Gaffing conifers while pruning

Here are my two-cents worth:

Okay, I guess you have a point with the Heron rookery... So I say, unless you have a contract for working in the Heron rookery, DON'T SPIKE UP TREES THAT AREN'T GOING TO BE REMOVED! The rest of this thread is tending toward self-serving rationalizations. You have to respect that the trees didn't ask you to climb them. Just accept the science and be professional. Accept that there are ethical issues with spiking and be respectful of the people who have used science to elevate this "job" into a profession that we can all be proud of. Be also respectful of those who care to get it right regardless of monetary gain or loss. Academia is a good in its own right. Recreational climbing should not be done if it can't be done without damaging the trees. Just quit it with the self-serving rationalizations already!

That's my opinion... nothing more or less.
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Self-serving rationalizations are a far cry from the reality of production arboriculture. Gord pointed out a great urban scenario in which he used the spurs to complete a job. While others will disagree with the practice, TRY and be pragmatic.

Ironically, Happyclimbing, the second you start introducing exeptions to never ever rules, the never ever part starts to seem a little weaker.

I am not an advocate for gaffing prunes, and never will be. Simply put, I would argue there is a time and place for their use on retention trees. The exception to BMP is an extremely rare situation, but it happens.

About SRT, I completely agree that it is the most ergonomic method of ascent, but spikes with a double tie in (choked SRT) provides a rapid method of ascent while retaining a similar level of safety...removals only of course.
 
I have a ton of respect for everyone on here, especially the PNW boys like Zeb and Will - I never stop learning, and don't mean to be self-serving with my examples. I will stop now and Zeb good luck with your case against these Dark Side climbers. I will catch up with you soon I'm sure.
 
Jedi I guess. Never spiked a prune but not willing to absolutely say "never". I'm mostly listening to the arguments and gleaning from them. Good stuff goin' on here. I've never been involved in large scale storm clean up. But, I've heard of guys spiking ice covered trees to free hung up trees. What say you all about this?

Hey this is fun. Next I suggest we discuss topping
......hehehe.
 
I remember the bad old days of the early nineties when nobody owned a throwline. We used to spike everything. We even gaffed some of your mothers, if that's what we thought they wanted. A young Bill Clinton had just come into office and everything seemed possible . . .

Things are different now. We all know more about the effects of spurs on tree health. But we don't always get to dictate the economics and practice of pruning for every tree or stand of trees. Gord illustrates this point well. Without worrying about rookeries or any other kind of bird, he points out that sometimes you have to butcher at top speed, the way you're directed, or you have to reduce tops on the edge of a forest to protect the crop.

If a rule is absolute, it doesn't require a reminder. Nobody tells you to obey gravity before you leave the house. This debate is more interesting if you admit there are still bad situations or economic interests that dictate less than ideal practices, and then discuss from there.

My company never spurs a pruning job, but we also get to tell crazy customers and aholes to go f*ck themselves when they start acting weird.
 
all of us need to push for more public education. getting the info about proper tree care out there. the people who just do this job because its a source of income will usually not usually be soo enthusiastic about public teaching. those like me who have a passion and live to be an arborist will go out of our way to teach people with a smile and help them to pass the info along. anyone have any ideas of how we can teach the public more about tree health and pruning practices?
 
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. . . those like me who have a passion and live to be an arborist will go out of our way to teach people . . .

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This might be coming on a bit strong?
 
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. . . those like me who have a passion and live to be an arborist will go out of our way to teach people . . .

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This might be coming on a bit strong?

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Right; most adults don't think they need no teachin'. Ya gotta sneak it in there.

Economics dictating ethics--there gotta be limits there.
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nothing new around here...biggest outfit around here with All the certs and accred still tolerates their climbers to spike anything bigger than a redbud...I've heard first account of city foresters nearly throwing them out of there cities....

Same co's owner told me once the TCC's are a waste and he sees not benefit for his co.....Yea i guess unless you wanted them to progress then you wouldn't....
 
Right; most adults don't think they need no teachin'. Ya gotta sneak it in there.

And not that hard to do, really.

"Here is my proposal for the service we discussed Ma'am/Sir. I should tell you that I've based these prices on rope access only. Meaning we won't be climbing with spurs which will create those unsightly holes all up and down the trunk. When considering other bids, you should ask if they are based on rope access only."

This is usually enough to get a discussion going, and you can turn it from the unsightliness of holes to the science of holes.

Northwind
 
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I remember the bad old days of the early nineties when nobody owned a throwline. We used to spike everything. We even gaffed some of your mothers, if that's what we thought they wanted. A young Bill Clinton had just come into office and everything seemed possible . . .

Things are different now. We all know more about the effects of spurs on tree health.

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My spikes retired to the removal kit in the middle years of Reagan presidency. Even before that I knew that spiking was bad. It took a while to shed the 'Evil Tom' practices.
 
