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Career Description

Using sophisticated climbing and rigging techniques, cut away dead or excess branches from trees or shrubs to maintain right-of-way for roads, sidewalks, or utilities, or to improve appearance, health, and value of tree. Prune or treat trees or shrubs using handsaws, hand pruners, clippers, and power pruners. Works off the ground in the tree canopy and may use truck-mounted lifts.

What Job Titles Tree Trimmers and Pruners Might Have

• Arborist
• Ground Worker
• Tree Climber
• Tree Trimmer

What Tree Trimmers and Pruners Do

• Supervise others engaged in tree trimming work and train lower-level employees.
• Operate boom trucks, loaders, stump chippers, brush chippers, tractors, power saws, trucks, sprayers, and other equipment and tools.
• Climb trees, using climbing hooks and belts, or climb ladders to gain access to work areas.
• Clean, sharpen, and lubricate tools and equipment.
• Cut away dead and excess branches from trees, or clear branches around power lines, using climbing equipment or buckets of extended truck booms, or chainsaws, hooks, handsaws, shears, and clippers.
• Trim, top, and reshape trees to achieve attractive shapes or to remove low-hanging branches.
• Prune, cut down, fertilize, and spray trees as directed by tree surgeons.
• Hoist tools and equipment to tree trimmers, and lower branches with ropes or block and tackle.
• Operate shredding and chipping equipment, and feed limbs and brush into the machines.
• Load debris and refuse onto trucks and haul it away for disposal.
• Inspect trees to determine if they have diseases or pest problems.
• Cable, brace, tie, bolt, stake, and guy trees and branches to provide support.
• Collect debris and refuse from tree trimming and removal operations into piles, using shovels, rakes or other tools.
• Provide information to the public regarding trees, such as advice on tree care.
• Clear sites, streets, and grounds of woody and herbaceous materials, such as tree stumps and fallen trees and limbs.
• Remove broken limbs from wires, using hooked extension poles.
• Trim jagged stumps, using saws or pruning shears.
• Transplant and remove trees and shrubs, and prepare trees for moving.
• Spray trees to treat diseased or unhealthy trees, including mixing chemicals and calibrating spray equipment.
• Plan and develop budgets for tree work, and estimate the monetary value of trees.
• Water, root-feed, and fertilize trees.
• Apply tar or other protective substances to cut surfaces to seal surfaces, and to protect them from fungi and insects.

What Tree Trimmers and Pruners Should Be Good At

• Control Precision - The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
• Reaction Time - The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
• Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
• Arm-Hand Steadiness - The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
• Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
• Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
• Manual Dexterity - The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
• Static Strength - The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
• Trunk Strength - The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without 'giving out' or fatiguing.

What Tree Trimmers and Pruners Should Be Interested In

• Realistic - Realistic occupations frequently involve work activities that include practical, hands-on problems and solutions. They often deal with plants, animals, and real-world materials like wood, tools, and machinery. Many of the occupations require working outside, and do not involve a lot of paperwork or working closely with others.

What Tree Trimmers and Pruners Need to Learn

• Mechanical - Knowledge of machines and tools, including their designs, uses, repair, and maintenance.
• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• Public Safety and Security - Knowledge of relevant equipment, policies, procedures, and strategies to promote effective local, state, or national security operations for the protection of people, data, property, and institutions.
• Transportation - Knowledge of principles and methods for moving people or goods by air, rail, sea, or road, including the relative costs and benefits.
• English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
• Biology - Knowledge of plant and animal organisms, their tissues, cells, functions, interdependencies, and interactions with each other and the environment.
• Education and Training - Knowledge of principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.