[Tim Harrigan]

Seems to be working. Now start working on ‘dance’, ‘roll over’, ‘lay down’, ‘sit’, and eventually ‘pull’. I am sure they are mighty impressed by the horse hay.

[Tim Harrigan]

It’s a hollow feeling, John. Sorry about your loss. T

[Tim Harrigan]

They are all different in my experience. Don’t hurry, do a lot of looking, a lot of thinking. They can be dangerous. Like Brad said, when you are cutting in tight quarters it can be tough to get the tree moving enough to push through the canopy. I have been amazed sometimes how little contact it takes to keep a tree upright, even with a pretty good lean. If it is on the stump, first I plunge through the hinge leaving the corners, then I set a couple of wedges and nip the corners to free the tree. If I can roll it off with a peavey I usually try that first if the tree is not too big. I always put the face cut wedge on the ground to catch the tree and hope the butt does not get planted if the ground is not frozen. Sometimes if you can roll it and drop it off the stump it will get some momentum and pull free, sometimes not. Like Brad said, a rolling hitch will usually get it moving if too big for the peavey. If the butt gets planted it will be hard if not impossible to pull with the team unless you dig it out and maybe rig a two part line or something to gain an advantage. If it drops and does not plant it might not be too hard to pull if it is at a good, low angle and on firm or frozen ground.

You also have to have a good assessment of how it is hung. Sometimes they will slide out easy, sometimes they seem to lock together. When I had Will and Abe they could stretch it out and sometimes the butt would lift right off the ground until the top snapped out. That probably won’t happen with Will alone. A few times, if I thought they were too dangerous or I did not think we could pull them, I just left them and came back with a tractor and long chain, whatever it took. Sometimes I have just walked them down in 6 ft pieces, not a great way to save a nice log.

One thing I was thinking that has to do with Brad’s comment about sliding it over the top of the stump. Takes special caution for sure but if you can get it moving maybe you can get it to lay out more before the butt hits the ground and has a chance to plant. I was thinking that if I have a situation where a hang-up is likely I might try making the back cut below the face rather than above so I don’t have a stump shot that the log needs to ride over. Might help, not sure, and there is a good reason to have a stump shot anyway. If the ground is frozen that can prevent the problem of planting the butt, but there has not been a single day this year where the ground froze to that depth here.

I could avoid some hang-ups if I was not so determined to minimize residual damage to the stand and just dropped them where I knew they would fall, but that’s the way it goes. One thing about them, they are always interesting.

[Tim Harrigan]

Thats not me, just found that video on the web. I agree, good cutter.

[Tim Harrigan]

@mitchmaine 32600 wrote:

George, tim,
Do you mean this conversation couldn’t have existed 100 years ago because of the lack of a computer? Back then This conversation wouldn’t have even been necessary…

Mitch, I think we are following the faint trail of conversations and conversions that have gone on again and again over the years. The problem is there are not many around who share the interest and expertise. Not in my area, anyway. So DAP provides a way to connect and find others with shared interest. For the most part, we are not the innovators.

I think George was referring to the spatial or geographic scale of the discussions. We are not neighbors geographically, and that is how the discussions would have occurred in the past.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Does’ Leap 32590 wrote:

…It is amazing to think that this “conversation” on this scale could not have happened even 20 years ago…

It is amazing, even 10 years ago I am not sure if it could have happened, certainly not with the speed that we see in some of these conversations.

I am indebted to Andy for digging up an article on sled and stone boat draft that I wrote with some folks at Tillers based on some work we did about 10 years ago. I had not looked at that work in several years and now when I look at it I find the introductory paragraphs explaining the motivation for the work to be more important to me than perhaps the work itself.

In writing a series of articles on implement draft, we at Tillers International are seeking to improve the relationship of people with their working animals. We are committed to easing the burden of animals as they help meet the energy needs of small farms.

If we lack an understanding of what we ask of our animals, we have limited means of knowing why they may act up in particular ways. If a teamster mistakenly thinks a load is light, he or she may become overly demanding. Underestimating a load may lead to a heavy whip and frustrate the animals into becoming nervous and unpredictable. Repeatedly overloading a team will discourage them and reduce their willingness to pull. Our goal is to enhance the teamster’s ability to match the power of the team with the demand of the load.

