When we first meet, Chris Gibbons tells me he spent the past weekend in Quatsino Sound taking down a danger tree—a large fir next to the community centre, a fall hazard during high winds. He whips out his phone to show me a video. As the top 50-foot length of the tree topples safely to the ground, you hear a whoop of exhilaration. It’s clear that Chris Gibbons is a guy who really enjoys his work.
Early beginnings in the logging industry
Born on the Island, he became a logger at only 17, at a time when new hires got little training. As he describes it, “Somebody gave me a chainsaw and I just learned to run it. Then they dropped me off and said, ‘Fall everything that’s leaning towards the road until you catch up with us.’”
Despite this dodgy start, he kept working as a logger well into his thirties, during which he developed both his chainsaw skills and his understanding of trees. Then, after a stint as a construction worker, he replied to a Nanaimo-based arborist’s ad for a tree climber in urban forestry. He got the job.
Learning the craft of urban forestry
Again, he found himself learning by doing, but at least he got some direction this time: “They yelled at me what to do and what not to do,” he laughs. Here he gained a Spidey-sense about which ones needed attention: “I could see individual trees everywhere, dead tops, busted branches. . . .” He now knew how to take down trees of any size safely, and had started developing an eye for tree health and maintenance. Finally, he says, he’d found out what he wanted to do when he grew up.
Even as a kid, Gibbons had been a natural climber, with no fear of heights. When an opportunity appeared back in the bush, this time for a single-stem harvester, he took it and gained a name for himself as a big tree climber. “The highest I ever went in a tree was 55 metres [180 feet! – Ed.] in Loughborough Inlet,” he says.
Chris Gibbons Builds Oak and Stone
He’s now been an arborist for 24 years, the last five or so as his own boss. He started his company, Oak and Stone, during the pandemic and quickly found plenty of customers. “Don’t plant a Doug fir in a yard in Cumberland,” he says, telling me that the tiny seedlings kids bring home from grade school can become a menace if planted too close to a house’s foundations. There have been many heartbreaks over these particular removals.
While many trees do need to be cut down, he’ll sometimes talk clients out of taking unnecessary action. “If it’s a healthy tree, we can prune it.” He’s been known to rescue unwanted trees. His 60×60 yard is home to many such rescues, including a pink and purple hibiscus that’s survived ten years so far and a peach tree that, with a little cover and protection, yields delicious fruit. (He’s also been called in to rescue 17 helpless cats from trees in the Valley, so far, with just his climbing gear and a pillow case.)
Tree favorites and personal preferences
I believe Gibbons finds something to like about every tree, although he’s not that fond of hemlock (“they stink”) and cottonwoods (“sometimes when you cut into them they dump gallons of water into your lap”). He says Western red cedars are his favourite: “They’re soft and they smell amazing,” he says. “I like the way they look. And they’re almost impossible to fall out of.”
Seasonal work and evolving passion
In late winter and early spring, his customers keep him busy pruning fruit trees. Then comes hedge season. It’s a far cry from the danger and adrenaline of his days taking down massive trees, but as he’s aged, he says, “I started to develop a love for trees—maybe it’s more a love for the finesse of caring for them over a long period.”
He shares this love on his Facebook page through whimsical posts like: “Imagine being trusted to modify paradise.” He often uses the hashtag #monkeybusiness, a nod to his very apt last name: gibbons are tree-dwelling primates with exceptional climbing skills.
As I surmised when watching that video, he loves his job, which he says makes his mom happy. “And every year I learn something. I don’t know [in advance] what it’s going to be, but each day I am excited for what the trees will teach me.”
