What do you call someone who does tree work?

Arbolists are professionals who care for trees and other woody plants. Certified arborists are equipped to offer planting, pruning, transplanting, fertilizing, insect and disease monitoring and treatment, and tree removal. People who cut down trees are called arbolists. They are also known by the names of tree surgeon or tree doctor.

Arbolists also perform a number of other tasks besides cutting down trees, such as tree pruning, risk assessments, tree inspections, and arborist reports. An arborist, or tree surgeon, grows, manages and studies trees and shrubs to improve the health and safety of individual plants. Work can range from pruning, planting and climbing trees with ropes and harnesses, to working in an office with reports and queries. They specialize in pruning, pruning and removing trees.

Landscapers take care of lawns, shrubs, gardening and light tree pruning. The two professions overlap, but they are not the same. The management of shade trees like the ones we have on the streets of our city is the work of an arborist. Both jobs may overlap, depending on the company providing the tree services, and both jobs require extensive knowledge and experience in working with trees.

Many in the business don't make tree conservation or general health a priority, but instead cut what they think is damaged or sick or what the owner tells them to cut. Chemicals can be applied to trees for insect or disease control by application to soil, stem injections, or spraying. Arbolists may be hired by a member of a dispute to identify factual information about trees useful to that member of the dispute, or they may be hired as expert witnesses who provide unbiased scientific knowledge in a court case. After all this, an arborist can do what an arborist does and much more, working as the real tree doctor.

Two of those works, tree surgeons and arbolists, are often called interchangeably, but in reality they are very different. It may be helpful to point out that a certified arborist doesn't necessarily cost you more for tree removal or any other tree care than “a guy on the road who simply cuts trees. If you love watching a plant grow and thrive, then you will be well prepared for this career in tree care. One of the most important things home and business owners need to consider when hiring a tree service company is whether the company is properly insured and licensed.

The protagonist of Italo Calvino's novel The Baron of Trees lives life on the ground as a child and spends the rest of his life swinging from tree to tree in the Italian countryside. The problem is that although they call themselves “surgeons,” arboreal surgeons don't require formal education or certification. Finding someone who cuts trees near you is as easy as searching for “tree services + your city. While some aspects of this work are done on the ground or in an office, much of it is done by arborists who perform tree services and who climb trees with ropes, harnesses and other equipment.

To earn ISA certification, you must complete ISA training, complete ISA tests, and have worked full-time tree tending for three or more years. There are many respectable and experienced tree surgeons, but there are also many without the necessary knowledge to protect and save a tree.