Wrong Tree

Once, we were called by the Director of Public Works to cut down a tree. The (assumed) home owner was tired of picking up sticks, and cleaning up the mess every time the wind blew. Although the tree was a Siberian Elm, it was still in pretty good shape, but since the Director called, we went ahead and removed the tree.

About a week latter, we found out the tree shouldn’t have been removed. The tree actually belonged to the neighbor of the person, who called to have the tree removed. Apparently, there was a neighbor feud going on, and when the actual tree owner left for vacation, the neighbor called to have the tree removed. I guess it really hit the fan when they returned, so trees are no longer removed by just a call-in.

Mike
 
first time my brother worked with me and another guy, we were told to prune a few trees at a house. supposed to take 3 hours (bid for 3 hours). we took four hours pruning (me and the other guy were experienced, 3+ yrs exp together) while my brother was hauling brush to the truck. we took the stump grinder instead of chipper. so after 4 hours of pruning, we figured we got everything. we got to the truck with brush piled up, we sawed it down to make more room... did this 3 times. we called the boss and apologized for it taking too long (5 hours after all said and done) and that we were leaving.
the next day, he got a call from the home owner saying we did not prune any of the trees.
boss went back the next day to "finish our job".
following day, he said that he went up there and "looked like you did nothing to the trees". said he spent 4 hours there pruning what we should have pruned. i told him that if there was THAT much to prune, why didn't we take the chipper so we could fit everything in the truck the first trip?
his reply- if you would have done your job properly, it all would have fit in the truck.
my reply- blame me if you want to, i just assumed when the truck was full and we could not put anymore in it, then that was enough pruning, but i guess it was a full day job that you bid for 3 hours. seems like shared fault, but apparently some people are willing to admit their fault
 
Hey Norm, how's it going, Bro! Yeah, you know us city workers, we aint happy unless we're complaining about something.

Well, gotta go now, it's break time. Can't miss my coffee and do-nuts.

Mike
 
I've had a few similiar "wrong tree" experiences during my utility career, but the one that stuck with me the most was the wayward spruce.

I was in the middle of taking down a small Sitka spruce in a customers front yard. I'll mention, there was freshly painted white picket fence around the entire property. The customer was present. It was a wreck job, without not much roping needed. Typical conifer, limb it up, top it out, chunk it down. Two groundies working below packing it all out. Everything going smooth. Pretty soon the guys neighbor who lived a couple hundred yards down the road walks over and yells up asking, "What the hell are you doing?" I explained. Then this neighbor fellow says quite coursely to me, "That tree belongs to me, Mister!" Oh, yeah. Seems the true property line cut a diagonal through one corner of the customers yard there. Oops! The customer knew it too and soon there began a very heated neighborly feud. Well, by that time the tree was beyond saving and so we finished taking it out.

Just goes to show, you never know.

Jerry B
 
I work at a Univercity on the grounds dept. Talking about verbal calls makes me laugh. Ito have had that happen and now I need to see my foreman point out the trees to be trimmed. All of this came by do to prunning some large branches out of the way for some roof work to be done. He came over and pointed to the building next to the one I am in. I looked down shaked my head, when I see a prof. looking at me through the window, Sorry about that wrong branches said in a proffesional manner, then to have a sence of humor I say like the view. To this day that prof. still talks about it and still talks to me with that tree as a part of his lectures on Bussinesse Management.
 
When I work in Milwaukee in the yearly days of my career. I went to a job with my ground man to reduce the height of two rows of Arborvitae's. The two rows were in a L shape in the clients back yard acting as a screen from his neighbors yards. The trees were about 35 feet tall, I read the photo copied work order and it said remove 4 feet to clear lines. So I started to work removing to 4 feet. I finally realized after 35 trees I was in deep s!#t. I'll never forget when my boss got to the job site. /forum/images/graemlins/bangtard.gif /forum/images/graemlins/argroo.gif
Luckly for me and my boss the client was understanding and all we had to do was replace 35 trees the were 6 feet tall.
It was a stupid mistake but one I will never forget. I always made sure I talked to the sales person before I left the shop.

