Old Tree Removal
 

A crew of just two guys were here for three days to remove two large dying Maple trees.

One guy ran the bucket truck to cut the branches down. The other guy fed the branches into a wood chipper and trailer. Then they loaded the big branches into a trailer with a skid steer.

What surprised me was....before they started cutting the limbs, they laid down a bunch of 4X6 ft X 1 inch rubber truck bed mats. They circled the tree with the mats and eliminated almost all the divots from the falling limbs.....nice work.
The total price for the two trees removed and cleaned up was $1500


Before they started.
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1726343813.jpg


The tree trimmed of all smaller branches.
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1726343911.jpg


Done....the stump grinder will be here next week.
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1726344018.jpg

Was this one of the guys?

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^^^ lol
The guy in the bucket truck had meat hooks that scared me.

He could run the chain saw with one hand and catch and guide the cut limbs with the other hand to the right place. And some of the limbs were the size of my thigh.

^^^ I should have hired her.
She could have done the whole thing with that saw.

Tree fellas, I thought there were only two.

$1,500. That's a bargain. Around here they charge a lot more than that.

^^^ Yes, I thought the same.
Two guys for three days, fuel for the trucks and saws, insurance and vehicle costs....not much left after that.

When they were done, I gave the guy a check and a $50 bill (which wasn't much) for the work. He said "thanks...Jim was just saying how hungry he was"
I wish I would have made that a $100

Don't pick a fight with any of the guys who work on hillsides below log decks.

Arborists are fun to watch.

[QUOTE=Superman;12321237]Don't pick a fight with any of the guys who work on hillsides below log decks.

Or those with tobacco juice drooling into their beard. :D

Around here that would have easily cost $6000

^^^ And the strange thing is...I never called them for the work.

I was outside one evening and a pick-up rolled into my driveway. A guy got out and said "I see you have a tree that is needing removal" "I can do that"
I told him I have two and showed him the other one. He said he would do both for $1500

I said "Do it"

$1500 is a deal. The pads that they put down sound like the mats that they sell here at tractor supply, 4'x6'x3/4" mats that I believe are made of recycled tire rubber. Heavy, and tough, $50 each.

^^^ Yes from TSC
He had taken a recip saw to them and cut out two handholds on each end for ease of handling.
They are heavy.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1311450170.jpg

^^^

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1311711885.jpg

Yeah, the girl with the "pasties" and silicone upgrades isn't worried about gawking or finding it odd or unusual.

Whoa. This thread took a turn.

.

Tree guys can charge from 1x to 4x ... it just depends ;)

You got a deal ....

I charge 10x :D

I had a gigantic (40” diameter at shoulder height) basswood (Linden) tree removed and ground up. Before they did the work i asked to see their insurance and bond paperwork.

It’s always a good idea per my lawyer.

When he made the last cut at the base of the tree, it was the large 10 or 12 foot section. He cut straight around it and then used the bucket to tip it over.
I was in the house watching (50 or 60 feet away) and it shook the house!

That is a great price today. When I was young, we (Dad and I) would have cut those down for you for free (by hand with a crosscut saw and/or axe and no bucket truck) if we got the wood for firewood. We would have cut the limbs by axe after it fell. We split wood into rails or firewood with a wedge and a hammer/maul. Sometimes made rough beams for small barn-building. That is a big job. Not too bad to cut trees out in the open (nothing to hit when it fell). Probably would have taken a week to get it done and hauled away.

I cut quite a few trees like that these days (most are a bit smaller trunk but much taller) on my properties...and a couple of years ago, some really big ones that fell on my house in a storm. That was a huge job as it was on a very steep hill, and I could get no equipment or truck in (had to carry wood/limbs out by hand for quite a distance). If I could have found someone reasonably, I would pay for the work and haul (as I do not burn wood and just end up hauling/dragging it into the woods to waste/rot). That job would have cost quite a bit more here too.

I had a pretty big tree in the yard of one of my rental homes (very close to the house) about 15 years ago. The best estimate was $1200. A fellow Pelican (that was doing a renovation on the home for me) did it for his hourly rate (total was $400). I imagine he used the wood since he had to haul it away.

Since you found a reasonable contractor, I'd also have him remove that tree (pine?) surrounding the wires........

^^^ Yeah, I thought about that after they started. I'm thinking the Spruce might fill out a little better with the big Maple gone.
It probably should be taken out.

The little tree with the green protector around it is a Mulberry tree. It will only get about 10 ft high and have berries.

As a teen in the 60's my brother and I were nosing around in our G'pa's shed and noticed his 2 man crosscut saw used for felling large trees.
We took it out in the woods and tried to cut a tree down....tried. It was all work and exhausting to get halfway thru a med sized tree and we gave up.
My father said it was nothing to go out and cut trees all day long. How times have changed.

We did it all day when building fences. Pretty much daylight to dark. Fit it in between planting and harvest (and school).

We would find the closest tall black locust trees (to where we were building) and saw one down. Remove the limbs with an axe and use the saw to cut it into 8 ft sections. They were hundreds of pounds. Then, if we had a horse or mule at the time, rig it up and drag the log to where they were needed. Then do another. When we had enough for the job, we would start splitting them with wedges and a very large hammer.

If we had no horse/mule, then we split them on the spot and carried them to the field. I carried the wood that was not right for fencing to home or to where we could access with a pickup truck where possible... and it was sawed up with a similar saw into pieces that could be split for firewood.

I got a real summer job when I was 13 or 14 and was a lot less help...and added an afterschool job at 15...so was not able to help out nearly as much. The graduated and left home after turning 17. It must have been hard on my father. We raised our own food and harvested firewood for heating.

My father bought a secondhand chainsaw before I left home...but it was as hard to use as the crosscut for us as we really did not know what we were doing, it was very dull, and it was hard to keep it running (knew little or nothing about small engines). Yep...we were pretty poor and backwards. But, it sure made the rest of the world/life/work seem pretty easy.

When did someone do research that found those other photos? I don't recall ever seing those.

^^^ one click search....roof girl

The original Tree Girl:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1726509862.jpg

^^^
I remember watching the Tarzan tv show every week...silly but good.


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http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1726538351.jpg

^^^ Search on this forum. :)
(Although, it could be her.)

That’s a smart move with the rubber mats. I had some tree work done last fall, and the crew used a similar approach to protect my lawn from damage. They removed a couple of large pine trees, and I was worried about the mess they’d leave behind. But they laid down plywood around the base to catch falling branches, and it made a huge difference.

Finally had the stump grinder guy show up this morning.
He rolled in at 8:30 with the grinder and his teenage nephew.
At 9:00...he was loaded up and gone!

The grinder was on tracks and had a double wheel cutter.
He measured the stump first at 5ft dia. and said the charge will be $300
I thought that was a very fair price.

Three pics....the stump before he arrived, him running the grinder, and when finished.
Couldn't get a closer pic of the grinder working, the kid was there to make sure no one got close. (flying pebbles and rocks)

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1728156638.jpg


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1728156691.jpg


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1728156760.jpg

$300 seems like a very fair price.... I would have asked for $3K... at least!

They call me $tumpy :D

Soon after he left, I started digging the mixed dirt and shredded root out. The mixture has to be one of the worst things to shovel. Can't foot drive a shovel in, a garden rake works to loosen each shovel full.
I counted 9 wheelbarrows full and I'm almost done with that. I'll get a few yards of top-soil on Monday to finish the job. (plus seeding)