[Gabe Ayers]

“Tim”,

“if he wants to improve his forest and take worst first it will not cash flow”

Well this is a provocative statement for me. I suppose it could come down to the timber being of such poor quality and low value to start with that the worst first individuals are of so little value it won’t even pay for the harvesting cost? In our area even the worst first has some value and often enough to pay a fair wage for the harvesting. I wouldn’t/couldn’t work anywhere with forested conditions of lesser value and in any way call my work sustainable.

“If he wants it to break even we cut accordingly. It does not matter what I cut I get payed the same. this creates a grater trust between me and the landowner because I am working for him not the mill.”

Well it matters very much to me about what I cut. Without occupying the high ground of superior silviculture then I am just setting myself up for competition with machines and any high grader that will work for less than I am willing to take for my services.

I would also be afraid that one day in the future the landowner would become educated about the forest and not trust me as an a forestry professional. I guess this is why I did work to get my forester certification, I do know what I want to do, why I am doing it and that is what I am determined to do – restorative forestry in order to be sustainable forestry.

I don’t want this to sound harsh, or self righteous about it, but there is a dramatic difference in what HHFF promotes and what you are describing Tim.

Each to his own and everyone has the right to do as they wish on their private property. But this just confirms that using animal power alone does not make the forestry sustainable. I am determined to be more than just a “Horse Logger”. I and many conventional foresters have seen animals used to high grade historically and that has been something we have determined to not be a part of, regardless of what a landowner wants.

This is one of the principles of the Forest Stewards Guild; if the landowner doesn’t agree with the best management recommendations for forest improvement, disengage. Fortunately we have enough work to be able to do that. So that’s what we do.

[Gabe Ayers]

If you are planning on going organic or with natural fertility the row crops need more room and the plant population per acre may be lower than conventional spacing and seeding rates.

We usually work with a 40-42″ spacing. It gives extra room for hilling plants up and ample room to work the horses later in the season when the plants get bigger for that last cultivation.

But it may depend on what stage of rotation your garden is in. Early in the rotation one may plant closer as the cultivation or mechanical weed control is less than a piece of ground that has been worked in open cultivation for more than two or three years.

How were you planning to do your cultivation or mechanical week control. What type of equipment are you going to use?

~

just a farm post, nothing to do with HHFF

>>>

[Gabe Ayers]

It is interesting that this sad situation made the national news and aired on our local news last night. The only comment after the death of the cattle and farmer was reported was that “he had personal issues”, as Erika suggested in her post.

The pisser with that is the dismissal of the situation missing that it may/must have much greater meaning than his “personal issues”. It is like a potentially huge statement being hidden under a dismissive conclusion by media and therefore the authorities, whichever comes first to the viewers mind, the line is blurred…

There is probably a much greater story than his personal issues and even if the personal issues are the same as all the pressures we know are being applied to small producers it shouldn’t be minimized by media. Hopefully someone will do more investigation into this mans life situation and try to understand what was going on in the overall picture of his life. Of course that story probably won’t get air time nationally, but it would interesting that it all be studied for the public good.

I don’t want to dwell on the negative but would be interested in knowing more about what Mr. Pierson was going through, his “personal issues”.

People seem to be doing unbelievable stuff all over the country/world and the details of why they are doing these things are important, just not suitable to the shallow sound bite portrayals that may reflect the depth of the general public’s attention span.

I agree with the posters that say you can make it as a small farmer. I have done it for over thirty years and it leads me to the comment that comes to mind when someone asks –

“How you doing man?”, my answer often is “Surviving! and I feel like I am bragging when I say that”, because what we are doing with our lives as small farmers and small loggers is extremely difficult and if you play the game against the stacked deck of the status quo cards dealt, you are likely going to loose.

So participate within your own place in the economy and community and create your own markets when you can and live modestly, cheaply. Keep your inputs low, don’t buy anything you don’t need and work as much as your body will allow and your heart and mind will inspire.

I am not going to bash the USDA as I have borrowed from them for almost thirty years. I am not involved at a level at this point the requires the reporting and baloney of the older programs, but still do service a loan that has more interest in the annual payment than principle, but I am glad to have this piece of land and the freedom to live as I wish. This is still the land of opportunity. The land of reasonably fertile soils, lush and productive forests and some humans around that actually are neighbors, not just folks that live close by.

