# Tree Paint



## Wulkowicz (Dec 31, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Nickrosis _
> *What do you think, Bob? I see Shigo mentions one of your favorite topics....tree paint. *



Ahah! An agent provokotuuer...

Here is a page from Kesslick's site on wound painting:

<http://www.chesco.com/~treeman/dress.html>

<hr>

"<i>Many arborists have known this for a long time. Results of research on wound dressings by many investigators during the last decade have further convinced these arborists, and they have stopped using wound dressings, or have discussed the treatment with their clients. Some arborists in this group - we will call them Group I - may paint wounds for cosmetic reasons, if the client still wants it done. Others in Group I refuse to paint wounds because they believe it reflects poorly on their professionalism.

Group II is arborists that doubt the worth of dressings for decay prevention, but want more proof. They are open-minded. Some have stopped using dressings; others are still using thinner coats of the materials.

Group III is made up of arborists who will not change their minds about wound dressings, or any other tree care practice, no matter what is said, done, or printed. Some members of this group manufacture wound dressings for profit.

Others have just grown up" with wound dressings and consider them a hallmark of professionalism. This is not bad, so long as the materials are not being sold or applied with the implication that they will prevent decay.

It is unrealistic to think that the use of wound dressings will ever cease; the search will continue for the perfect dressing. The increasing variety of new chemicals and the lure of easy profit encourage constant testing. The problem is that the emphasis is on the materials and not the tree, or profit first and tree second. 

The purposes of this paper are to present some additional data from wound dressing experiments to help Group II, and to discuss new directions for helping trees, especially for GroupI. We respectfully recognize Group III, so long as they are professionals, but we will not try to convince them that wound dressings do not stop decay.</i> "

<hr>


Well, I'm in Group II, but it isn't that I doubt the worth of dressings and am simply waiting more proof of that doubt. Instead, I believe in the concept of useful dressings, but think that proof of any value has still to be found. 

This won't happen in the present climate of cliches and dogma. Some experimental results 20 years ago for both wound closure speed and for decay prevention are presently almost muddled beyond redemption.

This inhibits further exploration and innovation with every parroting of the phrases that begin with "Experts say, ..." Personally, I'm sick of listening to it.

Every thing we do and say as professionals should be subject to routine re-examination, if for no other reason, to see if new truths have somehow slipped in the doorway. Professionalism is not that we all sound the same, and our strengths are evidenced in being indistinguishable from the next pro as interrogated by the public, or as yammered repeatedly in forums, or nodded to collegially with bent elbows after a conference.

Tar, paint or plastic; what do I care which specific one might benefit trees? But if we believe an answer probably won't ever be, then there's not ever to be any enthusiam for the search.

Speeding wound closure with a paint, I've alway thought was a dubious pursuit becase closure is essentially a mathematical function governed by the productivity of the leaves above. I simply wouldn't go looking in that direction at this moment.

And, very importantly, we are describing two distinctly different injury scenarios with the same word much like how we interchange suckers and watersprouts as only suckers.

An injury to the face of a woody cylinder is a decidedly different circumstance than a severing of a branch or any connection between cylinders. We call the both wounds and have a real blind spot about that. Should the same treatment or product work equally on both?

It may be quite improbable, but we still sell and use the same product for any "wounds." If the wounds are different; maybe the products should be different as well. 

I gotta go right now, but this is an important issue--not if paint works, but how we look at things, and how dogma forces a narrow, perhaps too narrow, perspective.


Bob Wulkowicz


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## rborist1 (Dec 31, 2002)

:Eye:


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## ORclimber (Dec 31, 2002)

I had never painted cuts until last month. I was doing multi-day job at a 55+ trailer park. The contract stated raising a giant sequoia 6 feet off the roofs of 2 buildings. The canopy of the tree was also over a picnic area, and all of the mail boxes for the 100 residents so they all got a good look at the tree every day. I had to raise the lower limbs up about 4 whorls to get the branch tips 6' off the roofs. The residents saw the shiners, started complaining about how much had come off the tree and the next day the owner told me she never would agreed to me working on that tree if she would have known how much I was going to take off the tree. The manager suggested I paint the shiners and that if the residents/owner couldn't see where the cuts had been made they would stop complaining. I bought some brown latex that matched the sequoia bark and applied it early the next morning. The complaining stopped, and I still have the account.


