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Wrote off climbing spikes for pruning after 12 years, then a guy named Dale in Portland changed my mind
I have always been the guy who says spikes belong on removals and nowhere else. Spikes wound the tree, that is what I learned in my first year and I stuck with it for over a decade. Then two weeks ago I was on a job in Portland with a climber named Dale who is 58 and has been in trees since he was 19. We were doing crown cleanings on a row of old maples, and he strapped on spikes for the whole thing. I gave him a hard time about it. He just laughed and said "son, I have spiked more maples than you have climbed, and none of them died." He explained that on certain species with thick bark and fast compartmentalization, the wounds close up in one season and the tree never even notices. He also pointed out that gaffing in and out with the lanyard is way safer and faster for him than fighting a throwline on a windy day. I still think spikes on thin barked stuff like beech is a bad idea, but I have been rethinking my blanket rule. Now I want to actually track wound closure on a couple test trees instead of just repeating what I was taught. Has anyone here done real long term follow up on spike wounds, or do we all just parrot the same line?
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mason.drew15d ago
Wait, Dale is 58 and climbing trees since 19? That is 39 years in the canopy, and he is still gaffing out on maples like it is no big deal. The part that gets me is the wind thing, I have spent way too many afternoons fighting a throwline in a gust while some old timer just spikes up and gets it done. Maybe the blanket rule was never the point, maybe it is just easier to teach a hard line to a nineteen year old.
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