nothing is ever regular, you may know all the best practice in the world but occasionally you have to think outside the box as it were and carry out a task differently,,,,, i'm not to good at getting my point across which is evident.

I'm fortunate to of learnt from dozens of top climbers, and worked with all skill levels. Some of the newbies fresh from college have a strict sense of whats right and best practice, they often carry out a task to best practice because it is what they are taught rather than thinking for themselves.

A case in point and kinda what I mean about making climbing idiot proof:
On a job involving re-pollarding some old willow, where the willow stems had grown to nearly 30ft in length and straight with diameters of 6-8" approx.

We had one of the new guys up a tree, and I was told to keep an eye on him, he got himself anchored in on one of the central vertical poles and went to one of the laterals that was growing outwards from the crown.
He got into position about 6ft out from the old pollard point and was finding it hard to hold his position, so he went to lanyard onto the stem, at which point I shouted upto him to not bother, he yelled back that he was taught to always have a second tie in point (which is true) to which I told him to THINK why am i not reccomending he tie in?

This is my point, climbers or groundies doing something through automated action just because thats best practice instead of thinking through the task at hand, you cannot make this job idiot proof!.

In the end I got the climber to set-up a second tie in point on another branch to give him stability, then he made the cut and as I predicted it barber chaired, that happened to him on nearly 30% of the limbs that were heavily leaning, o.k some of it was his blunt saw and lack of accuracy.

The other point to take note is he had been working with us all day, and had seen several of the trees pollarded already, a couple of the guiys had them barber on them or the bark tear out, most only had one anchor, he just thought they were idiots not using best practice, and failed to understand the reason why they did not have a second anchor.

This is only one example.

Whats worse is some newbie who come out of college or training and goes striaght into bad habits because thats what he sees other climbers doing around him, even though those guys have 10 years or more experience!!

I watched one guy removing epicormic from a lime trunk using one hand on the saw at full revs, going nose first towrads the trunk with the saw between his legs, at anytime it could kicked back and embedded itself in his stomach or worse still his family allowance.

I asked him why he did it that way and his answer was "that the way all pro climbers use the saw"

So yeah be carefull who you teach your bad habits to.

Marc

And Boa, about the wear and tear point I have to disagree, I know 3 retiered commercial climbers 2 with destroyed tendons in there arms, and one with a bad back, there advice is always do a little climbing as possible, make fewer cuts and always find an effcient and comfortable position to cut in.

It seems to me to make good sense, although your point is pretty much what I meant, work smart not harder and all that.

As for reducing your cuts, that makes perfect sense to me, the major issue as I see it is undercutting especially with the top of the cutting bar, when you pull that up and into the cut there is no doubt it puts more strain on your arms and back than say resting the saw on top of the limb and letting the bar cut down, the weight is held by the wood and not you and the chain is pulling against the dogs.
Please correct me if i'm wrong.

I also think wear and tear is down to what level your working at, I know companies that expect their climbers to prune 3 say veteran Oaks a day, where as other will give you 1. yet both expect the same quality.

Sean Freeman

Hi Marc, interesting points, if during repollarding of any species with great age I permitted the limbs I was working on to barber chair or tear down the bark I don't think I'd be getting a call back from that company again, and rightly so. Sounds, as you suggest that the chain was not sharp enough, nor the climber.

If I have to carry a large saw into the tree to remove heavy wood I always make sure I'm getting into a postion from which I can work with control over the saw, poor work positioning is the number one cause of stress injuries in climbers. One guy has said to me in the past that its tree work and its going to be uncomfortable, to which I replied that there was no requirement in our job to make things uncomfortable. There certainly are times when removing a limb requires me to get into very awkard positions, looking more like a yoga practitioner than anything else, but with careful forethought and planning of your cuts before you make them and the sequence that you make them in I have found the straining you describe to be very much the exception than the rule. As such that exception is something I will bear to maintian what I consider to be safe working methods.

I am very fortunate to be in a position where the company I work for values me and my skills, but I am not silly enough to fail to recognise that others are in positions that require them to "get it done" then move onto to the next job. The pressure on climbers for speed at the cost of safety is a real problem, I've seen it like everyone else. Its one of the main reasons why I am commited to getting best practice standards established here in Queensland, without them there is no job specfic protection for tree workers at all.

