Pure Plant Health Care

[underwor]

How many of you actually practice Plant Health Care as originally designed? Inventory the site, map it, write an "owners manual" for each plant, soil type or microclimate, produce a plan to integrate tree, ornamental, floral and lawn care services for best management practices, monitor regularly and provide information on cultural alternatives before chemical or pruning.

In my travel and visits with very respectable companies the past few years, I have found that most advertise PHC departments, but provide the IPM service, which was a sales tool for the spray division. I am not suggesting they were ripping the customers off, but it definitely was not the total PHC program explained at the train the trainer meetings run by ISA and USFS about 8 years ago across the country.

Even the most professional companies have trouble marketing their knowledge on the same level as a doctor or lawyer, charging for information given rather than loads hauled or sprayed.

As an educator, who values knowledge as the basis of success, I would love to be involved in or made aware of a pure PHC program. It is depressing to dispense all these theoretical "best scenarios" and not have a single grad find a company that actually tries the whole program.

I was in private business for 12 years and know the bottom line counts, but I also know that other professionals pull this off. Why haven't we????

Bob Underwood, Associate Professor of Forestry, MSU-Bottineau

 

[Nickrosis]

Perhaps I'm merely an example of this ignorance, but I was unaware that that is the definition of Plant Health Care. To me, the definition has always been much broader - covering both treatment and analysis, all being part of PHC, but each considered PHC independently. I can't see the majority of homeowners in the world as being willing to pay for that kind of service, but there certainly are some out there.

I just finished proof-reading my dad's articles for his newsletter, the Urban Forest Newsletter, and read about his dream of someday having trees mapped out in a GIS-style format (computer-based Geographic Information Systems) for every client. With this model, pruning schedules could be calculated and recorded with PHC being an integral part of this.

Here at Stevens Point, we are planning such a process, but only because we are an institution with the last remaining slave labor force - students. Each tree will be placed on a five-year pruning cycle based on its location on campus. The condition of the tree will be noted along with other necessary individual information. When pruning time rolls around (when school is in session), the arborist looks up the GIS file and follows the directions.

My dad's dream, and that of myself and many others, is for this to begin to occur on commercial then residential properties. The bottom line is a limiting factor, but with technological advances occurring all the time, costs will continue to be driven down. Soon, I hope, your dream of all-encompassing plant health care will take place.

Nickrosis

 

[underwor]

I would like to amend my first paragraph to include "if a cultural alternative is available." Also we need to articulately explain all the options to the homeowner and help them determine the threshhold of injury (quality) beyond which they are going to be bothered by the condition affecting their tree. Some want it to stay relatively green, others want "human perfection" (I am not sure that botanic perfection ever exists, too many variables.)

We should be selling attractive, sustainable landscapes rather than big trucks, buckets, chainsaws (just look at the clip art in the yellow pages) and package deals (do they need the whole package, does the part they don't need adversely affect any other plant or animal in the environment). Doctors are selling good health and we are happy (willing??) to pay their fee when they tell us that we have achieved it on our own.

You woke me up again, you'll learn some day not to do that.

Bob Underwood