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## Wulkowicz (Dec 31, 2002)

> _Originally posted by rborist1 _
> *Boob,
> 
> Its good to see that you are stirring up the melting pot of our minds. This thread reminds me of a conversation I had with one Tubs a couple of years ago. I am sitting this one out for the time being as the infamous lurker that I am. *




I always had a hard time remembering if you were the infamous lurker or infamous lurcher.


Tubs

Or wait, maybe it was as a melted pot of a mind...

Oops, I better be careful, or JPS will accuse me of a personal attack and banish me to the eternal JPS Zoo--on the outside, looking in.

"There," he''ll explain to the cheering audience, "good riddance to bad tubbish."


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## John Paul Sanborn (Dec 31, 2002)

No no, you did not call him an idiot or a moron or so imply. He is not a new poster either, so I assume it is the normal jocular banter.


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## Wulkowicz (Dec 31, 2002)

> _Originally posted by John Paul Sanborn _
> *... so I assume it is the normal jocular banter. *



Jocular banter is generally mild compared to jockular banter. Is there a meter for that?

Bob :angel:


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## FBerkel (Dec 31, 2002)

Bob,

I understand your point regarding different potential applications of some form of wound dressing, but do you question whether traditional tar-based dressings interfere with compartmentalization?


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## rborist1 (Jan 1, 2003)

:Eye:


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## Wulkowicz (Jan 1, 2003)

> _Originally posted by rborist1 _
> *Boob,
> 
> I do believe that all of that east coast air is getting to you or is it something in the water. Anyways, its good to see you made it to the board, you original insight is welcome here. I do look forward to more of the "Jocular banter " that you alone can offer.
> ...



Hey, Jabbers,

Stop patting me on the back in public or I'll be forced to call you an idiot or a moron. That'll bring JPS down on me in a high velocity swoop faster than Cheney on speeedos.

Then, I'll be trying to be inciteful over on some other forum. I'm in Chitown with bad air, and water filled with additives to keep lead from leaching out of the supply pipes. I'm, by definition therefore, rather teste.


To think or not to think.........that is the more important question.



wulkowicz


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## Wulkowicz (Jan 1, 2003)

> _Originally posted by FBerkel _
> 
> *Bob,
> 
> I understand your point regarding different potential applications of some form of wound dressing, but do you question whether traditional tar-based dressings interfere with compartmentalization? *




Let me establish a personal view of context and background by opening with a story by Steve Silverman:

<i>It all started way back in 1859 in Brooklyn, New York. Imagine a young chemist named Robert Chesebrough (of Chesebrough-Ponds fame) at work in his office. Young Robby was burdened by a very common problem of the time - he sold kerosene for fuel, but the great oil strikes in Pennsylvania threatened his livelihood. 

What to do? What to do? 

He did the obvious thing - he hopped in his horse and buggy and made his way to Titusville, Pennsylvania, the home of the oil well. His intentions were well - strike it rich in oil. 

However, he became intrigued with a paraffin-like gooey substance that stuck to the drilling rigs. The riggers hated this stuff - it caused the drilling rigs to seize up. For all the problems this substance caused, the riggers found one small use - when rubbed on a cut or bruise it helped it to heal faster. 

Robby bottled the stuff up and dragged it back to his Brooklyn laboratory. It didn't take him long to extract the key pasty ingredient - the translucent material we now know as petroleum jelly. 

He needed a guinea pig to test it out on. Slashing his wife and kids up for the sake of science was out of the question. He chose to inflict all types of cuts and burns on himself to test the stuff out. They all seemed to heal quickly without any sign of infection when the goop was applied. 

His next problem: what to name it? 

We can imagine the names he may have tossed around - "Yellow slippery stuff", "100 million year old stuff from oil wells", or "Slip 'n Slide brand lubricant". 

They were all catchy names for our modern society, but people were dumber back then (your parents were dumber than you, and they thought the same of their parents, and so on...). 

He chose a great name - vaseline. 

Why vaseline? - No one really knows. 

I like to believe the story that he would store the stuff in his wife's vases in the lab, and since all medical products back then ended in "ine" (Listerine, Murine, etc.) - he came up with vaseline. 

