looking for hooks

[Reed]

Help!!!

I've spent all my money on ten years of oak wilt work - five years of trials located 150 miles apart and I can't stop treating the original test sites although I gave the label away - no longer starting new sites.

I worked as a climber for a S.C. island outfit doing removals over palaces (longleaf pines) and this work payed very well, but I'm back in Texas now doing hazardous oak removals (completely dead) in situations larger companies avoid. I like take-downs, they are simply black and white - no complicated explanations or nervous expectations of results. I charge quiet a bit less than competitive rates because I work by myself and it's not easy but there are tens of thousands of dying live oaks and many people simply cannot afford the standard industry costs. I refer the multiple trees on, and with independence I have low overhead with the state, although insurance rates chap my hide.

Because of the fanaticism involved here with wilt (too many cooks and PhD's clouding the reality of pathology), there is not a resource to locally purchase the gear I sadly lost in South Carolina - climbing spurs I realize are detrimental to healthy oaks in light of the transmission of wilt spores into open wounds but jeez, these oaks are dead. I'm a thirty year rope and saddle man, but at 46 years old I sadly miss my gaffs and many of these giants here are awsome and deadly, especially when I have to haul-up on my belt my 024 and sometimes my 044.

I've tried the eBay actions but always seem to miss-out by one bid - Bashlin gaffs are what I use for tall pines but I've had time with every make and style. What I'm looking for is a set of used spikes - and can not pay too much just right yet. There was a close friend who I lived with back east while working there and her medical bills set me back a few years - we both had bone marrow transplants but hers didn't go so well. What I didn't sell while there I lost from blood thirsty creditors. I do expect however to recover back to the days when I owe no bank or institution.

How about it anyone - a used set of spikes and I can pay by cashier's check and shipping - just can not send away for new ones just yet. I have four big jobs I'm delaying until I can climb a bit safer but these guys, when killed by wilt are susceptible to secondary fungal infections and rot extremely fast.

I'll check this board for a few days and keep trying eBay.

Thank you,
Reed Holt in Texas

 

[DDM]

Oak, I was on Ebay last nite and i know there were
atleast 10 Pair Going cheap.

Later,
David

 

[Reed]

Yeah, I saw 'em.........

Thanks David, caught 'em advertised but the problem's solved. Right now with the state of affairs here being what they are the difference between 50 bucks and 100 bucks is a big chasm for me - seems to be feast or famine a lot of the time.

Someone I know from several other arbor boards thru the years has sent me one of his old pairs - and it's a gesture I'm very thankful of. I'll get back on this deal some way or another - it's kind of like the way I lean my life and it's also going to help keep the costs of removals down for some old people who can not afford to have it done otherwise. Just because they can't afford it doesn't have to mean they can't have it done - wilt has killed millions of trees here and they certainly are not all out in the forests.

One day soon I should have all my stuff together again - but never on a scale too large to be independently worked and enjoyed, I'm getting too old to keep the nose on the grindstone for the benefit of bank payments on $150,000 worth of equipment, I wanna have fun doing this, I am having fun at doing this!!!!

note: check-out the bucket trucks coming onto Ebay, most are utility rigs without chip boxes but many are retired and well maintained, being sold by municipalities. I couldn't believe a 75 ft center mount HiRanger on a 12 year old ford 2.5 ton diesel would ever go for $12,000 but I saw one. There is always a lot of cheap stuff but I really couldn't visa-card the price of a fairly-new sets of spikes just right now and I have a few trees I will need them on real soon.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

From what I've seen most muni stuff is pretty well beat to pulp.

There are similar deals at T&L Trader.

 

[murphy4trees]

Brother Oak,
I've been reading some of your posts and hold you in high repect.
If I had a spair set of spikes I'd send them to you, N/C.
And I will give you a free bit of advice, instead.
RAISE YOUR PRICES
and keep raising them.
This is hard dangerous work that requires skill, intelligence, knowledge, experience, and brass blls from time to time.
It is painful for me to hear a man of your age and experience struggling to afford proper equipment. I gave away too much work myself for too many years.
We deserve more, our piece of the pie.
And I hear that you care about people that are having a hard time paying for tree removal. That's good.. take care of them, and find some that aren't. Hit them up. Replace the sruggle with joy and satisfaction at a job well done and well compensated.
Change the mind, and the outer experience will change to fit new thinking. We have all created our own glass ceilings and can move them up at will.
Enough preaching. I Am going to find a mirror and read this to myself... repeatedly.
Daniel

 

[Reed]

Murphy, thanks. I have always tacked-on additional (what I call "pucker factor") prices and fees for the customers that have "empire gates" leading to their properties. You know the type - they live on Seabrook and Kiawah Islands. This enables me to undercharge the old folks - and I'm pretty good at noticing little things that in our area designate "hidden wealth" - the kind many of our old German bitter-faced cheap-skates hide and complain always they never have enough money.

So many thousands of the dying oaks are however over homes of truely pension-living old timers. Not that I'm underbidding so much, or keeping the work away from other arborists (Davey or Asplunhd bids run up sometimes to $4,000 per tree), but I can piece away a takedown in a day or two while the more aggressive tree folks are so busy down the road - getting more than enough work. We have an epidemic here, plenty of work for all and more so. Kind of like a hurricane came through, but it's long-term, all this death going down.

Still, I know I'm too cheap. I did a bid last week on presidential trees (you know who) way east of here. Don't know yet if it was successful, but believe me, I'll stick it to 'em. It's suppossed to be privately funded but you know politicians - he'll most like get the PArk Service to pay out of our hard earned tax monies. Perks of office I reckon.

I used to operate on a successful scale on treatments for disease - but medical bills for a close friend zipped my hide a few shades short of crimson. Soon coming out from under that weight plus Tom Dunlap (bless his heart) sent me a pair of old but trusty (and a bit rusty) spikes that enabled me to do four giant take-downs over a house in time before rot set in - and a good enough invoice from it to get my truck back from the bankers here. If you're reading this Tom, I truely apologize for my no-show in Waco but I couldn't effect a phone call nor was allowed to communicate the three days I was generating a bid for the Federal project. From there I had to return to M.D. Anderson C.C. in Houston for some repair work on my t-cells (got anemic the last few weeks accidently). Always something.

But I assure you I will do some increasing on basic rates - a take-down this last week beat the bajesus out of my equipment, broke two log chains, snapped both my climbing and bull rope, ripped open three carabiners, dulled all the saw chains, and tore my rear bumper off the truck (giant lightning-killed pecan).

I'm returning to good health again, back to advocating alternative treatments for pest and disease control, and feeling a bit chipper about the future, unlike the past few years. Got many bids out and hopefully, would like to stage some sort of event that could afford to bring down all the shining and excellent independent arborists out there together in one spot at the same time. I feel terrible about not meeting Tom when it looked to cool that we could have gotten together in Waco.

Again, thanks Murph.

Reed