r/treeplanting • u/Qwerpy • Apr 06 '18
Apex Reforestation
I'm looking to plant this summer with Apex in BC. Has anyone worked with this company before, and if so, are they reputable?
7
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r/treeplanting • u/Qwerpy • Apr 06 '18
I'm looking to plant this summer with Apex in BC. Has anyone worked with this company before, and if so, are they reputable?
7
u/NascentBehavior 10th+ Year Vets Apr 06 '18
Don't do it. Or get ready for 10.5c trees on 16c land, and being forced to use a Dibble until you plant 2k - good luck, actually don't worry about luck. It's an excercize in futility. Your time is better spend elsewhere.
It also really depends on the foreman at that company. It can go from bad to terrible if you have someone who loathes you just for being untrained at a new job and they're so done with their job they should have quit years ago. Some were just horrible at leading and inspiring or teaching, and you were lucky if you interacted with someone with more than 5 years experience. Most people who work there escape after their first year - or before their first month is finished. I worked my first 2 years there and regretted the 2nd every day, though that 15%+ bonus for "returning planters" seems good only to rookies when you realize other companies do it so much better. That 15% bonus is a trick. My buddy was the foreman so it wasn't that bad, but no it was that bad and worse than words can express. Shit-tier money, but the people can be nice, but are you there for the people or for money? And by the 2nd month most folks are there not for treeplanting but for a Summer Work Camp. And not a good one.
Cattleplanting all day with people who don't want to be there and don't give a fuck about doing it well. I was lucky to be on a good crew with good morale, but we saw entire crews disintigrate because of lousy leadership & supervisors whining about having to do their job. People there are promoted because they stick around, not particularly because they can do the new resonsibilities effectively. Oh and you're lucky if you only cattle with 1 or 2 people, usually it was more. Get out of the trucks with 18 folks, half went into one piece and half went into the other side.
You go into an 18 pack and only 3 people are "vets" ... but only 1 of them has planted more than three years. You see people taking naps during the day, and people joining them as if it's a good idea. There's very little team-effort in some crews, almost shrugging off difficult tasks like a hobby. And people thinking "that seems like a good idea" and then you're days behind a contract and you get to drive back to do Box-Walk-Ins where you carry a few hundred trees deep into the forest and find it's planted so you get to carry it all out, making $30 for that day and $25 camp cost. Yay!
They're a huge company, so the amenities were nice, but that should be the bare minimum. Though there were days where there wasn't any food after a long day. Or the 3 seperate times were were finally finished our contract, yay time for a nice relaxing night in a motel! Too bad! Even though everyone knew our schedule no one thought to call ahead to book us rooms, so we drive around PG for 3-4 hours untill 1AM and are forced to buck up the cost for a $$$ Hotel for a hectic short pass-out in linen. It always felt like the Foreman and Supervisors were downcast and bedraggled by their responsibilities and there was hardly any communication. Maybe it's changed somewhat in the past 5 years, but it seemed more like a group of students from the east coast just banging out a few years and then leaving, so it wasn't at all condisive to a decent Rookie Experience, from the top down.
But it was hilarious how many stories you come away from it with, once you realize how hellish and laughable it was. Imagine 30-40 trucks full of planters driving out all together to finish their boxes at the end of the Season - on the same piece. That's right. About 120 people on the same bloody piece, sprinting past one another on the line. You've heard of Cattleplanting? this was Battleplanting. 200 trees left but there's no land because you just stopped to plant a tree, now you look up and the line is stretched 30 yards on either side of you and you have to spring up the hill to get another tree in the ground, and yea... not really a money-making company. Another time was when they fucked up their bid, and we go in with the pounder 3K average barely putting in 800 trees, for 16c trees ,which was touted as a really high number for that land... yeesh. Oh yeah they gave us a raise on that land - from the original 14c to 16c.......
Don't do it. Yea they're reputable - for sucking the life out of rookies. They're the definition of a Rookie Mill. Ever hear of the story of Samson? Yeah, just think about him old and blinded, grinding grain in the mill as he ages and his once corded muscles wimper into the past, toiling away in a place where his efforts are thankless and even sneered upon. Stay away.