Culbert & Sons Tree Care is an outstanding second-generation, family-run business based in Ballinasloe, County Galway, boasting over four decades of experience of arboriculture. We caught up with Seamus Culbert to get an insight into the continued success of this exceptional operation, which provides a full range of tree surgery services.
An A-rated, ESB-approved contractor with vast experience in all areas of tree care, Culbert & Sons offer unrivalled, expert services to private, domestic, semi-state and commercial customers working in a variety of different industries and sectors.
Specialists in working from either hoists and harnesses, their fully-trained and efficient team take genuine pride in the outstanding quality of work provided, offering professionalism and safety as well as value for money across an extensive range of services from tree felling, dismantling and pruning to hedge cutting, hedge removal, dangerous tree removal, wood chipping, stump grinding, site clearance, crown lifting, tree reports and consultations, equipment hire and forestry maintenance.
Needless to say, a 24-hour emergency service is provided 365 days of the year.
Taking on myriad projects on a small, medium and large scale, Culbert & Sons Tree Care have developed an outstanding reputation, based on high quality workmanship, compliance to Health & Safety and their willingness to go that extra mile to get the job done.
Operating across the west of Ireland and throughout the midlands, they benefit from a high level of repeat business through customer satisfaction as well as continuously picking up work from positive referrals and word of mouth.
Every team member is fully-insured, -trained and vastly-experienced as well as being trained in tree climbing – an area of skill that many tree care companies tend to neglect. This particular skill means that Culbert & Sons don’t rely solely on machines to get the job done … rather, they are fully-trained in accessing trees that machines simply cannot reach.
By providing services of an exceptionally-high standard at reasonable rates, Culbert & Sons Tree Care is renowned as one of the premier tree care contactors not just in the West but on the island as a whole. The directors of the business are James and Rachel Culbert, whose sons David and Seamus oversee day-to-day activities.
James recently celebrated his 60th birthday and the team at Culbert & Sons Tree Care all want to send him their best wishes!
Reflecting on the genesis of the family business, Seamus notes: “My father has been cutting hedges since 1975. He started off with a McConnel PA93 hedge cutter and Hydrocut saw machine both mounted onto the same tractor – a Ford 5000 – and he was one of the first in the country to have that set-up.
“In the mid-90s he started to work for a tree surgeon and served his time before deciding to set up his own tree care business in ’04 as he had previous history cutting timber for ESB Networks and there was a market here in this area for this kind of work between the County Councils and the ESB.”
“As well as my parents, myself and David, we also have one other full-time members of staff – Alan Corbett– in addition to a couple of part-time workers who help out with some of the bigger jobs.”
Operating anywhere within 90 minutes of Ballinasloe grants Culbert & Sons Tree Care access to a vast catchment area in the West and midlands including Galway, Tipperary, Roscommon, Offaly, etc.
“We’ve been working with the ESB and County Councils since we started as well as Bord n Mona,” Seamus continues. “We’ve recently started to work for the OPW, when we were contracted to take care of large dangerous trees on the Dunkellin River Drainage Project in Craughwell, County Galway.”
The nature of tree care services these days is such that practically nothing goes to waste. “We mulch a lot of it and we also have contracts with furniture manufacturers to take some of the larger timber from us, while some of it also goes to firewood.”
Emergency / urgent call-outs are a big part of the business. “We do a lot of dangerous tree removal and you can be called out for that any time, day or night. The dangerous tree could be situated close to utility wires or structures and the priority is to take it down as quickly and safely as possible once we’ve surveyed it and checked its health and structure.”
Every effort is made to keep trees in the ground if at all possible. “Wherever possible, we will leave it where it’s situated and do a reduction,” Seamus confirms. “We don’t like to remove a tree unless absolutely necessary. From an environmental point of view, it’s always nice to leave mature trees standing if you can. Unfortunately, down through the years, a lot of them have been removed where a light reduction would have sufficed.
“We also carry out a lot of domestic work on private properties as well as verge maintenance and dangerous tree removal for Bord na Mona. Maintaining clear visibility at junctions and crossings and around road signs and street lights is a big part of it, particularly at this time of year. You get up to three-and-a-half foot of growth during the season, so it’s a busy time of year for us, as is the winter when you are more likely to have storm damage.”
In order to guarantee the best-possible level of service, a great deal of time and money have been invested in personnel and equipment down through the years. All operatives are City & Guilds NPTC qualified and Seamus spent two years at Caple Manor College in Enfield, London, where chainsaw, tree climbing and tractor-mounted disc saw courses were amongst the specialist areas studied.
Machinery-wise, Culbert & Sons Tree Care run a superb fleet, including a 75ft narrow-access Teupen Leo 23GT cherry picker that can fit through a 6×3 doorway as well as a 52-foot, 4WD all-terrain vehicle, Valtra T130 tractor with a Moffett Bushmaster saw machine mounted and two wood chippers – 9” and 12. There are also two Land Rover Defenders, specially kitted out for tree work.
Everything is maintained in pristine condition. “If you buy the right equipment, you will get a lot of time out of it,” says Seamus. “We do all our own maintenance and focus on preventative maintenance – once you keep the moving parts greased and have regular service intervals, there’s not a lot that can go wrong, especially when the lads are all fully-trained.”
Of course, training and concentration are paramount as this is a highly dangerous line of work. “You have to have your wits about you all the time,” Seamus agrees. “You will suffer for a lapse in concentration or a slip-up because if an incident takes place it will more than likely be a severe one. We are currently rated at No.3 by the ESB for safety and we place a major emphasis on Health & Safety and training standards.”
Going forward, Seamus predicts that domestic work will continue to account for an increasing percentage of overall activities. “We’ll continue to concentrate on the domestic sector as well as the work for semi-state bodies. We have never been as busy with domestic work as we are now. The ESB used to account for around 90% of our work but it’s now 50% domestic.”
The black market is one of the biggest challenges facing compliant, above-board tree care specialists who have invested greatly in making sure they are doing everything by the book. “When somebody is hiring in a tree care contractor, the onus is on them to make sure they are using somebody who is fully-insured and –qualified and with the right machinery to do the job safely.
“Insurance is another big problem and that’s one of our biggest overheads at the moment,” Seamus concludes. “We have 0% claims and have had no incidents or accidents but insurance is rising all the time. It’s more than doubled over the past three years and it’s the same with public liability as well. You’d be hoping that the Government might do something about the spiralling cost of insurance before some of the smaller businesses are forced to close down over it.”
Culbert & Sons Tree Care,
Ardraigue Killimor,
Ballinasloe,
County Galway.
Tel: 086 1204038
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.culbertandsonstreecare.com
Taken from Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 5 No 5, July/August 2017
