[Carl Russell]

😥

[Carl Russell]

I have yet to view the pdf…. even through the google doc.

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[Carl Russell]

Just a comment that I cannot avoid making…. This rant has nothing to do with the work you are doing George, just a treatise related to broad cultural assumptions about commercial logging, spurred by my reaction to your comment about trucking and paying stumpage.

Whether or not we are trucking or paying stumpage, paying attention to details like minimizing impact, and using techniques that may be complicated or time consuming to accomplish a specific end result, is in fact the point of draft animal powered forestry.

Just as on your land, or any work done on clients’ land, the stumpage value should reflect the cost/value of the work being done to deliver the residual stand in line with the long-term objectives.

Taking the time to use the appropriate techniques builds flexibility and functionality into any operation, and these will pay off many times, especially when these techniques can be used to augment the low ecological impact that is, at least in some part, one of our objectives for using horses to begin with.

Foresters and the forest industry have done a huge disservice to us by relying on economic incentive to convince people that forest management is good stewardship. There is no doubt value in forest resources, and anyone owning land should capitalize on that, but the convention that timber harvest is a source of income, rather than an investment in improving timber quality and protecting inherent natural value, has led to assumptions that the cost of harvesting workmanship is less valuable than the potential value of timber sold.

By using horses we have exceptional low-impact capability, but when we compromise that advantage to play the stumpage and production game, we have not advanced the practice of forest stewardship in the way animal power has the potential to do.

Rather than developing habits that overlook the subtle levels of restorative practices because the potential costs put us at competitive disadvantage, we should embrace them, and hold the resulting work in the high regard that it deserves. By showing how those added costs translate into better stewardship, stumpage values will become secondary to the results in the residual stand, and we can create harvesting fee structures that support the forestry practices.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

As nice as it is to go slow, and visit with neighbors, one thing that has always bothered me is that everybody thinks that because I am going slowly that somehow that means I have tons of time and can stop to talk. Some times I will be coming home from logging at a nearby wood lot, 1/2 to 1 mile away, and all I want to do is get home, unharnessed, and get a snack, and every other car going by slows down and stops to chat. I love people, and I am quite sociable, and yes I generally stop to share the time, but if I was in my truck, I know they would just wave.

Or I’ll be un hitching logs on a landing near the road, or raking hay in the field by the road, and someone will just roll up to pass the time, like I’m just lingering there waiting to talk with them. I know I am blessed with social opportunities that most modern folks miss out on, but it makes me wonder sometimes what these people think I am doing.

One time a couple from out of state pulled up as I was emerging from the woods on my way home. It was fall, and they somehow found themselves at the end of a dirt road. As I was waiting for them to turn around, or get out of my way they got out of the car with cameras. Wearing sweat pants and sunglasses they proceeded to ask me about my work and life with the horses. Just amazed that I would actually spend an entire day in the woods working with horses they asked if my life didn’t get boring sometimes just up here on this little dirt road….. I thought to myself, who’s bored? At least I’m not just driving around wearing sweat pants and interrupting people who have places to go.

Rant over, Carl

[Carl Russell]

Years ago I made regular trips into Randolpb with the wagon to pick up grain and groceries. 3.5 miles one way. I also really valued that sense of time that it really takes us to get from one place to another. If we didn’t have motor vehicles our lives would be filled with much more dense vicinity related experiences.

I used to work on a property on the Stock farm Road, about 6 miles from here… Back in the day before I had a good truck, or trailer, and I would load my wagon with tools and spend a few hours driving down there, work for a few weeks, then drive them back.

That was when I was so sure that the economy and energy systems were going to fail any minute. I was so committed to developing my transportation and motive power needs based entirely on horses….. Somehow they keep propping up this house of cards,and I have slowly broken down my resolve.

I really enjoyed those days. Somehow I will have to regain some of that. I sure do like my truck and trailer, but seem to spend a lot more time just running around.

Thanks Brad for jogging my memories..