Make the most of it as you can. If you get to the point you feel like acting out as Mr. Peirson did, get help because neither you or your animals can clearly make a commonly understandable statement in a violent death. The dominant paradigm will just sweep you under the rug with a dismissive comment like you have “personal issues”. I am sad for him and the farming community at large, as someone else posted here, the suicide rate among farmers is alarming. But there is no fire drill exercised for the lost leader segment of our society, that is spent to insure that food is cheap, so the ignorant masses/consumers can eat nutrition-less food that makes them fat while they set on the couch and watch tv that is trying to sell the stuff they don’t need, as they head back to meaningless jobs soon to be replaced by computerized robots. Modern life does reek of personal misery issues.

It is like the joke about modern times – The problem with being a part of the rat race, is that even if you win, you are still a rat.

Carry on dear farm friends from all over, stay small, stay sane and humane.

I am not one to speak to this in a holier than thou sense, or earthyier than thou – I get down sometimes too. But I also still get excited by the new patches on my overalls or how much manure I have collected so far this winter or how big that one mare’s belly is getting – so take this with a grain of salt, remembering though, that salt is a necessary element to a horses survival…. whatever that means and everything means something….

Anyone else feeling mad and sad about this?

This is a personal post and has nothing to do with HHFF or my signature that is automatically posted at the end of every post here….

~

[Gabe Ayers]

I am actively researching the issue and Carl and I are trying to plug the hole. Will keep folks updated as to what we find. Thanks for your patience.

[Gabe Ayers]

Hey Guy,

So glad you and Troy are going to be at the PASA event this year. Jagger and I presented there a couple of years ago and Gary Anderson spoke there last year on forestry issues.

The work Troy Firth has been doing for years is a quiet example of some of the best forest management I have ever seen.

I am also glad you have joined this site.

I would like to direct your attention to the DAPFI group that is developing with the support of Carl and this site. I am not sure if I included your email address and contact information on that list, but would like to be sure you both are included in this new group. I would imagine you could add some names of the practitioners you all have working in your group in NW Pa.

I think it would be interesting for many DAP readers to hear about what you are doing management wise.

How many horse loggers are you all working with now?

How many acres of forestland are involved in the effort you and Troy are managing?

How are the markets for native species of logs and lumber looking lately?

When your landowner’s do decide to liquidate their forest do you guys bid on the sale and do the work?

Please tell us more about your programs, silviculture and collection of practitioners. I heard from Troy at SDAD that you all had some great
Amish horsemen working in the woods on some of your jobs.

We have just posted the dates and location for this years SDAD event and hope Troy and you will be able to attend. Maybe a panel discussion would be a good way for you guys story to be told to anyone interested.

Have you personally worked any horses when you are not carrying a paint gun or chainsaw around? I am sure you have guys that could provide instruction in the skills of that aspect of this work, but I suspect Troy will want to keep you doing what you are already doing.

Welcome aboard. Thanks for sharing what you all are doing. Troy has been an inspiration for me personally for years now. I met Troy through an article in Forbes Magazine years ago entitled: “This asset grows to the Sky”. This was a great story documenting the superior economic returns from improvement “worst first single tree selection” styled forestry. Forbes doesn’t care about horses or the environment, but they care about making money and this article highlighted that potential in a clear way a long time ago. I believe the economics are still the same as long as we have markets for the products.

Best wishes to Firth Maple Products ~

[Gabe Ayers]

I think some horses may get bored with light stuff particularly if it is in a circle or doesn’t leave evidence of the previous pass. When pulling the chain harrow it isn’t long before they see the impact from their last lick, but that isn’t really light work.

I know I get bored from just driving around empty, which in itself may be conveyed to the horse or perceived by the horse.

Maybe they are destination oriented and think they are “going somewhere”, like when the boss mare decides the other side of the hill it the best grazing spot for now and herd moves behind or in front her, from her signals?

Where does a horse think it is going, when we drive it aimlessly? Maybe the resistance flips a switch that they are doing something more than just wandering about? I guess riding them adds the load of the rider which is a certain resistance and presents a much closer contact of signals.

