Pics From The Logging Site This Week

[Gordon Gould]

Here are some small scale logging pictures of my site from this week. It is timber stand improvement work. I am cutting over mature balsam fir which has butt rot so that new growth can start in the sunny opening. Some times I loose quite a bit off the butt log. All the slash will protect the new growth and rot down to provide nutrients.

 

[dex3361]

Makes me want to go out and cut some logs up. :thumbsup:

 

[Chilly807]

Looks good Gordon.. makes me wish for some cold weather to freeze the ground so I can start cutting my firewood. The land I cut my wood on isn't exactly swampy, but it's soft until the frost gets in it. Your snatch block looks very similar to mine, they make hauling out a lot easier. Did you see the ones that automatically release when the log gets to them? I wanted one, but the price was ridiculous, around $300 I think. I ended up building a plain one, even the simple commercial version of the one I have was overpriced.

Do you cut your stumps down lower when you're finished with an area?

Sean

 

[Grandad4]

Nice photos, Gordon. You make me envious. Beautiful timber and cold weather to work in! We've done some clearing of a few acres in front of our church this fall, but I've not had any time to work on our own property. Still all kinds of deadfall, leaners and still standing dead pine. All nasty stuff. It will look so much better if I live long enough to get it thinned out. Thanks for sharing.

Sean, I swallowed hard and bought one of those self-releasing snatch blocks. It's the cat's meow if you're working solo, as I often must do.

 

[Rock knocker]

Ick, butt rot.

 

[MIKE R]

Looks good. I feel I should go and cut some trees. I'll wait till this storm passes then I will have some to clean up in the sugar bush and a good reason to get the chainsaw out.

 

[Gordon Gould]

Do you cut your stumps down lower when you're finished with an area?

Sean

I cut these a little higher than normal hoping to be above the worst of the rot for better hinge wood. The pictures are on the down hill side too making them look even higher. Sometimes I will go back and recut the real high ones. But even if they were flush to the ground I couldn't drive my tractor down in there. It is steeper and rougher than it looks. I like to keep the tractor on the road.

I know what you mean about the price of releasing snatch blocks. I make a lot of extra trips up and down the hill because I don't have one though.

 

[20 20]

Thanks for sharing. Is any of the wood going to be milled, I understand there is bottom/butt rot but is any of the wood further up the tree any good. I have milled many trees like this and it is surprising how much board feet can still be used? What caused the rot, around here we are having a horrible time with pine boring beetles?

 

[Gordon Gould]

Thanks for sharing. Is any of the wood going to be milled, I understand there is bottom/butt rot but is any of the wood further up the tree any good. I have milled many trees like this and it is surprising how much board feet can still be used? What caused the rot, around here we are having a horrible time with pine boring beetles?

Yes I sell it to a local mill. I skid out whatever I can make a saw log or pallet log out of. Every thing else I just cut so it lays close to the ground and let it rot. I load my truck with 10 and 12 foot logs and an occasional 14 footer. A typical load is 500 board feet like the picture from a couple weeks ago.

I don't know what causes the rot. But any fir around here older than about 60 or 70 years has it. They grow to good size in that time if they are not crowded. But if they dont have room they get stunted. That is one reason I am opening this area up.

Here is a picture of that big tree from last summer when I put the spur trail in. You can see how crowded the woods are behind it compared to the picture of it above laying on the ground all limbed out.

 

[arrow]

Thanks Gordon…my favorite kind of pictures. Your butt rot can be caused by a couple of things but it is mostly armillaria fungus lesions. This is a fungus that has been measured to be the largest living thing on the planet. It sends up little tendrils into the tree base looking for carbohydrates and begins to literally "suck" the life out of a tree base.

 

[20 20]

Nice lookin load of logs, sounds like you have a good system

 

[Adiredneck]

We're waiting for a little snow and colder weather before we start winching. Nice pictures. Stay safe.

 

[john_bud]

All the land I bought had already been logged flat, so I'm still waiting and watching! Good to see you safely and successfully dropping them!

 

[Chilly807]

I've never had much luck with fir around here, at least not with balsam fir. Generally by the time they're big enough to cut for logs they're starting to die out. Spruce seems to be a much hardier local softwood, as is juniper or hemlock.

Same deal here with the weather. I need some frost in the ground and some snow preferably before I start cutting anything.

Sean

 

[crazyal]

My Beech has the same butt rot problem. It amazes me just how far rotted the butt can get and yet still have a healthy canopy. All I have for softwood is Hemlock over here. Usually just leave it alone since it's not large enough to mess with and there's not enough of it. Alwys fun looking at pictures.

 

[creekbend]

I enjoyed the pictures. Thanks for posting.

 

[Thomas]

Good clean operation..keep the updates coming.

 

[Gordon Gould]

When you look at a just logged site it is hard to see it as improvement. But for a working forest and for wildlife habitat diversity it really is. Leaving all that slash lay looks a pretty messy for a while but it is a real magnet for wild life. Every morning I see fresh deer tracks where they have browsed thru the fresh slash and the place is loaded with rabbit tracks. They love fir. In the summer it will be rodents, hawks and more. To me this is the most ecologically sound way to leave a logging site. Our forest soils are already depleted enough. Might as well leave as much as you can for replenishment. Most of the nutrients are in the limbwood and tops. Here are some photos of a similar cut I did two years ago in Oct 2010. The last two are taken from the same spot two years apart. The first is how I left it, the second is this fall two years later. It already looks better and there are a lot of new seedlings started if you could see down in close to the ground.