Selling it was easy for Chesebrough - he simply loaded up his horse-and-buggy and gave out free samples across New York State. Within six months he had twelve buggy setups distributing the stuff. 

People used this stuff for everything: cuts and bruises, removing stains from furniture, polishing wood surfaces, restoring leather, preventing rust, and as a sexual aid (you can use your imagination on this one). Druggists used vaseline as a base for their other medicines and ointments. </i>

<hr>

It strikes me there's an inherent genetic fondness in the human spirit for something drippy and mucousy that then allows anything with those physical characteristics to become beloved and stick around forever. Freud might explain it as a response to early toilet training and keeping one's own poo, but I take a distinkly less clinical view.

For whatever reason, today, it's green slime. Throughout my lifetime, vaseline has been a dolloped staple. For the arboreally inclined over a few hundred years, ugly, sticky tarry stuff has been smeared everywhere possible on a tree for its obvious magical effects.

Early medical doctors set their prestige and status by having the most malodorous and vile concoctions possible to swallow, inhale or smear. It's little wonder that tree doctors wouldn't take up the same tactics.

Having never seen a lamb tree, I'm intrigued by how lanolin gained its fame. But I guess, if enough people keep doin somethin, we end up with dogma. (Speaking of that, since there are dogwood trees, I'm surprised that tree wounds weren't slobbered with Fido innards.)

I suspect arborists were quicker to stop wound painting than to stop flush cutting because of their wives. The women had to clean that ???? tar that got everywhere, while they couldn't care less if their man took off a limb with a V-notch.

<hr>

<i>...do you question whether traditional tar-based dressings interfere with compartmentalization?</i>

Fred,

Somewhere in my wanderings above I suggest traditional tar dressings evolved well separated from any effect on a tree. They didn't melt the tree, and arborists didn't fall dead from touching the stuff, so the purported pluses weren't countered by any memorable minuses. Bingo, tar dressings stuck.

Compartmentalization, a word perhaps that is longer than it has any right to be, is only beginning to be understood. It is very complex, and Shigo and Shortle say in their 1983 abstract: 

<i>The individual tree had a greater effect on the wound than the treatments. Some individual trees of a species closed and compartmentalized wounds rapidly and effectively, regardless of treatment, while other trees did not close and compartmentalize treated or control wounds. </i> 

If we, then or now, can't quite discern the range of individual wounding responses between treatment trees and control trees, we can honestly say that treatments seem to not make any difference. I can accept that. But, in equal honesty, I can take the lower, primal road and simply say we can't tell.

If we say it doesn't make any difference, why do we say, don't do it, so emphatically? Tree paint has become a pejorative; "painting" is now a bad action.

Well, I don't know that it is; I'm quite content with, "what we tried so far hasn't made a difference." That position allows the past experience, and still leaves the door open for future discoveries.

I do applaud attacking the snake oil and the magic bullets, and I think those were the original intents, but the issues have become distorted and then fossilized.

As I waddle toward your question, I want to separate wound closure from compartmentalization. Indeed, both can have the same point of initial injury, but they are individual responses and trackings that can benefit from our consideration of each by themselves for a few moments. 

Well, don't we do that already? Yes, we often do, but in the world of wound treatment as reported in the abstract and in the field, it is blurred.

What magic occurs when a wound closes? Is the tree home-free? Is compartmentalization aided by the complete coverage? Is compartmentalization no longer necessary? Is a quarter-inch opening relevant? Is it better a proof of the adage, "Out of sight; out of mind?"

Is plastic wrap an instant replacement for wound closure? If it is, why aren't two coats of latex paint?

<hr>

How can compartmentalization be interfered with, and to what extent? I don’t even know that, let alone how specific tar products may somehow affect it. So yes, I question the intereference. Not preventing decay is not the same as causing decay. One is a failed goal; the other, probably an interference.

As I pointed out before, a wound to the surface of a trunk is significantly different than a cross-section cut of a limb. Compartmentalization in each circumstance has different destinies.

So, which one are we referring to; what follows a drill hole, or follows the removal of a limb?

<hr>

Trees run on tree time. That can be tediously slow for us; we can watch a tree reach a first consideration, and by the time it gets to the second, we've gone off and found another career, so there's no one there to see it. 