I have never been able to drive them for the sake of driving them after they learn enough signals to be controlled. The next step is do something with them, I just don’t have time for any less to justify my having them.

I guess my excuse for having more than I can work myself is to have them in case anyone comes along that wants one of their own. They often do.

So think up something for that horse to be doing. Hook that drag and drag the pastures spreading the droppings/manure from the toilet areas while out there. Get a one horse mower and clip weeds, maybe a one horse sized v-plow and move some snow, or knock the ridge out of the middle of the driveway. Stockpile firewood for the coming winters?

Good question, lots of things about the horses that are not real easy, but most are in some way fun, even if just trying to figure out what they are thinking and why they are doing what they are doing – good or bad.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

Welcome JimB,

Hope you make it back to the south, plenty of good land and lots of work in the woods. Let us know if we can help you in any way.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

Seems like a good idea to get any help available for this tuff nut to crack.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

I think sweet sorghum would be an alternative for temperate climate farmers. I have grown sweet sorghum in the past and love to make molasses or as many may know I have raised allot of cane in my time and hope to raise some more.

We proposed it to be a feedstock for ethanol production years ago when we had a grant to produce ethanol during the Carter administration, but the powers to be of the co-op went with trying to make alcohol from wood which never worked. The tax break on producing renewable fuels was dropped when the next administration came into power and the industry is now only about ADM and industrial ag using only corn. Making molasses is very labor intensive using methods from 100 years ago. It is easy to grow but hard to harvest by hand.

We had proposed to make ensilage from the bagasse or pumnings or whatever you call the leftover stalks after squeezing the juice out of them. This creates a feedable byproduct which makes it allot easier to convince local small cattle farmers to grow cane. Another big problem was the lack of mechanized harvesting equipment for sorghum. We were working with our local land grant U. on that but nothing ever came of it. Of course sweet sorghum syrup is a great value added crop that is low demand (compared to corn) on the soil and can be put in a jar and sold later from an expanded window of marketability.

My family actually spent five years providing an interpretative demonstration of pioneer methods of making sorghum molasses and sold the product to the public on a Dept. of Interior site. We were the last people to do this to my knowledge. The administration of that department and time period reduced our prices to below cost and we went out of business.

There is a group called the National Sweet Sorghum Producers that still is working on this feedstock as a source of energy as well as syrup.

How did you find this site?

~

[Gabe Ayers]

We compete with a local Forest Co-op for access to private forestland. So they are our competition in some ways. We rejected the co-op when we started HHFF and went with what we consider “ecological capitalism” meaning that those who are best at taking care of the forests get the work and get paid according to the quality of their services.

I could see how Guy’s approach is not exactly what the Co-op model here does.

The problem with the co-op model in the Appalachians is that the folks down here don’t like to pay for services of managing their forest. They like to get paid for any products harvested from their sites and most are not willing or able to wait for the payment until after the products are value added and sold at some time in the future. So we tend to work directly with the landowners on a more traditional sharecrop basis and pay them a percentage of what we harvest and sell.

I think Guy’s approach is more of a long term management agreement that could be a form of CSF.

Thanks for joining this discussion. BTW is this Guy Dunkle with Tory Firth?

Hope so, you guys are great and would be a real asset to this community of interest.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

Both my computers have crashed in the last couple of weeks and I can’t figure out how the Trojan and worm virus got there, maybe this is it, maybe not, I know so little about these machines.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

BF,

I am not sure where an online source for these hame fasteners may be, I will look into it.

These are at least 20 years old now, hard to admit that, but they are.

These devices along with lever bits are important changes in equipment we made years ago to keep working without breakdowns or runaways.

I hope you can see the fastener in this photo, I will get back to you on a source for them on line. As you can see we are not using a regular hame strap over the top of the heavy duty fastener. Must have taken it off as unnecessary to repair something else that broke or wore out while working.
It is not necessay obviously. I also will say that on some really heavy loads we have had the D shaped loop on the bottom of the hame break, but that is usually related to the rig being fitted a little loose. We keep extra D loops in the truck, just in case.

