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I wrote a sentence in a report recently that initiated this article and video. Referring to a tree that was lion-tailed a bit severely:

“This practice maintains its prevalence because there is no barrier of entry into working with trees, nor are credentials earned or maintained by implementing proper practices.”

This sentence was unintentionally so concise and succinct that I wanted to dissect it. This sentence is a vehicle for saying there is a need for a reevaluation of how credentials are both perceived and utilized by the public and by arborists.

Lion-tailing

Firstly, when I say ‘lion-tailing’, I’m referring to anything similar to the style of pruning pictured in figure 1. A very common way big-arb and traditional tree companies prune trees. This style of pruning is lazy and uninformed, but we’ve all seen it before; its problems are well-defined and don’t need revisiting. Some offenses are more egregious than others, and they all come from a similar place too.

The attitude of this article also extends to any kind of overdose pruning; huge removal cuts, for example too.

No Barrier of Entry

Tree companies are always hiring laborers, and folks can just stumble into tree work. Tree work has to happen sometimes and people gotta work. A lot of people become ‘arborists’ in this way, and they emulate what they see. They see people removing all the interiors of crowns, all of this substandard tree work done, that’s what they think tree work is when you’re not killin’ em. They think this stuff must be good for trees, cuz why else would people be doin it? “To let some air through”, lol.

This is post-rationalization. Justifying why the work was done after the fact, not before. Trying to find the benefits of doing something after it’s already done, and only have done the work in the first place just to have something to do. Inventing reasons or explanations to make the decisions seem justified. Sometimes folks will just simply wave their credentials around to justify whatever it is they wanted to do to a tree on that day.

Credentials

There are arborists or trimmers who, when asked if they’re a ‘certified arborist’ say “yeah I’m an arborist”. A lie by omission sort of, because anyone can say they’re an arborist. Some irony here is that the people using the ‘certified arborist’ title falsely rely on the credential being highly esteemed, which, I argue, is not necessarily the case. If you have a chainsaw, you’re an arborist. If you work with trees, the public tends to think you’re an arborist. Though this trend is changing, admittedly.

I have to acknowledge there are many true arborists that enter into the field from this same path. But the right mindset has to be met with the right guidance at the right moment in order to produce a true arborist with good perspective and decision making.

For a lot of arborists, and the public too, the “gold standard” is becoming an ISA Certified Arborist.

People online will say don’t hire someone unless they’re “certified”. Some clients ask “you’re a certified arborist, right?” The CA is a good credential to understand trees at a base-line capacity through the lens of using them to make money with.

Look, I don’t want to be patronizing about this, because people having their CA is a good thing. Learning more about trees from anywhere is good. But it just is not the gold standard, it is the intro qualification. It just gets you in through the door. Being informed exclusively by industry material with clear bias towards working on trees guarantees being stuck at the door, too.

The public seems to think that a CA’s decisions are good because they have that credential. That they are beholden to some oath to do no intentional wrong to trees. I know a lot of arborists who have gotten this certification only for a pay raise; their allegiance lies with their paycheck, not in good outcomes for trees. The Certified Arborist credential does not equip arborists to advocate for trees, which, as you’ll see, is problematic for both homeowners and the few arborists wanting to do right by trees.

Implementing Proper Practices

Perhaps this commentary is an issue with many professional credentials, not just this industry’s main one. Qualify for the test, pay for it, pass it, they’re now a CA with some continuing education credits necessary to maintain the credential. Normal credential stuff.

There is no part earning the Certified Arborist credential that requires someone to prove they are upholding good practices. They must pass a test, test their basic logic. And that’s totally fine, because it is an intro-level certificate. And again, part of this problem lies with the misalignment of how this standard is perceived by the public (and arborists too), and what it actually is.

There is no one assessing the work. The credential is not contingent on one’s ability to implement, it is contingent on you showing up to earn CEU’s, which is sort of just how credentialing works. Which is not a very high bar to clear. ISA has incentives to make passing the CA easier too. It benefits them if more CA’s pay their dues annually and stuff, it is a big money maker for the organization.

This is problematic because a lot of Certified Arborists and tree cutters are working on trees don’t have a good grasp on their effects on trees if that credential is their zenith. Another layer to that is sometimes, with the post-rationalization industry brain, they think they’re doing good things to trees. And to triple-down on that, the public also thinks this is true too.