Spiking trees is mostly an aesthetics issue. If a few gaff marks are going to kill a tree then so will a few pruning cuts. I think it more depends on the customer and what they want. They type of tree and thickness of bark make a difference in how aesthetically unpleasing a gaff mark will look. A lot of customers don't want to pay for the extra time to spurless climb. Not saying that spur climbing is always faster, but a good majority of the time it is. This time gap between spurs and spurless has narrowed a lot in the last decade with newer gear that is now readily available.

As for the safety issue between the two; can anyone explain how being tied into a crotch is safer than being tied into the main bole of the tree. Not saying the spurless climbing techniques are unsafe. It's just hard for me to picture how its safer than spur climbing.
 
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Spiking trees is mostly an aesthetics issue. If a few gaff marks are going to kill a tree then so will a few pruning cuts. I think it more depends on the customer and what they want. They type of tree and thickness of bark make a difference in how aesthetically unpleasing a gaff mark will look. A lot of customers don't want to pay for the extra time to spurless climb. Not saying that spur climbing is always faster, but a good majority of the time it is. This time gap between spurs and spurless has narrowed a lot in the last decade with newer gear that is now readily available.

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Hi Fingers,

There is plenty of evidence that gaffs cause wounds to the trunk of the tree (A New Tree Biology, p 556) Proper pruning of a tree will place the pruning wound away from the trunk in the case of thinning and pruning at branch ends, as opposed to lion's tailing, and at branch collars where a natural protection zone is located. Gaffs penetrate directly into the trunk wood where there is no branch protection zone. IMO someone willing to spike up a tree is not going to be concerned about the quality and quantity of their "pruning" cuts.

Do you really want the customer who is unwilling to pay for proper tree care? Like Guy pointed out, should economics dictate ethics?

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As for the safety issue between the two; can anyone explain how being tied into a crotch is safer than being tied into the main bole of the tree.

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A lot of spur climbers are not "tied in" but only on flipline and spurs. They can fall down the trunk if they gaff out or fall to the ground if there flipline fails. Plenty of accidents have occurred this way. Whichever way you are climbing, you should have a means to be doubly tied when performing a cut.
 
that is a major issue here in hawaii. " customers dont wanna pay for the rope access" well why offer spike climbing then? i dont for pruning. imo thats stupid to offer spike climbing for cheaper. customers are always going to try to get the cheapest rates they can so if the low baller is a spiker they are going to more then likely use the spiker. offering rope access only is not expensive if you are a good climber. i am crown thinning and cleaning a 40 foot tall by 60 foot wide ficus tree today and am using my ropes to climb. i bid the job out at $600. the spiker who tried to low ball me $400. thats way to low and he was telling the customer he was gonna take off HUGE branches that imo is unnecessary. i got the job becuase im not taking off huge branches that will dramatically change the trees shape, i can accomplish the same goal through thinning, im not risking sunburn issues from removing HUGE amounts of foliage at one time. the reason the low baler said huge branches was becuase he cant access the outter branches like i can do.
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heres what i think about spiking. it takes more time to prune a tree with spikes on, one its more dangerous, two it causes all kinds of problems with insect and disease infestations and three, ropes allow you to access the trees branch tips better and allows you to have more mobility and better efficiency in the tree.
 
absolutely .. anyone that thinks its faster to spike a tree to prune it has never seen a good climber move through a canopy... IMO the real threat to the tree from spiking comes from the stress created as the tree has to compatmentalize so many areas on the main stem, causing a disruption in the flow of vital fluids..

back in the day before all these new diseases were killing everything in sight, we'd roll up on dead oaks that showed no good reason for their demise, other than the old gaffing scars.
 
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Two pages ago I asked about phellogen, but that fell on deaf ears. Phellogen is cork cambium, living tissues in the bark that are vulnerable to infection by wounding by spikes. So when you say you are tiptoeing and you say your spikes aren't entering cambium, think...how do you know this? Sounds like "...but I didn't inhale"
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How many young climbers have read A New Tree Biology?

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I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that the folks advocating using gaffs on pruning jobs have not. Call me crazy.
 
As one who started out on the good side of the force and walked briefly down the path of the dark side, I think that spiking up trees feels "dark."

However, like me, there is redemption through the light side, no matter how much of a hack you have been. Reject the temptation of easy and do the right thing.
 
wow! i got on this site to maybe learn some stuff and talk trees..all I got from this very long thread was 2 things. 1. The sad stero-type of tree climbers being egocentric, self gratifying, "look at me"s is still true for some. "Teach don't Preach" 2. As a man that grew up in a small logging community in the Pacific Northwest, I know what a "educated practice vs. economic stability" discussion looks like, and I do believe you'd get your kicked for talking down to people in that neighborhood...
 
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