With my understanding of tree time, I made an opening discussion and proposal over in the ISA forums for what I call CODIT Pruning. It recognizes the importance and usefulness of <u >time</u> for a new practical technique

In a real sense, I can describe it as a substitute for tree paint; it can meet the same goals and it doesn’t get your pants messy. Isn’t that a kick in the dogma?


Bob Wulkowicz


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## FBerkel (Jan 1, 2003)

Bob,

Say in limb removal, with proper "shigo cuts". Isn't oxygen required to form compounds that slow decay, and doesn't tree paint interfere with the passage of oxygen through the pruning cut?


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## Wulkowicz (Jan 1, 2003)

> _Originally posted by FBerkel _
> *Bob,
> 
> Say in limb removal, with proper "shigo cuts". Isn't oxygen required to form compounds that slow decay, and doesn't tree paint interfere with the passage of oxygen through the pruning cut? *



Shigo taught us to avoid cutting the branch bark collar because that bump contained the intersection where the branch vascular system merged with the trunk vascular syatem. 

With a flush cut, we not only removed the branch and its systems permanently, we also cut the top and the bottom of the trunk system that was being diverted around the existing branch. 

There was no reason to do that, Shigo argued. We slowed wound closure that way and crippled what was a natural sequence of compartmentalization which made a tree more vulnerable to decay.

<hr>

I don't have an easy answer for your question about oxygen being needed to form decay-inhibiting compounds, except to say that oxygen must be available at all times to the living cells inside a tree to allow maintenance metabolism and for the activities of dividing cells. It might be that these uses sequester most of any available oxygen, and there's not enough left to trigger premature comparmentalization, so the tree interior stays in an defensive readiness. Perhaps, that's how trees handle small local injuries.

However, significant CODIT responses can occur at the same time in parts of the tree so distant from from any breech in the bark covering that it might be presumed that higher oxygen levels can't easily migrate to those locations, so there are likely some other mechanisms at work.

Here, you are talking about the removal of a branch and then covering the stub end with "paint" that blocks oxygen access. Let's say for the moment that you're correct and it's not in the tree's best interest to have oxygen denied at the wound. That "preferred" state then also allows any spore or pathogen around, easy access to the interior of the tree through the exposed ends of the old branch vascular system.

The tree must rush to block those subway entrances with tyloses or plugs and chemical barriers because it knows full well there are pathogens coming for lunch. The chemical changes you described are designed to delay or inhibit decay. They may be precipitated or enhanced by the presence of oxygen, but I must say that I can't agree that this is a reason for leaving wounds uncovered or open.

It's wrong to argue that leaving pruning wounds alone is recommended because we leave the tree to natural processes. I'll bet compartmentalization evolution goes back a few dozen million years, while saw and chainsaw-type cutting can't go back more than a few thousand.

Trees never anticipated the types of wound we routinely leave. They expected breaks, tears and limb death; that's a big jump from those to our repeated instantaneous injuries right at a branch junction. (And I am counting the flush cuts that Shigo and Shortle said went on for 400 or more years previously.)

Tree time. It is the time scale at which each tree operates acording to its genetic background. We come and short-circuit it with a saw, then say it's natural, and walk away. Strikes me as a bit foolish, cosidered we say we know so much about trees.

I'm not critical of you or your question. Oxygenation may be an important process in a defense against decay. I'm not knowledgeable about those possibilities or details, and I will research them, but my instincts tell me what damage we do in our prunings far overweigh the oxygen denied by any painting. It's a bit like a tank driving in through a storefront and then pointing to a squished smear on the floor. Yes, it's there and it is a result of the invasion, but in proportion to everything else...

We had a habit of finding reasons after the fact to explain our practices until Alex set us on our collective ear with the furor about flush cutting. It's healthy to debate and reconsider perspectives--at least that's what I think. Thanks for writing and asking good questions.

Bob Wulkowicz


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## FBerkel (Jan 2, 2003)

Bob,

Presumably, one of our goals in pruning is to minimize total decay volume in "tree time". We try to minimize the number of cuts, choose smaller ones over larger, prune at proper times. Also, we use strategies such as training leaders, encouraging trunk taper, etc., that (we think) make a tree stronger for the long term. This would be a beneficial tradeoff: small wounds now to prevent large ones later. Maybe we are fooling ourselves in this effort, but maybe not. Isn't it possible that an experienced, observant arborist could achieve these goals?

