Weather!

[Cotreewhisperer]

It's snowing again today- no work.
What do you guys do when the weather is bad? I work for a couple small companies in the boulder,co area and when the weather is off (rain, snow wind) they dont work. One thing is that neither of these companies have bucket trucks, all climbing, so if conditions are wet or windy we dont work.
What do you think? Do people save certain work(stump grinding, mulching) for bad weather days, or do you just "suck it up"?

 

[Koa Man]

If it is raining where I am supposed to work before I leave the house, I don't work, or try to switch jobs to an area that is not raining. If it is raining all over the place, I stay home and catch up on paperwork or waste my time on this site.

If it rains after I start a job, I will almost always continue till I finish. A few times I did that and over 4 inches of rain fell in an 8 hour period. I see people giving us strange looks as they drive by.

 

[Stumper]

Koa's rain probably isn't cold. I guess that the guys in the Pacific NW get so much rain that they have to work in it. The majority of days here in Colorado are dry. The work can wait for decent weather-On the other hand I went out this morning and removed a couple of small elms despite the wet snow hanging on the leaves and blossoms everywhere. It is cold and gray but not actually raining so I'll grind some stumps and do a vertical mulching job after lunch.

 

[jamie]

work on

we work on, not had many days the weather has stopped us in 2 years....if it is tht bad we stay at the yard and fix things, do all the jobs that have built up.

jamie

 

[Ekka]

Here in Australia there is no award for this industry.

IF, and that's a big if.

The industry was under the Landscapers Award for pay and conditions (similar outdoor conditions) you would have to pay normal rate whilst waiting for rain to stop, minimum 4 hour pay for turning up, if the employee was happy to work in the rain with wet weather gear provided by the employer it would be 2.5X pay. If the worker was wet etc it would be 2.5X pay until he got home from the job site + laundry of clothes.

Besides it being dangerous it is unreasonable to expect people to work in poor conditions for the same amount of money.

As a boss I agree with KOA and suggest you "suck it up", it's just part of the puzzle with outdoors work. Days lost to bad weather are never recouped, everybody loses money unless you catch up on traditional days off (weekends etc).

If you have chosen an outdoor career with nature and believe you want to live by a man made calendar ... you'll be disappointed.

I used to have a saying ... we have our weekends on those rainy days.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I try to work seven days a week. Bad weather gives me all the time off I want. You gotta chase the weather!

 

[Tom Dunlap]

When it snows on the Front Range doesn't everyone go skiing?

Let me know and we'll go crank some turns on the next snow day!

Telemark-half the binding twice the fun

 

[Cotreewhisperer]

Tom sounds great! Its dumping here in littleton right now. A-Basin should be open for another couple monthes. Are you one of those free- heelers?

 

[clearance]

I don't care if it rains or freezes long as I got my plastic jesus hanging from the dashboard of my car......Someone out there must know the rest of this song..... hey there jesus, you'll have to go, your feking up my radio.... Is all I can remember. We don't stop unless it's too windy up here in the PNW.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Hahahaha.