Carl

[Carl Russell]

Yes George sometimes the situation is not ideal, and we just have to work through the mess. I was having a hard time visualizing what you were up against. I was just thinking that getting the end of the log up was the bigger issue. I have used my bobsled in some instances one log at a time to stabilize, to reduce effort, and to minimize soil impact….. however it does require site considerations (which I can only suggest at as I haven’t seen yours).

I have said many times that horse-logging is not about skidding logs with horses, it is about working horses in the woods. It is very difficult generally for us to shift our focus away from moving logs as our primary objective when in the woods with horses, but I have found that the low relative cost of using them allows for other objectives to rise to the top of the priority list. Thinking about ways to move logs over challenging terrain can become complicated when we try to make our every move most efficient to maximize harvesting production. However, if we look at this ground condition and think about long-term costs of repairing damage, or the continual added difficulty, then using the diversity and maneuverability of horses to the advantage will have lasting effect.

It will take more time to cut, position, and load the sled, or it may take more time to extend the contour slue-log skid trail around a different access, but I see those as being costs that make the long-term application of horses more effective.

This doesn’t answer specific questions, but generally describes my approach.

I agree with Brads illustrations about loading. I will sometimes drive the sled alongside the log, park it, unhitch the team and roll the log on, then re-hitch and pull the sled away. I try to break down the enterprise into steps, silviculture, felling, bucking, and skidding. Each step has priorities pertaining to its own genre. Each tree has different criteria to add to the decision-making. This is why I feel it is most important to have responsive horses as part of the mix, so that the appropriate decision can be made on a situation by situation basis.

Good luck, Carl

[Carl Russell]

Brad, there will be an article in the DAPNet NL. I hope to organize a summit Spring 2014 to get most us in one place to make some major progress, then in Fall 2014 we want to hold NE BWW, hopefully in cooperation with DAPNet.

It still seems like there is a lot of uncertainty among many about how we all will benefit from Draftwood, but getting on the same page about Biological Woodsmens practices will be an important first step. Draftwood is complicated to market in the best scenario, but it is nothing without authentic restorative forestry practices.

It also seems to me that our first market will be landowners who want the services of Biological Woodsmen because of the financial and ecological benefit that result from our work. We cannot be beholden on a potential premium return from the sale of source differentiated lumber for us to adopt restorative forestry practices. If we implement these practices as a standard of our operations, not just as a function of the preferences of landowners or their managing foresters, then our fee structures need to represent the level workmanship that will support this.

So, in the next few months I will be finding a location and convening a NE Draftwood(?) Summit somewhere in Central New England….

Carl
Carl

[Carl Russell]

George… staking the log in place is a big key, but it really won’t address big butts plowing… If it is that steep, use the bobsled…. I have used both my Barden cart and my higher style log cart on pretty steep slopes…. I have heard from others that they think the slope is too steep for such a device….. I’m sure that some land offers some pretty severe obstacles, but if it is that steep, I bet the logs would roll down better than being skidded… I have done that several times.

I truly believe that access issues can trump some silvicultural choices. If you have an access that is destructive, or hard to maintain, then consider not using it, or making some other compromises to develop access that can be more sustainable.

Good luck, Carl

[Carl Russell]

George, I have had good luck building semi permanent log water bars. I have attached a pic, but using a 6″-8″ log that extends across the trail. Dig down the soil to make a trench the size of the log and back-fill on the downhill side. The pic doesn’t show it, but I have used 2-3″ pegs cut from saplings to bracket the log on each side of the trail. The uphill side of the log needs to be carved down for a channel for water to run in.

These water bars will last pretty well during a harvest, but they can be pretty abrupt for wheeled vehicles. If the log is placed across the trail at the same angle as the slope on which it is placed, then water will run for the best effect, and you won’t hit both wheels at once.

I built many like this for years, and they are good for temporary devices during a harvesting season, but they really are inadequate for the long haul as they can fill in, and heavy rain events can jump them as they are only 6-8″ deep.