If so, then I think the marginal gain of preventing further decay in our unnatural cuts would be a worthwhile goal. 

I appreciate the level of knowledge and thought you bring to this discussion.


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## Wulkowicz (Jan 5, 2003)

> _Originally posted by FBerkel _
> *Bob,
> 
> Presumably, one of our goals in pruning is to minimize total decay volume in "tree time". We try to minimize the number of cuts, choose smaller ones over larger, prune at proper times. Also, we use strategies such as training leaders, encouraging trunk taper, etc., that (we think) make a tree stronger for the long term. This would be a beneficial tradeoff: small wounds now to prevent large ones later. Maybe we are fooling ourselves in this effort, but maybe not. Isn't it possible that an experienced, observant arborist could achieve these goals?
> ...




CODIT Pruning will provide a dramatic gain in dealing with decay when removing large limbs.

The problem most people will have with the concept is it clearly runs on tree time. There's nothing I can do about that. But it will absolutely work. Greed and impatience will be its worst adversaries.


Bob Wulkowicz


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## Kneejerk Bombas (Jan 5, 2003)

*.*

.


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## TheTreeSpyder (Jan 5, 2003)

Great education in fluid words, thanx for staying Wulke!

Mike, i missed your point there bud!

edit-look this made it to the top line of threadlist; that 'sticky' must have fallen off the ceiling!


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## Guy Meilleur (Jan 5, 2003)

> _Originally posted by FBerkel _
> *Bob,
> 
> Presumably, one of our goals in pruning is to minimize total decay volume in "tree time". We try to minimize the number of cuts, choose smaller ones over larger, prune at proper times. Also, we use strategies such as training leaders, encouraging trunk taper, etc., that (we think) make a tree stronger for the long term. This would be a beneficial tradeoff: small wounds now to prevent large ones later. Maybe we are fooling ourselves in this effort, but maybe not. Isn't it possible that an experienced, observant arborist could achieve these goals?
> ...



Right on. See Fungal Strategies of Wood Decay in Trees, by Schwarze, Engels and Mattheck: Large wounds are slow to heal and become motorways for decay in the heart of the tree. In light of this phenomenon we've all witnessed, experimentation with sealants on wounds taht are prone to cracking is not only warranted but obligatory for those who do not want to create hollow trees.
Shellac works.

DK Fighter


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## Kneejerk Bombas (Jan 5, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Guy Meilleur _
> *Shellac works.
> 
> DK Fighter *



What do you mean it works?


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## treeclimber165 (Jan 5, 2003)

It means that he made some cuts, painted shellac on them and they did not rot out. So it MUST work!


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## Oxman (Jan 5, 2003)

Tree paint than seals an injury seals in decay causing micro orgasms. If your goal is to rapidly discolor the offending injury try rubbing mud or dirt into the injury. Soil has anti biotic properties and chewing or boring insects dislike the tiny particles. Diatamatious earth has been used to treat wood for carpenter ants and termites for years.

John Kakouris
WC isa Certified arborist #379


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## Oxman (Jan 5, 2003)

My old friend Mike Oxman came to visit me this weekend and informed that my former employer and mentor John Britton has passed away. John and his wife denise Frolich were instrumental in the development of the certification program in the 80s. I went to work for John and denise in 88 after I myself became certified. This was the golden age of certification it used to be such a big deal, and I wanted to learn this trade from the real experts, people with college degrees. Befor I became certified every new employer was a challenge because every arborist had a different way of pruning than the former. Now the certification exam is world wide and there are thousands of us who have benifitted from it. Because John Britton lived he has made the urban forest and our lives richer...he will be missed. 

check your root crowns to determine the extent of root rot befor climbing. 

Prune shade trees with hand pruners

clean out all the dead twigs in diseased trees. 

John Kakouris
wc isa certified arborist #379

twigs ,branches killed by the disease becomes inoculant:angel:


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## Rob Murphy (Jan 6, 2003)

*Dirt*

[" try rubbing mud or dirt into the injury. Soil has anti biotic properties and chewing or boring insects dislike the tiny particles. Diatamatious earth has been used to treat wood for carpenter ants and termites for years.

