How Perspectives of Field
Arborists and Tree Climbers
are Useful for Understanding
and Managing Urban Forests
by Adrina C. Bardekjian, MFC, PhD – As published on The Nature of
Cities on March 24, 2016
When there is a storm, trees can cause damage to homes,
cars, and people—ultimately, the tree itself is a casualty of a storm.
At these moments, generally, the public perceives arborists as the
heroes of storms—arborists remove the "problem" from their prop-
erties. But at most other times during the year, when people see an
arborist pruning or removing a tree, they perceive them negatively.
Throughout my doctoral research (2015), several narratives
emerged from interviews conducted with field arborists and
climbers across Southern Ontario, Canada—one of those stories
was that public perception of arborists seems to change with
the seasons or variances in weather. The arborists I interviewed
considered themselves to be environmentalists and nurturers
of the urban forest—general public opinion often contrasted this
image with stereotypes that arborists mainly perform removals,
or harm trees.
My interviewees raised the issue that they can be either glorified
or vilified, depending on the season and whether there is a storm
involved. When the public perceived them negatively, participants
felt undervalued given their integral role in urban forest manage-
ment and maintenance; this story is latent with power dynamics.
As one participant noted, "We can do so much damage" (not just
to trees, but to ourselves). Field arborists and climbers hold the
power to physically shape the urban forest canopy of the future.
Their awareness of their position and, often, the modesty with
which they perform their roles, has earned my utmost respect.
One interesting story revolved around the notion that nature has
its own agency and trees should be valued as living organisms
for their own merits, not solely for the services they provide to
humans. This was particularly true for large trees. One of my inter-
viewees asserted: "You don't really know how big a tree is until it's
lying on the ground, vulnerable, exposed and, at that point, dead.
Then you truly appreciate its majesty even if you don't understand
its worth." There is an interesting paradox in the conceptions of
the public between the veneration and appreciation of large, older,
heritage trees and the lack of attention for smaller seedlings.
Within the subject of agency, par-
ticipants included stories about
decay and defenses and how vul-
nerability is a factor in preser-
vation and management efforts.
Climbers and grounds crews con-
tinually negotiate their positions
according to the size and spe-
cies with which they are work-
ing on a given day. Species type