Tractors and wood! Show your pics

[WinterDeere]

I already know a few suppliers, as we got bids a few years back on harvesting out a few hundred cords of tornado damage at a property I help to manage. So I'd call those companies first.

And I don't care that much about the cost. I'm not paying double for one over the other, but $100 one way or the other isn't a huge deal, in the grand scheme of things. I just want to make sure I'm getting straight logs of good quality, preferably higher BTU woods, and nothing badly-infested with pests or disease. I suspect that I'd have trouble spotting some of those issues before the truck is already half unloaded in my front yard.

I guess I'll also need to figure out a good staging area, which might actually be in the street, as we're near the end of a cul de sac. My wood processing area is way at the back of the property, not really accessible by a logging truck, and the front yard is kept too pretty to be dumping 8 cords at a time there. Setting the logs on ashphalt in one corner of the cul de sac, and then forking them into my own 7k# trailer for transport back to my processing area, might be the best option to minimize damage out front.

 

[arrow]

For the first time in at least a decade, I’m out of logs! I usually always have a backlog of 15 foot saw logs, at least 5 - 15 cords worth, but I just worked through all of my 2024 and 2025 felling.

I'd normally be making some calls and getting the trailer ready to go fetch more, but I've been so busy recently that I'm thinking about just ordering a log truck. Never done that before, I've always harvested my own (10 - 15 cords per year), but I'm familiar with the process. Not sure how to find the hauler who will actually bring me primo oak and hickory, not just crap walnut, ash, and soft maple... they all say "mixed hardwoods".

I'll burn ash, soft maple, and walnut when they fall in my own yard, just to make them go away. But I don't like the idea of hauling or paying for that stuff. I normally burn about 80% oak and 20% hickory, but lately everyone is trying to get rid of miles of long over-ripened EAB damaged ash.

I’m in the same boat.
Always harvested my own stuff.
Now I live differently by the shore line, but I still burn wood.
My problem is that this property is only 2 acres instead of 100 and like you, the bulk of it is not accessible to a log truck. Lots of ash here as well.
They get about $1100 here for seven cord load but stipulation of types of wood is difficult much like you’re running into.
I have to develop a place where this truck can unload however and on this confined space, it’s difficult.

 

[WinterDeere]

One thing I need to figure out, is a way to more-gently set logs down into my closed-side trailer. Here's the trailer:



Out in the field, I use that winch to drag logs onto the trailer, and it works great. But if I'm having 8 cords dropped in my cul de sac, it'd be much faster and less intrusive to the few neighbors sharing the street with me, if I could just fork-lift the logs into the trailer.

The trouble is that I don't want to be just dropping them onto the trailer from the height of the sides. Having some way to set them down gently seems to be in order.

I have a third channel running out to the end of the loader arm, usually used for plow tilt or grapple, but I'm wondering if I could rig a small hydraulic winch onto the hitch receiver socket on my pallet fork frame, such that I could run a strap around the logs and use the winch to slowly lower them down the tilted forks into the bed of the trailer while reaching over the sides.

 

[John_Mc]

The trouble is that I don't want to be just dropping them onto the trailer from the height of the sides. Having some way to set them down gently seems to be in order.

I have a third channel running out to the end of the loader arm, usually used for plow tilt or grapple, but I'm wondering if I could rig a small hydraulic winch onto the hitch receiver socket on my pallet fork frame, such that I could run a strap around the logs and use the winch to slowly lower them down the tilted forks into the bed of the trailer while reaching over the sides.

You mentioned a grapple. You can't use that to set the logs in over the side of your trailer? I've used my forestry grapple to load a lot of wood on trailers that way.

 

[Gordon Gould]

As John said - a grapple will set them down easy over the side rails.

gg

 

[shooterdon]

WinterDeere, I use my grapple to load logs into the bed of the F250. The other option is to add something like Sawyer Rob uses on his pallet forks.

 

[dodge man]

You can use a chain to lower them onto your trailer. It’s almost a two person job though. You pick it up, it’s not balanced, move the chain a little and so on until you get the log balanced enough to pick it up and on the trailer.

 

[Billrog]

One thing I need to figure out, is a way to more-gently set logs down into my closed-side trailer. Here's the trailer:

View attachment 3885403

Out in the field, I use that winch to drag logs onto the trailer, and it works great. But if I'm having 8 cords dropped in my cul de sac, it'd be much faster and less intrusive to the few neighbors sharing the street with me, if I could just fork-lift the logs into the trailer.

The trouble is that I don't want to be just dropping them onto the trailer from the height of the sides. Having some way to set them down gently seems to be in order.

I have a third channel running out to the end of the loader arm, usually used for plow tilt or grapple, but I'm wondering if I could rig a small hydraulic winch onto the hitch receiver socket on my pallet fork frame, such that I could run a strap around the logs and use the winch to slowly lower them down the tilted forks into the bed of the trailer while reaching over the sides.

View attachment 3885406

Set one end one the trailer and winch them in while holding the tail end up with the tractor.

 

[LouNY]

Many of those log trucks will be using a grapple to unload, so at least the first load could be loaded directly to your trailer.

 

[WinterDeere]

Yeah, a grapple would do it. I've been avoiding buying one, just because of storage space and the PITA of getting it on/off my pallet forks. I use the pallet forks almost daily, for other chores.

But maybe that is the best solution.