John Kakouris
WC isa Certified arborist #379 [/B][/QUOTE]


I too have used dirt on wounds.to make mud just add water and it is available in most places where trees grow!!


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## Wulkowicz (Jan 6, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Oxman _
> *My old friend Mike Oxman came to visit me this weekend and informed that my former employer and mentor John Britton has passed away. John and his wife denise Frolich were instrumental in the development of the certification program in the 80s. I went to work for John and denise in 88 after I myself became certified. This was the golden age of certification it used to be such a big deal, and I wanted to learn this trade from the real experts, people with college degrees. Befor I became certified every new employer was a challenge because every arborist had a different way of pruning than the former. Now the certification exam is world wide and there are thousands of us who have benifitted from it. Because John Britton lived he has made the urban forest and our lives richer...he will be missed. *




Thank you for telling us about John Britton. 

Trees, and the ethics of professionalism and stewardship, need all the help they can get these days, so the death of someone so dedicated will be felt in many ways. When that person is a friend, we can't help but take stock of what we have done together, and what we will do without him. May he teach us as well, that same courage, tenacity, and wisdom he has shared with his wife, his friends and his colleauges.


Bob Wulkowicz


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## TheTreeSpyder (Jan 6, 2003)

Dirt is usually freely available, even around poison ivy! Dirt is sometimes my first absorbing/ drying line of defense, do to availability (or lack of) other immediate options. Have only got it bad 2x, think that quick action helps. 

Respects to the Britton Families and relations, and appreciation of a life well lived.


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## Oxman (Jan 8, 2003)

For those who didn't have a chance to meet John Britton, there is a link to remember him by at: NAA obituaries website 

John was the ISA rep to the ANSI Z133 committee for many years. John was given to understatement, and could say quite a bit in just a few words. Because of his vast experience, he was able to put a lot into the few points he elected to persue. His style was very conciliatory and low key until it came to a point important enough to not back down from. Then he was a bulldog fighting for the rights of trees and arborists. We are lucky to have had this man on our side during these talks.

Over the years, John and his wife Denice, and others on this committee (like Don Blair) visited different ISA chapter conferences and presented progress reports on the ongoing saga. It's a very comforting feeling to know that our future is in the hands of this competent group of volunteers. 

I know many arborists who have never attended a tree industry conference, meeting, seminar, workshop or jamboree. I realize they feel they have important things to do. It saddens me that they can continue to reap the benefits of organization without a clue to the sometimes tedious committee work that has gone into laying the groundwork for their benefit. 

If folks would just pitch in and make a payment on the interest that their predecessors put down, we could really take off on an interesting journey. Instead of our clientele hearing a different story from each arborist they encounter, we would have a unified front that can improve the quality of life for people, by taking good care of our trees.

About 20 years ago I rember reading an obituary in Arborist News about another dedicated tree person that had a real effect on me. It was written in the first person by his wife after he died early from a brief illness. He had also been very active in promoting our trade association activities, like John Britton. 

His regret was that there was not enough time for him to become president of the ISA to accomplish essential tasks to tighten up the effectiveness of our group effort, and improve the lives of arborists everywhere. 

When we healthy people squander the short time we have available in ineffective, inconsequential blather, we are missing the incredible opportunity of making a difference in other people's lives. The horrible waste of mental decrepitude as we lollygag about our business would be a tremendous chance for one of these dedicated arborists who have passed on early. It's an inspiration to get busy and get done what is needed, for we may never have the chance again.


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## Gopher (Jan 8, 2003)

One very good discussion. Nice to see you are "on-line", Fred, at an early hour.

The one comment that Bob mentions, "Tree time" does not take into account that WE are here, and that pristine tree time does not exist in the purest form.

Many times I have read and listened to professionals debate over numerous sides to all sorts of natural and enviromental issues. Great thought provoking discussion, with no real right or wrong answers. Usually at some point, the topic of "natural", or "virgin" or "un-altered" comes up. Well, no matter how hard we try, we are here.

There are more and more of us every day, fighting for the same space, the same air, the same beer (oops, maybe not that one!) that the trees we care about need as well. In a controlled setting, the tree sealant/paint argument would be more easily debated. We don't have that.