They take longer to build than the style that Brad has described, but you only need to kick out the loose dirt after a day of skidding, and they will outlast skidding logs. I use any species, pine, spruce, hemlock, or even hardwoods.

If the bump is too abrupt, and second log can be placed 4-6″ away, parallel, to make an open-topped box-culvert.

Simple to build, just takes a bit of time.

One rule of thumb in regard to slope and frequency of placement: Standing on one water bar looking up hill, level with your eyesight is the approximate location for the next water bar. The more the better. Once water gets in the trail it is a continual management problem.

I believe that one product of timber harvest should be improved access…. not the opposite, so whatever you can do before harvest starts will be time/money well spent.

Good luck, Carl

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[Carl Russell]

Well George, my laptop crashed so I am going to give a brief response with thumbs on my iPad.

I was most concerned about my blind mare. I didn’t want her to get taken advantage of…. It’s bad enough with the gelding. She can find her way around, and for the most part the other horse act as a herd for her, but. When they get foodie it can get a bit rough. The new mare is pretty bossie, but they all seem to hold their ground in a fight….with no significant injuries.

I just kept rotating them in and out of pasture. Her in the barn, them out, for about a week, then just let them work it out. Still some fireworks from time to time.

As far as working her….. She had been running away with folks before I got her. I generally just work in the moment with horses, watching how they are reacting, and manage my initiative accordingly, but I couldn’t escape being somewhat mindful of the info, so I held off on much working pressure for a while…. Maybe a month.

I just started with little bits of information, a push here, or there to see how she reacted… To the push, and to the release/reward. She seemed to catch on pretty quickly. I love seeing a horse that is untrusting and thinks they can get away with whatever begin to realize that I have something to offer…. I watch it sweep over them.

One day I decided I’d start hanging harness on her to see how she reacted, and to start fitting her. She was certainly agitated. I think it is clear she had some experience with inadequate leadership whenever the harness was put on. After a few days, the harness fit, and she was taking it with a lot more comfort, so I took her out to see how she would drive…..

Once again, anxiety. She tries to turn around on me, walked sideways, throwing her head all that…. So I just found a few instances where she did what I asked… A step… A whoa… A good turn… And I showed her how I reward that good response, and took her back to the barn…. Did that a few days….. The farther we got from the barn, the more nervous she got, so I didn’t hook to anything, but she dragged a whiffletree around pretty well.

A couple of days later I had hay on the ground so I hitched her with Ted and tedded some hay. She was pretty iffy about bit pressure,and the noisy equipment behind her, but by this time she was showing pretty good signs of trusting me and looking to me for guidance so we worked through it smoothly. This is when I saw the two horses trying to get used to each other… Even accommodating each other. By day three of tedding and raking they were both light on the bit, and still walking with good forward energy.

From there it has been a steady increase in functionality. Learning to lift heavier loads, standing quietly on whoa, and generally she is a great horse. I had a few logs down over a very steep bank and skidded them up about fifty foot climb at about 60% slope….. That got her thinking….. She was pretty soft, so I have been making sure to not over extend her.

Overall I have seen her steadily gain trust in me, and confidence in her own ability to perform as expected. I will be shoeing them all in the next few weeks. That should be a good exercise in communication,and helpful for skidding logs on these greasy trails.

Well my thumbs held out pretty well, Carl

[Carl Russell]

Jereon, I don’t argue with any of that…. lord knows that I would much rather run the new saws instead of the Mac 35 I learned on….. in 1971….. but you know, I still have that saw, and if I cleaned up the points, I bet I could still start it up…

My beef is that with all the improvements to make these saws better machines, they still skrimp on quality around the edges. I know that their markets are shrinking, and that most people don’t do what we do with saws, and they want to keep the prices down so the saws will sell, but I say sell us a saw for the cost of building something that is worth the investment.

