08/10/2026
A reminder that you don't have to change your standards to get every job. Saturday morning on my way to Bardstown to assess a very old tree on a historic site, I stopped to do a pruning estimate. The lady has a pin oak and wanted the lowest five limbs of the tree all removed back to the trunk - the trunk was probably 14"-15" in diameter, and the limbs she wanted removed ranged from about 3" to 6" and all within about 24 vertical inches along the trunk. I explained why you wouldn't want to do such work due to the risk of decay starting in the wounds as the exposed wood dried out and cracked and instead explained how pruning the limbs would accomplish the same objective without the risk of decay in the trunk, but she was adamant she wanted it done anyway because the neighbors had done the same to their trees. The tree directly beside her property actually had a perfect visual representation of what I was explaining - a cut just like she wanted already showed signs of decaying wood right on the trunk well before the callous wood could cover the wound. Even after seeing this, she remained firm on wanting it done, so I said it was a pleasure meeting you, but my company isn't the one that will perform that kind of work.
Just because your neighbors get something done to their trees, it doesn't mean it was done properly. There are plenty of guys, and even companies, out there that will blindly do what someone asks them to do to their tree whether it's a best practice or not, but we aren't one of them. Sadly enough, I had another estimate today in that same neighborhood while waiting on the new throttle cable to come in for the truck, and I saw a company there and they had already skinned all those limbs off. The limbs removed were big enough to already have heart wood, so I would bet money on decay starting in those cuts. Sad.