What we have is a willingness to educate people who like trees enough to have them around, and entrust us to make sure they (and hopefully their grandkids) will continue to enjoy. As long as we can show them that we are open-minded to applying the best known techniques for the time, and can give them reasons (both for and against) for doing so, let them feel good about their decision. If, as in the "55+" example where the people were kept happy, it allows more time to allow the arborist to further educate and do even more good work for them, then so be it. As long as what was painted, sealed, gooped on, tarred, didn't grossly effect the length of "tree-time" as we know it, then do what is needed and we will spend more milllions figuring out why our brains hurt from wondering why we did what we did. (Yikes, run on, much?!)

"...And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever."

from "The Brook" - Alfred Tennyson

Gopher


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## Oxman (Jan 14, 2003)

*Tree Time*

Tree time is an abhorrant concept to arborists. It removes our egotistical contribution to the arboreal imperative. Our manifest destiny is to whittle away, removing any impediment to future tree growth.

Why, then, do ancient urban trees collapse? With the intensive aid we provide, especially with the application of our considerable expertise, a tree should become immortal. All of its physical and physiological needs are provided for by its benefactor, man.

When a small limb is removed becaused it is 'dying', are we allowing enough 'tree time' for callus formation to add to trunk taper? If the limb is left until 5 or 10 years have passed, the stub falls off, and wound closure occurs, then the cone of callus tissue forming the limb scar beefs up the trunk for the betterment of the tree. This 'scar' stores energy and has all kinds of other side benefits, to boot. The tree didn't need us for that at all.

When we get into preventive treatments or corrective pruning operations where it is obvious human intervention is beneficial, we can still feel good about what we do. But hindsight may just reveal our supposed 'advances' resulted in meddling for our own gratification & profit.


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## Gopher (Jan 14, 2003)

Great words, Oxman. Now I can tell my wife when I had a porr month that actually I am doing a better job of "listening" to the trees and leaving them be!  

Well, I've got a ton of willow to eradicate in the next couple of days, so even with sub zero temperatures, I'll bring home the bacon doing meanial labor.

And where we can't leave that limb to Ma Nature as to when it will fall off and land on the kid's head, there will be enough to keep us in milk.

Gopher

P.S. I didn't previously se the words about the passing of Mr. Britton. Sounds like a great guy to learn anything from is in a better place than we.


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## Guy Meilleur (Jan 15, 2003)

*Re: Tree Time*



> _Originally posted by Oxman
> 
> When a small limb is removed becaused it is 'dying', are we allowing enough 'tree time' for callus formation to add to trunk taper? If the limb is left until 5 or 10 years have passed, the stub falls off, and wound closure occurs, then the cone of callus tissue forming the limb scar beefs up the trunk for the betterment of the tree. This 'scar' stores energy and has all kinds of other side benefits, to boot. The tree didn't need us for that at all.
> 
> When we get into preventive treatments or corrective pruning operations where it is obvious human intervention is beneficial, we can still feel good about what we do. But hindsight may just reveal our supposed 'advances' resulted in meddling for our own gratification & profit. [/B]_


_

Mike, there's a compromise between meddling and waiting for natural processes: a more natural form of meddling.

Outside the first branch collar are often swollen rings of stem tissue creeping out the branch. If we look closely and cut to one of those, we allow the tree to form that cone of callus tissue or burl you describe.

The worst kind of meddling is the inflexible kind. If we're stuck on one "right" place to make the cut because "stubs are always bad", we take too much off and damage the tree. If we read the tree's natural targets, we anticipate nature and act as part of it.

And the more we act as part of nature, the more we earn the gratification we feel from what we do. As a climbing arborist par excellence, you should know that. THose who don't go into the trees can't understand as well. This talk about humans and nature being separate is false; we are part of it. The trick is to act like it._


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## Oxman (Jan 15, 2003)

ArboristSite is actually a mental gymnastics workout. Thanks for sweeping out some of the cobwebs. The rest of you, grab a broom! Welcome to our version of the video game that the Army distributes to its forces, and the general public. 

I'm not saying we are guessing. Since this forum is composed of thinking arborists, we have lattitude to make professional judgements. We are engaged in a discussion of splitting hairs, of which the exercise keeps us on our toes. 