The reality is oftentimes, the thinking is “this is what I do to every tree”. Indiscriminate work done to trees is good for business, and bad for trees.

The work is only ever as good as the hand that cuts. Lots of companies advertise and flex they have a CA or a BCMA on staff and if you check out the trees they work on, you’d not be able to distinguish it for anyone else’s bad work.

I think it is more useful to look at BMP’s than the ISA CA. I don’t think there is a good synthesis between those two things, and the BMP’s are far more informative on what to do. But those are often for folks with agency to make decisions, and many in-field arborists are not doing that. Many of them just do their job as described on the work order, made by another so-called arborist further up the hierarchy.

An Anecdote from My Past

While I was working in a big-arb company, I was quite deep in study. While not running our own practice yet at that time, I could hit the books pretty hard (I miss doing that). The more I learned about tree science, about ecology, about nature, gradually it became quite apparent that what we were doing to trees, what we were selling to people, was so clearly not in theirs or their trees’ best interest.

And as far as that business was concerned, me knowing more was not in their best interest because Jack and I would unsell silly things sold to clients by the sales staff. We caught on to the game. We began offering them different solutions, and the clients were extremely grateful. They didn’t know they didn’t have to have insanely major and expensive tree surgery when minor reductions were enough. The salespeople were incentivized to make big sales, not advocate for trees.

Clients’ misplaced faith in these credentials makes it easy for companies to prey upon them.

Deviating

Professional arboriculture struggles sometimes to distinguish itself from tree guys because the space is such an unserious one. Everyone posts the same nonsense online, everyone prunes trees the same way, everyone dumps excessive pesticides in the name of “PHC”. Being a little hyperbolic here, but you get the idea.

There are good reasons to deviate from best management practices at times. However, tree companies regularly deviate from standards without even knowing it because they prioritize customer-satisfaction and revenue creation first and foremost.

The ‘customer is always right’ mentality is a slippery slope in tree work. I hear it all the time. “That’s what they wanted”. Bullshit.

The client is usually asking you for guidance, even if their language doesn't specifically say that. That's what they're asking, they're hiring a professional or so they think. Some arborists complain about not being able to do good work, yet comply when it is game time. If arborists can’t stand up for trees, there are important tools missing from their toolbox.

This is a symptom of the big arb production-oriented tree work paradigm. Thinking in sales terms and not tree terms; focusing on revenue outcomes for the business and not positive outcomes for the trees being worked on.

A company can have good arborists on staff, but it means nothing if good recommendations aren’t followed and executed properly in the field. Which is, again, the norm. Unfortunate for trees, tree owners, and arborists looking for fulfilling work.

So then, how does the public determine who is worthwhile?

During my time working for another company, having ISA credentials did not change how I worked with trees. It made it harder for me work in the big arb machine; I was expected to shut up and make the cuts. While I did not learn much about how to actually take care of trees from getting ISA credentials, to the public,

Having the Certified Arborist credential means something to some arborists. Although homeowners don’t quite understand what that credential actually signifies, they too think it means something. Ultimately, I question if it has a meaningful affect on outcomes for trees those people are working with, if those Certified Arborists are beholden to work orders that are not in the best interest of trees.

These credentials were originally intended to help the public find qualified arborists. Instead, they’re sort of used, intentionally or unintentionally, to convince the public that work done those who hold that credential is inherently good. Perhaps this is as much of a critique on how tree companies operate as it is of the ISA Certified Arborist certificate.

There are other credentials that exist, but ISA’s Certified Arborist certificate is the base-line, and therefore is where we look first, I suppose.

But how does the public sus out who is worthwhile and who isn’t? That’s a complicated question. Maybe some people are working on this problem right now. Maybe they’ll measure something else other than multiple-choice test taking. Maybe they’d have steeper requirements that are more specific and environmentally focused.

A peer-reviewed public-facing database that recognizes arborists who work in alignment with trees and nature. Arborists who are constantly striving for learning more about trees, about how their decisions affect the communities and ecosystems they live in. Yeah, that would be kind of cool. Maybe some people are working on that.