__________________
Sean

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.
- Kahlil Gibran

Marc

O.k it probaly sounds bad my description of the climber tearing out limbs and barber chairing, the boss was on site at this job, a particularly large job with pressure to get it done, unfortunatly although the company I work for is without doubt of the highest quality in terms of the work they do this job was very much quantity over quality, although the finished job was still to higher standards than most would do in the circumstance, but i'm not here to justify the reasoning behind the work.
The boss is all for challenging new climbers, he often like to put them in situations outside there comfort zone to see how the respond, not in a way that would risk the climber, now it was messy but I hope that he learnt valueble lessons from his mistakes, I know I did.

Tree work is a funny game out here, in my area there are 5-6 large quality firms and 60 one man banders of varying quality, most are hacks. Its a very competitive marketplace, with the small outfits undercutting the big ones, so it unfortunatly means the larger firms really have to up there productive output.
In the name of speed guys cut corners (ugly term) to be faster, I wish it was different and so do they, but a climber is rated by his commercial speed and quality combined. Me I prefer quality over quantity, now i'm lucky I can find enough work to keep to my ethics and approach to work, others prefer the glory of being the quickest, but I do respect them, most of the best have never suffered injury to themsleve or others, but they do not always work to best practice, unfortunatly as a result there commercial viablilty seems to end at 40 years old. Which to me is to young to stop climbing.

I wish things could be different, but I would'nt want to see companies like the ones I work for disappear, they are the hero's of tree work over here, but there is no way they could compete if they had climbers who always got themselves into good working positions etc etc, very sad but true.

We have a company called Treevolution and a guy called Paulo Baveresco or something i'll try to find links, who are pushing for changes in the industry, unfortunatly must firms I work for just cannot adopt there best practice and still be commercially viable.

Change will happen just very very slowly.

Sean Freeman

You're right things are a little diferent in the UK, even regionally there are quite dramatic differences in the market place, LGAs' perspective on urban forestry etc...and the age limit at 40...well since I'm over that mark it sort of explains part of my approach to my climbing I quess.

I'm assuming you meant this guy http://www.treemettlenexus.com/ Paolo Bavaresco his website is excellent his work ethics and philosophy beyond reproach great guy doing great work in a very beautiful part of Britain just quietly

Its also really good that you want to work for the company you're currently with staff turn over is a real killer for cohesive efficient and safe work crews in our profession. I'm also very lucky the small company I work for is the exception in the North (Cowboy country) I would last not one half hour in the other tree businessess around here (PPE why would we need that we're not unsafe!!!! )

Change will happen Marc and it will happen because of guys like you working alongside others showing why professional tree care is better for everyone, clients, workers, owners, trees and the environment as a whole. (OK speech over )

__________________
Sean

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.
- Kahlil Gibran

jim1nz

Once again Boa great post.

Marc, good contribution. Great points raised. I have always said the best arborists are ones that think efficiency with an out of the box approach.

You are right, "in tree work nothing is ever regular, you may know all the best practice in the world but occasionally you have to think outside the box as it were and carry out a task differently".

I think work positioning as Boa comments on is very important. You will find good climbers, climbers who can get around the tree with ease, smoothly and efficiently do not struggle to get into a good position for their cuts. Its second nature to them, very little effort. Less effort exerted means less strain on the body.

We use our lanyards not only as a double roping point but also as a work positioning aid. It helps me not hinders me, it takes 2 seconds to put it on, i dont find it any effort what so ever.

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SPEED ALWAYS FOLLOWS TECHNIQUE

jim1nz

Marc, ill be in Sweden in a couple of days and will continue to the UK after that. I cant wait to get over there and check it all out!

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SPEED ALWAYS FOLLOWS TECHNIQUE

Sean Freeman

Man Jim are you the jet setting Arbo or what?? (

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Sean

Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness.
- Kahlil Gibran

jim1nz

Absolutely Boa, im going to go every where see what i can learn.

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SPEED ALWAYS FOLLOWS TECHNIQUE

Ekka