I am just a small fish in a huge pond wishing that a really big fish would care what I think, but I am resigned to spending money on what I get, and trying to work with it. The really sad thing is that I cannot even count on continuity from one model change to the next. Once I make accommodations for some weakness that I have grown accustomed to, there will be a whole new set of inadequacies in the next saw I buy. Time was when you could buy something to replace what you have that would be the same or similar, so that the features you liked would still exist…… not so anymore.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

2.5 tons/cord and 2 cords/MBF or 5 tons/MBF 5 x $28/ton = $140/MBF or 2.5 x $28 = $ 70/cord at the mill…… means you’ll get $50/cd or $100/MBF or less to get the stuff to the landing. I leave as much as I can as it is a losing proposition…. takes value away from the logs you cut……

I don’t like to pull pulp that I can’t get at least 3 – 8 footers out of. If you can pull it out attached to the logs some folks say it just adds to the pot, but it still takes time to produce and handle it….. Good food for soil ecosystem in my mind. I love to see piles of coarse woody debris. Looks like a real forest to me.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

I can get a better sense from those pics. I have never used a sled set up with individual hooks for each horse, but had thought that was what it looked like. Puts much less stress on the pole and roll that way, but need some pretty stout horses to work individually like that. I suppose you could find some way to use a spread-chain to center the hitch, then attach an evener.

Funny how limiting photos can be. I can see a lot more of the sled now. I can see how the rear sled will track well enough to manage a plank body.

If you are on typical SE NH land, I would be inclined to use the sled double even when hauling logs. Loading is not that much more difficult than with just the front bunk, but it will travel a lot easier over moderate terrain when loaded, and you just need one good chain and binder to hold the logs down.

Les will have a good eye for the condition of the wood, and/or other fabrication improvements, as well as hitching insights. Don’t be hesitant to tap that resource……

Good luck, Carl

[Carl Russell]

So funny, I always use the compression release, and never have a problem starting my saws, Husky or Jonny.

I have yet to lay hands on an auto-tune.

As an old schooler who has been hand tuning and tearing saws apart for 30+ years this transition has been hard and slow. I used to be more miserly. Spend $5-750 on a saw, and I would keep that thing around for ever, squeezing every GD cent out of it……. but I’ll admit that I am slowly succumbing to the steady decline in workmanship, and foolish technological advancements.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

Joel, it is difficult to determine answers from photos sometimes. Also in this day and age of standardized fabrication it may not seem plausible, but it amazes me how designs differ so greatly even within regions.

I am pretty sure that the “U”-bolts are to attach planks for the bed that would reach back over the rear bunk….. which would require the front bunk to swivel.

I have found that a swing bunk can be problematic when loaded with logs as it can become unstable on turns. As the sled moves out from under the bunk, the weight of the load can tip the bunk similar to the old-style hay wagons with the axles that pivoted under a pin. This is especially true on sidling hills.

I have solved that by putting extra bolts/pins down through my bunks that can be removed when/if I want the bunk to swivel. Generally the attachment for a swing bunk is a large pin, not a bolt. With weight on, it is unlikely to bounce up and out.

As far as the chains, I am not certain that they are bridle chains. Any breaking chain I have ever seen has a mechanism that allows the chain to be undone when under extreme pressure. These would not work as such. In fact they actually look more like attachment chains that would be on the front of rear runners of sleds that had swing bunks fore and aft. Those chains would cross from the rear of one front runner to the front of the opposite rear sled runner so that sleds would track each other on turns.

I think you could easily use the front sled alone to move logs. The runners on the rear sled are too long to maneuver easily under load. I think there may have been a different rear sled that was used with a plank body. Most double-bunks that I have seen with plank bodies either had no reach, or had the reach attached directly into the front swing-bunk. I worry that the way this is attached the angles would not match up, putting pressure on planks and/or attachments.

I think this double set-up would probably work fine for logs, but it is interesting to me that the rear-sled bunk does not have stake pockets……

It all looks heavily built though… can’t hurt to play around with it…. remember it is more of an art than a science. Also wouldn’t hurt to get some insight from a few old-timers in your neighborhood.

It would be good to see a pic of the front-sled pole, roll, and attachments. You’ll want to make sure they are pretty rugged if you want to use it for bobbing logs.

Carl

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