Sincerely,

~

[Gabe Ayers]

Y4,

I totally agree about the computers. These things/machines are just the most up to date version of designed obsolescence, they are always not as good as advertised and are consistently disappointing in doing what you think they should. There are always restrictions, you can’t post a photo over this or that size, you can’t send but so many attachments and you constantly need an upgrade or new virus protection or more memory…… computers suck…

Now that big hitch of horses working the ground is a beautiful site and you seem to be doing pretty good for a start up or for making a transition.

Get a kid to help you post those photos, we’d like to see them despite all the honest complaints about computers.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

We use a heavy duty hame fastener from Chupp’s Blacksmith Shop in Fredericksburg, Ohio. They can be bought through most good harness shops. They’re a machined steel version of the light binder type that are adjustable with the light chain. We all use the pulling logging hames with the double hame strap loops, so we use the Chupp fastener and a long nylon hame strap over that. It has to be the heavy duty binder type, the light one will break when you are moving any heavy logs or loads.

They are around $20.00 a piece, but on really heavy loads an stout horses they will pay for themselves in not breaking at a critical time and not having to buy new hame straps so often.

I saw a pair hame fasteners the other day made out of stainless steel. I just hate it when my apprentices have better gear than me…naw, just kidding I am proud that they have the best equipment they can find.

~

[Gabe Ayers]

This is a quote sent to me from a young horseman that is getting his masters in English and said reading it made him miss his work mare and the woods.

I enjoyed reading it too: it is from Herman Melville (Redburn)

Among all the sights of the docks, the noble truck-horses are not the
least striking to a stranger. They are large and powerful brutes, with
such sleek and glossy coats, that they look as if brushed and put on by
a valet every morning. They march with a slow and stately step, lifting
their ponderous hoofs like royal Siam elephants. Thou shalt not lay
stripes upon these Roman citizens; for their docility is such, they are
guided without rein or lash; they go or come, halt or march on, at a
whisper. So grave, dignified, gentlemanly, and courteous did these fine
truck-horses look–so full of calm intelligence and sagacity, that often
I endeavored to get into conversation with them, as they stood in
contemplative attitudes while their loads were preparing. But all I
could get from them was the mere recognition of a friendly neigh; though
I would stake much upon it that, could I have spoken in their language,
I would have derived from them a good deal of valuable information
touching the docks, where they passed the whole of their dignified
lives.

There are unknown worlds of knowledge in brutes; and whenever you mark a
horse, or a dog, with a peculiarly mild, calm, deep-seated eye, be sure
he is an Aristotle or a Kant, tranquilly speculating upon the mysteries
in man. No philosophers so thoroughly comprehend us as dogs and horses.
They see through us at a glance. And after all, what is a horse but a
species of four-footed dumb man, in a leathern overall, who happens to
live upon oats, and toils for his masters, half-requited or abused, like
the biped hewers of wood and drawers of water? But there is a touch of
divinity even in brutes, and a special halo about a horse, that should
forever exempt him from indignities. As for those majestic, magisterial
truck-horses of the docks, I would as soon think of striking a judge on
the bench, as to lay violent hand upon their holy hides.

It is wonderful what loads their majesties will condescend to draw. The
truck is a large square platform, on four low wheels; and upon this the
lumpers pile bale after bale of cotton, as if they were filling a large
warehouse, and yet a procession of three of these horses will tranquilly
walk away with the whole.

The truckmen themselves are almost as singular a race as their animals.
Like the Judiciary in England, they wear gowns,–not of the same cut and
color though,–which reach below their knees; and from the racket they
make on the pavements with their hob-nailed brogans, you would think
they patronized the same shoemaker with their horses. I never could get
any thing out of these truckmen. They are a reserved, sober-sided set,
who, with all possible solemnity, march at the head of their animals;
now and then gently advising them to sheer to the right or the left, in
order to avoid some passing vehicle. Then spending so much of their
lives in the high-bred company of their horses, seems to have mended
their manners and improved their taste, besides imparting to them
something of the dignity of their animals; but it has also given to them
a sort of refined and uncomplaining aversion to human society.

I think that last sentence describes many of the great horsemen I have know very well.
~

[Author]

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