heres one

[lancek]

Just got a great new job for us today but I have a question we were contacted by one of the bigest utillity pole mills to log a job for them we will be moving 40 to 70 ft poles out of the woods and too a landing! The land owner wanted a horse logging opperation because they dont want any resedual damage to there woods! so we have to move these logs with out tearing any trees up, could you put a steerable cart on the end of the logs to keep from hitiing other trees or would flat draging and placeing tires around pivet point trees to keep from skining them up work best Tim

[Ira]

Whats the terrain like ? Is it possible to just lay the skid roads out string straight?(Yeah,I know, dream on lol) Cross hauling the ends on the corners is also an option.

[Carl Russell]

I have cut 100’s of utility poles over the years and have found that they are reasonably easy to maneuver without much to-do. Felling and skid trail layout plays a huge role…..obviously. I think that using a pole trailer would actually be harder to control than just ground skidding.

Make sure that you let the LO know that low impact logging is not just about what equipment you use, but primarily about how the job is laid out, including marking for felling, and trail placement. You should not get stuck trying to fell a 70 foot stick into a place where you are going to have to swing it around a crop tree. Otherwise you might as well have a skidder.

This is a bit overreaching the original question, but it is a pet peeve of mine. We cannot continue to try to compete with machines by just replacing horses for the machine. The job has to be laid out to facilitate the animals, or using animals will not be an effective way to provide the desired results.

Anyway, if you can get the butts off of the ground with an arch, cart, or sled, then the load should move easily enough that you should be able to get them out efficiently. The other thing to consider is that many times pole harvests are exclusively poles, which means you have to work around sawlog of poorer trees that are not being cut because they aren’t part of the sale. In my experience those trees should be cut anyway. It may make the job a bit more complex in terms of managing the landing, but it will make all the difference in the woods.

Carl

[Rick Alger]

If you have to make tight turns, a directional snatch block will help. You can pull the butt much deeper into a corner. Labonville sells them. Both self-releasing and standard. I have had good luck with this method, but it can only do so much.

[lancek]

Ira the tarrain is flat to rolling hills the problem is that most of this will be up a slight slope! And Carl, I agree with you but the trails are already establised and the lO has made it clear that he dosnt want too many more trails made! With that said my conceren is that turning the logs up the trail may be a problem. I think useing ricks idea along with tires around the pivot trees will proubly be best! We took up over 250 trees in a 8 acher plot so this stand is way over matured we are going to just take the 40 too 70 foot poles and leave the rest for another harvest 4 to 5 years from now!as far as the lumber logs I am still working on a source for the lumber. The pine market is dead as a door nail around here so selling the logs is not a opption but Im hopeing to move it as wainscoting and flooring! Tim

[Jim Ostergard]

I have use poor quality trees on the corners to pivot long stems on a trail. Let the land owner know they will be used for that and hopefully they will agree. I cut them off about 3-4′ afterward (sometime during the job also) so it is obvious what the use is. I you remove them then the next harvest will make a deeper turn so I try and get the land owner to agree to leave my bumper trees. Good luck, sounds like a nice job and a possible nice future job.
Jim O.

[Author]

Posts