Estimating a load will take a little practice and attention. But you will be rewarded with a more productive relationship with your animals. They trust us to attend to such details and their trust grows as we demonstrate our trustworthiness to them. Those who have not worked oxen or draft horses may think this overestimates their perceptiveness and memory; nonetheless, experience clearly teaches the perceptive teamster that oxen and horses develop differing levels of trust and respect for variations among drivers. There are real benefits to be gained by understanding the loads you are asking your animals to move. Tillers hopes this article will help all teamsters empathize with the tasks they are presenting to their animals.

Now, with the benefit of hindsight, I can see how this philosophy has always provided guidance in my approach and interaction with my animals, and more recently in many of the discussions on DAP.com that I have been able to contribute to, particularly the times when folks were having trouble working through behavior or training problems, and in particular the need to ‘listen’ to your animals and attend to the details of the work and the relationship. So in looking back, with only three or four years experience with working animals at the time, I did not really know where this craft was going to take me, but now I can see that it was a path to higher ground. Not only to a deeper relationship with my animals, but to a deeper understanding of myself.

I hope some of you can find some value in it, it has been a great journey for me and this community of interest has been very important in the process. Thanks.

[Tim Harrigan]

Why do I get the feeling that Andy is making room in his shop for a new project? 😀

[Tim Harrigan]

@Countymouse 32569 wrote:

…So, I think that by unweighting the nose we make the angle of approach easier, but will also increase the total amount of sinkage. Is it better to have more sinkage and preconditioning, or less sinkage and no preconditioning? … I still like the wider rear edge as this distributes the additional force over a wider area and minimizes high pressure areas that might increase total sinkage.

The soil is not homogeneous. Soil strength and carrying capacity increase as the soil is firmed up and compacted so you have probably experienced 90% of the compaction in the first half of the runner even though the rear is packing a heavier load. So you have diminishing returns working on it from that point. If you widen the runner in the back you are trading surface area for the plowing effect of the ever widening runner, and the trade-off is for snow-plowing tillage versus a runner surface on optimal carrying conditions. I think your system might have an advantage in bad conditions where flotation is of interest, but maybe less so under normal conditions.

So part of the trade-off generally is how wide should the runners be. If flotation is primary, wider is better, but we also need the runners to cut in some to hold the line on side slopes, etc. That is the big disadvantage of a stone boat on hilly ground. So it is tough to have one tool for all conditions. Interesting to think about what impact minor changes might have.

Oh yeah, where did you find that sled/stoneboat article? Is that on Tillers site? Have not seen that in a long while.

[Tim Harrigan]

I agree that turning is probably the key advantage of that bunk placement and also with the lift and leverage observations. There has been some discussion of even load placement over the runners and I am not sure if I agree with that. If you think about what happens at the leading edge of the runner it is important in pre-conditioning the track. If the snow or soil is soft the curved front of the runner begins to firm it up so that the runner that follows actually has very different conditions, much better conditions actually, firm and smooth with less motion resistance. Think of pulling a wagon across tilled ground. It is tough, and on the return trip you are probably going to ride in the tracks that you already made. Now think of the micro-topography of the trail under the runners. If you have bumps, surface roots, loose soil, snow etc you want to compress those if possible, and if they are not compressible you want to ride, actually ramp yourself, over the top. You do not want to be nose-heavy. Think of a large diameter wheel compared to a small diameter wheel rolling over a rock or out of a rut. A nose heavy runner is like a small wheel or a short ramp/lever. A light nose is more like a larger wheel or ramp/lever.

If you pre-condition the tracks with a lighter leading edge you minimize soil or snow disturbance. It is a differential process that occurs from the front end of the runners to the back, so in most conditions trail under the back half of the runners is in the best condition to carry the load with the least runner/ground resistance because it is firm and smooth. It might look like there is some tillage going on, but that probably happened at the front. If you are nose-heavy it will be worse.

