When Louise Kirkbride sets off for work, she doesn't bother to check she has remembered her make-up and handbag before climbing into a sporty saloon.

Louise, 29, pictured at work, is more concerned that she hasn't forgotten her safety helmet, goggles, boots, karabiner, harness and ropes before she jumps into the cab of a mobile shredder.

This week she has spent her working hours chainsaw in hand, suspended 30ft up a horse chestnut tree.

Only a few weeks ago she was working with her partner in business and partner in life, former soldier John Webber, of Threshfield, dry stone walling.

Louise, a former student of Skipton Girls' High School, is a tree surgeon and dry-stone waller - the only female in the business in the Bradford area.

And she isn't your burly Charlie Dimmock-type either.

Heavy, physical work hauling millstone grit and limestone and manipulating a chain has kept her slim and in shape.

Her latest job involves felling four trees and crown-thinning two others in Cross Hills near Skipton.

"Felling a tree is a dangerous job. You're high up, roped on and handling a chainsaw. So you have to be extra careful."

John and Louise are both qualified in using chainsaws and in aerial rescue work.

"I'm always a bit nervous when I climb up, but once there and at work I forget about where I am.

"Unlike walling, this is very physical work. And it isn't over when the tree's down.

"We have to load all the logs into the shredder. It may be the easiest job but at the end of the day it's the most tedious because we want to get home."

Louise and John have been in business for about four years as drystone wallers, branching out (if you'll excuse the pun) into tree felling in the last two years.

"I don't know of any other woman doing this type of work. When people see me walling they think I'm a volunteer.

"When I told one of my former school friends what I did she just said 'Oh how lovely.'"

Last winter they spent weeks at Ribblehead building 400 metres of dry stone wall.

"That wasn't as physical as tree surgery, but it was tough. It was wet, cold and bleak. It wasn't just two pairs of gloves I needed but as many as I could get on," said Louise.

A geography graduate, she is pursuing the type of career she always wanted - working outside.

But when that feeling of envy creeps over her for we milksops behind our cosy office desks, all she needs do is look up at the spectacular countryside which is her workplace and she knows who should be envying whom.

Louise and John, trade as Webbers, Yorkshire Dales Tree Services on (01756) 752926 or 07729 062199.