This is a good group of arborists to come up with more instances of 'Tree Time'. Perhaps they can actually be compiled into a list of specifications of when to 'hold off' implementing treatments until the subsequent wound response has demarcated the boundary of cambial dieback. 

One instance that comes to mind is assessment following fire. Can't we really tell better how extensive the damage is if the stimulated dormant buds are allowed to pop the following spring? This delay could require the consulting arborist to keep the case file open for awhile. Yes, it pads the pockets, but, aren't these folks asking for the 'best available information & care' for their tree?

As we listen & compromise (as my illustrious contemporaries portend) between the need to expeditiously 'solve' a problem of excess gowth in need if removal, and the potential desireability of that growths' contribution to a certain anatomical portion of the plants metabolic structure, we are speeding up nature.

Let's keep the pedal off the metal.

By going too fast, we may be testing the mettle of the petal. 

(Sorry for the pun, mixed metaphors, etc., etc..)


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## John Paul Sanborn (Jan 15, 2003)

Glad your sticking around Guy!


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## FBerkel (Jan 15, 2003)

"Why, then, do ancient urban trees collapse? With the intensive aid we provide, especially with the application of our considerable expertise, a tree should become immortal. All of its physical and physiological needs are provided for by its benefactor, man."

Mike,

Your point is well taken. Another example would be in the case of storm damage occuring in the fall. Many customers request additional pruning (at this stressful time in the annual cycle). Probably better to give the tree a year or more to recoup energy. 

In some cases, though, our lack of "meddling" can lead to the same decaying result. e.g: dead branches that take 30 years to fall off, and not always at the wound-wood target. The amount of decay introduced by such would be much greater than if it had just been removed by one of us. Depends on the species. (don't take the meddle to the popple?)


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## Gopher (Jan 15, 2003)

*Tree-time extrordinaire*

By posing the questions, sometimes answering them ourselves, but always looking for the best solution for the tree will always benefit all involved.

Maybe to use a quip from an ad, "...We will serve no wine before it's time." (I believe it was Ernest & Julio Gallo), we should sell ourselves with, "We will cut no tree before it's time."

"A young man is so strong, so mad, so certain, and so lost.
He has everything and he is able to use nothing."
-Thomas Wolfe, Of Time and the River

Sounds like me, but I'm not so young...

Gopher


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## geofore (Jan 16, 2003)

*time*

Paul Masson ad, the best of their wine is still in the cellar.


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## TheTreeSpyder (Jan 16, 2003)

Excellent discussion, hope Wulke comes back and starts another!


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## Guy Meilleur (Jan 18, 2003)

> *
> 
> This is a good group of arborists to come up with more instances of 'Tree Time'. Perhaps they can actually be compiled into a list of specifications of when to 'hold off' implementing treatments until the subsequent wound response has demarcated the boundary of cambial dieback.
> 
> ...


Mike You'll see two good examples when you get back here to Ice-Land. On one Dunlap held off on taking a big lower branch back to the trunk even tho it was decaying. I saw Hypoxylon just outside the collar, thought hmm maybe it should come off now to lessen H's entry into the trunk then hmm maybe this 12" dia. 12' long stub can stay to see if more collar will form a la bw's "codit pruning" hypothesis. 
I decided to hold off for now since I KNOW I'll be back in a year.

Another hold-off on action was on a 30" Q. nigra trunk-damaged by fire. Tom D, jps and scarlata all concurred on waiting for the tree to show its response. 
A bigger factor for me in prolonging the project is not padding my pocket but keeping track so I'm SURE to re-check in a year. Even when customers are willing to pay, they too can forget about the need to followup.

Yes the presentation went well but cutting to nodes that aren't crotches still bothers even open-minded arborists. Despite citations that Shigo, Niklas, Schwarze, ANSI, etc etc condone the practice of cutting to nodes that aren't crotches (heading cuts), all "stubs" are evil in the eyes of those who don't re-look at the references once in a while. 

It's like my eqpt supplier tells me, when in doubt, read the directions! 

O and re John Britton I saw him just once, presenting root-collar checks at the ASCA conf in napa, 97 I think. Common sense, lack of pretension made him an excellent teacher and role model.
It's up to us to carry on.


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