[HRLand]

Tell me how many man hours you would expect to plant the following:

15 5-6' arborvitae nigra

10 3 gal. euonymus, manhattan

Soil condition was rocky.

[Stonehenge]

3

[Bill Schwab]

If it is rocky like out in Rancho Penasquitos, where for every shovel tip you try to get in the dirt, you only get about half way because there is a fist sized rock, with a jack hammer, to double dig the boxes, discard the spoils, and add amended soils, you have a day with 2 men.

If you use a reenforced auger with lots of Arrrr Arrrr Arrrr POWER, you cut that time in half, assuming you can get it in, and, the rock is not so heavy it restricts the thing from turning.

Most rock jobs we have have our exclusive rock clause, which reverts to T&M.

[HRLand]

I had 3 guys working on this yesterday and it took them about 4.5 hrs total. I expected more. Some days I just feel like firing everyone.

[HardDaysKnight]

Originally posted by HRLand
I had 3 guys working on this yesterday and it took them about 4.5 hrs total. I expected more. Some days I just feel like firing everyone.

That's 13.5 man hours. Not unreasonable and I bet you
made a decent buck. You also have to consider unloading
tools and trees etc., laying them out, and clean-up.

[Stonehenge]

About a week ago we planted 70+ 6-7' Arbs in 9 man-hours. The soils were an easy dig, but lugging the plants around a 5-6' tall berm where we had limited skidsteer access made it harder. 10 minutes per Arb seems pretty reasonable, and 3 minutes per #3 pot also seems reasonable.

[HRLand]

Originally posted by HardDaysKnight
That's 13.5 man hours. Not unreasonable and I bet you
made a decent buck. You also have to consider unloading
tools and trees etc., laying them out, and clean-up.

I took advantage of a rain day the day before. All arbs were set near thier spots. I brought the euonymus there and placed them that morning. All they had to do was plant 'em and mulch 'em. There was other work to be done that we ended up having to go back for today.

[VoodooChile]

Stone,
Please provide details about this planting: ball size, crew size, equipment used, access, time to transport materials to site and to planting location, etc.

70 6-7' trees in 9 man hours sounds impossible to me...

[Stonehenge]

Originally posted by VoodooChile
Stone,
Please provide details about this planting: ball size, crew size, equipment used, access, time to transport materials to site and to planting location, etc.

70 6-7' trees in 9 man hours sounds impossible to me...

Ball size - this was actually interesting...They were in 5 gallon pots, but they were B&B inside the 5 gallon pots (and the burlap was new). The rootball was right to the edges of the pot, so whatever that would be in diameter - 16",18",20"?

Crew size - 3

Equipment used - 1 Gehl 6635 SXT with bucket (no augers) to assist in transport, and to lift up to the top of the berm for the 150' of berm length we could access (the other 150' we had to take each Arb and carry it, by hand, along the top of the berm to it's new home). Shovels and rakes were also seeing heavy use.

Time to transport materials to site - 0 minutes, 0 seconds. Free delivery to the site for the size order we placed.

Access - kind of addressed in the 'equipment' question - it was a commercial property with a berm running down one side, but the berm was so steep and so close to the building and a/c units that we only had skid steer access for half of the berm. The other half we just lifted 4 Arbs in the bucket to the top of the berm as close as we could get to the building, then carried them one by one, by hand (couldn't run a wheelbarrow) to their location.

Planting location - top of berm.

Even though getting plants to site is a reasonable question, HRLand was only asking for planting time. But for us, because we got the materials delivered free of charge, the answer is the same either way.

7-8 minutes per Arb seems reasonable to me for planting time, if they're already on site. I was looking at RSMeans data and they call for a little better than 30 minutes per 5 gallon plant, and I can't imagine spending that much time.

Just a few days ago I saw a crew of 4 plant about 300 conifers in a day. Now they did have the benefit of a skidsteer with an auger, and all the trees were on site the day before, but not in their specific locations. The trees were 5-8', depending on species, and were spread further out than our planting, and they had full skidsteer access. I thought that was amazing. Sure, they were still pounding out the trees at 8pm, but it changed the whole development in a day.

I believe the rootballs for these trees were quite a bit larger than what we had, likely in the 24" range for most.

That's about 10 minutes per tree, which seems quicker than us for the work they had to do.

[treedoc1]

The 2 guys I send out to install this job had better be done and cleaned up before lunch (6 man hours) if locally grown, (4 man hours) if west coast. They had also better say thanks for the easy morning.

[HardDaysKnight]

Originally posted by HRLand
I took advantage of a rain day the day before. All arbs were set near thier spots. I brought the euonymus there and placed them that morning. All they had to do was plant 'em and mulch 'em. There was other work to be done that we ended up having to go back for today.

I don't know anymore. It always seems longer if you're not doing it and if you are doing it you think you cranked it out.
I'm saying it's not unreasonable(with rocky ground) and
we need to cut some slack now and then. These guys are not
bringing home what we do and we have to keep that in mind.
Also how hard the day before or the week was.
Cheer up HR, your boys did just fine. Have a good weekend!

Johnny

[Stonehenge]

Originally posted by HRLand
I took advantage of a rain day the day before. All arbs were set near thier spots. I brought the euonymus there and placed them that morning. All they had to do was plant 'em and mulch 'em. There was other work to be done that we ended up having to go back for today.

I think my foot would have been planted in their backsides under those circumstances. I have been known to tell my men that they need to leave their skirts at home.



Well, what I actually say is much worse than that....

You might want to consider giving them a similar assignment, leave the jobsite, then come back a few minutes later and hang out in a spot where they can't see you or the truck, and just watch what they do. I have blown my top a few times with what I found when I did that.

[HardDaysKnight]

Sometimes I say to the crew, "If I stayed here and supervised
and never got dirty this job would be completed in 3 1/2 hours.
I am going to pay you for 8hrs. Now make me proud of you.
5 hours later it looks incredible and they can't wait to see
my reaction. Sometimes we have to ease up and sometimes
suck it up and other times raise hell. Last year at a rocky
job it took me 15 minutes to plant a 2 gal. fountain grass and
5 minutes to cut it out of the plastic pot it was clinging to
for dear life. That's why I say I don't know. I get much better
results not cracking the whip but there are some who don't
have pride in thier work or even having a good job.

[jwholden]

Are we planting this stuff so it is going to live of sticking it in the ground and ignoring the callbacks?

[VoodooChile]

I'm with Johnny. I am in the trenches too often to expect my guys to bring 110% everyday to a $9/10 laborer job, or for things to always go as planned, bid or expected.