Robert
 
my neighbor across the street had beautiful trees her husband had planted. one day a tree crew/lawn service showed up and severely overpruned all of them and installed cables in some. this was soon after her husband had passed on. she came home looking at her trees stunned!!! that's when a man showed up from the lawn serv. wanting promt payment!!! even though he knew he had the wrong house!!!
 
Ive pruned the wrong one before too. PIn oak, dead wood job. Trimmed it according to the work order the boss gave me. Homeowner came home and nothing was said until we were done. She came out and asked what we were doing and why. I told her and she said no one had ever called for the work. I then called the boss and he had written down the wrong street! The owner was understanding and didnt really care...she got a free trim job.
 
Today I was asking about this tree that had some lean to it do the winds we have had in the past. Leadman said oh it is gone I tookit down yesterday why he asks, well I said to him and pointed then what is that tree doing there. This coming from the guy who is in chrge of our crew and said to us I am never wrong and you all have to many questions.
I shook my head and walked away never wrong but took down the wrong tree. Heehee I ma removing it tomarrow when he starts his vac. I hat being the black sheep on the crew but I can make mistakes and learn from them. Cause I took down another tree today in the wrong place. 2 for mistakes 1 for my bosses sence of humor,0 for leadman.
 
Whoa cugd484, that's some post! I kinda like that whole stream of consciousness thing you've got going on there. Do VS. Due, To VS. Too... who cares? The point is, your narrative really puts the reader in the mindset of a man who cut down the wrong tree.
 
Well the whole deal is that we all make mistakes. Some choose to think it as oooopps well I will do my best to fix or rectify the situation. Others just place the blame and pass the lead off to some one else. Heck I can probabaly say this will not be the last I just hope it is.
 
I nominate Jason head of the Sarcastic Grammar Police. Now we know why he wears that ski mask; so his targets can't target him back.

cuq are they removing every leaning tree? That's nuts--you can mitigate leaning by pruning or guying.

One day a utility company supervisor saw a conifer with brown needles and ordered it cut. Later learned from the owner that it was a larch, doing its fall shedding thing.

Owner was polite about it, but the utility wound up paying him $3000. This was back in the 70's, when a dollar was a dollar. Shortly after, the utility started some basic dendrology training. Smart.
 
In my 31 yrs in the tree biz, I had two incidents...once I was pointing out the work order to the other crew guy (a rock climbing bud who I'd gotten to work with us for a while) He got mixed up and cut down a wrong tree. It was small, the boss prolly got off easy, I don't recall the details, it's been nearly 30 yrs.

Then, for my company, once I told Merle to cut a horse chestnut down. I casually pointed to it, and was nearby working on a tool or something when I heard him cutting. Took a second to realize he had cut the neighbor's tree. We had to replace it with the biggest tree we could wrestle to the spot, which was a 3 inch caliper so it was pretty heavy and cost a fair bit.

The worst was at a company for which I worked. I wasn't involved, but the boss's son was sent out to cut a white pine. He was nearing the top of a 70 footer when the customer (1 or two houses away) came home and asked Eric what he was doing in that tree. Big oops!! Though it was a poorly placed and less than optimal species, the damaged party took advantage of the mistake, and ended up getting quite a bit of fancy fence building done and what all else I don't remember.
 
No the tree had been left do to out of the way and not really in eyeshot. I was just doing some scouting for some possible climbing time off clock on campus and saw it. The tree had up rooted and was leaning, and was heading towards a spot of going over the bank towards the lake. Up here now it is detial time on the campus graduation is less than month away and everything and anything that can upset anyone has to be dealt with. Today did some pruning and temerary tying of limbs for a funtion in and open area where there will be over thousand people.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

New threads New posts

Back
Top Bottom