George, you mentioned skiing and that made me think of one of the top skiers from probably the 68 Olympics, Jean-Claude Killey. Pretty sure he was a gold medal winner. I remember him because he had an odd style. As he approached the finish line he would sit way back on his skis and concentrate his weight on the back half of the skis with the fronts carrying almost none of the load. Everyone wondered what the hell he was doing. Well, he was pre-conditioning his track with the bowed fronts and concentrating the load on the back half of his skis where there was the best track and the least motion resistance. So he was in a controlled, out-of-control run for just a second or two, but maybe just enough to gain those few hundredths of a second that he needed.

So this bunk placement seems a nice compromise between maneuverability and carrying the load on an optimal track. Farmstead engineering rocks!

[Tim Harrigan]

I think working in the woods with animals is not so much about how much they can pull as it is about energy conservation. I always thought about how to make the work easy for Will and Abe, and I am even more attentive to it now that I am working single with Will. The ground surface and how you are skidding has a big difference on the effort your team needs to bring to move the loads. If you are ground skidding with a choker chain you can increase the size of the log by about 1/3 and move it with the same effort by skidding it on a stone boat. A boat or scoot can make an even bigger difference if you are skidding on snow and unfrozen ground because you might be both digging in with the log and plowing snow with the butt. If you are on frozen ground with hard packed snow there might not be much difference between ground skidding and skidding out on a boat or a scoot, but the footing might not be very good and that will make it tough on the team. It might be that you can skid out two on a stone boat where only one might be possible with ground skidding.

If you are working alone and cleaning up slash there is only so much you can do in a day. It is not a race. Your team will find more than one way to remind you of that over time.

[Tim Harrigan]

@oxspan 32483 wrote:

I didn’t know they had 4H oxen in the Midwest.

Abby Richmond (now Johnson) worked hard to get a 4H program in working steers going in Ingham County about 10 years ago or so and several teams got started. They also worked with the Ingham County fair and were able to show their teams and do some competitions, etc. Abby is now living in northern MI and no longer involved with the county program, I guess I don’t know for sure if it is still active. It takes a lot of effort to keep those programs going and bringing new young folks into the craft.

Looks like a nice team, Andy. Sorry I missed you on Saturday.

[Tim Harrigan]

@CharlyBonifaz 31973 wrote:

numbers for dairy freestalls:
stall length to solid front: 2x rump height
stall length for completely open front: 1,8x rump height
bed length (t0 brisket board): 1,2x rump height
deterrent strap in front open stalls: 0,7x rump height (nothing below this to impede head)
stall width: 2x hook bone/hip width
hope that helps

OK, Will is about 64 inches rump height. Some of the bigger breeds like Holstein or Swiss could easily be 4-6 inches taller. So based on Will, and Elke’s stall size guidelines, a reasonable stall for him would be:

Length, solid front: 128 inches
Length w/ open front: 115 inches
Length to brisket board: 77 inches
Height of barrier in front of open stalls: 45 inches
Stall width: 54 inches

These seem reasonable, the only one that seems odd to me is the 77 inch length to the brisket board. That seems like a lot of lunge space to the front of the stall. Elke, can you check that just to make sure that 1,2 x rump height guideline is correct?

[Tim Harrigan]

Don’t know Mark, but I would guess that some guys might consider them a bother that low when thrashing around in the bush. I like mine low as well, good protection from multi-flora rose in addition to protection from chain cuts.

[Tim Harrigan]

Nice, George. I knew you would have one before I got around to it. Now you can field test it and let me know if it is perfect or it you might make a second one a little different. And I like the loop for the peavey.

[Tim Harrigan]

Kevin, I agree with you assessment of the media and that there is value in sharing experiences and challenges. Most media writers have no knowledge of the topics they are writing about and that is why you rarely see in-depth or insightful articles, and the closer you are to a topic or situation, the more horrified you are. The story is more important than the facts in most cases. I have seen many articles referring to work that I have done along with direct quotes of things I supposedly said, and in reality I had never spoken to the reporter, or anyone from that media source, and there is no way that I would have ever have said anything that I was quoted as saying. And as far as conference programs and related write-ups, pretty much the same thing. They write what they think will bring folks in, very rare that they run what they write past the speakers for a reality check. You are lucky if the title of your talk accurately reflects what you plan to speak about. So if you expect honesty in reporting you are ripe for disappointment. But don’t lay it all on the speakers.

[Author]

Posts