skid distance , what can be done, bob sled logging, ,,, me rambleing it is raining

[TaylorJohnson]

4 cord is what I shoot for some times I get more sometimes less but it is a good number to head toward. It is a good days work horses and man have to be conditioned for it for sure ( if they are going to do it every day ) . Carl you do enough of that bob sled logging to be very efficient at it. I think it is an underutilized tool in are our part of the country. I went through those pics of yours and that looks like good country you live in.
That 500′ mark is a good one to stick to wile twitching wood out I think. At that distance you can get a lot done with a pair of horses.
Carl are those old trails set up at about that distance? back were I am from there are old trails and cut outs in banks for loading and all of the trails I would bet are 3 to 4oo’ apart. That is how my Dad and them did it as well around 500′ but at times they had to go farther. Also when I was a kid there were little cans around the woods that the guys use to use for cleaning saw blades . They looked like little oil cans but they had kerosene in them I think. It is funny to me how people have doubts about what can be done with a horse and this hole lakes state area was leveled with them . We have every kind of country a person could deal with here from flat ground , to high rocky hills . There is some rough and tough country that these old boys worked with horses. They did it day in and day out and I will bet there were men working that could get done with a horse that we would not think even possible . If the stories are true about my Great Uncle Jack then I have a long ways to go, He is quite and will not brag but every one else does for him . He is in his mid 70s and works with another old guy about the same age and they cut and skid about 3 truck loads a week . Now that is with a short wood skidder but never the less they are in the 70s ( here I am bragging on my Uncle now ,, LOL ) . In his 20 — 50s I bet he could really go , He lives 3 hours from me now but I wish he was closer so he could work with me , I am sure he could speed me up a lot. When he talks I just shut up until he has said every thing he want to say, I listen to the things he says close because his message is always subtle. Some times this takes a long time because he is a slow talking Kentuck that does not get excited for any one. Guys like that just laugh when they here people say things like well can you really do that with a horse?
One thing to consider if you are going to horse log I think is that the amount of work you will have to do to make a living at it is more than most modern people can imagine. I have poured concrete, framed houses, roofed,,,,, and nothing I have done is like logging . The first time I poured concrete the guys had me half nerves about it , saying well you better be ready it is going to me hot and we have lots to pour , you will be lucky to walk out of there at the end of the day. Me and 4 other guys poured 47 yards of concrete that day it was in the eighties and one of them guys was 64 and had a wooden leg and one was pushing 70 and looked like he might die before we started . Don’t get me wrong it was hard work but not harder than a hard day cutting jack pine , not even close. I take some of that back , I would rather cut jack pine than pour concrete any day of the week I just like the woods. The bush is not a spot for every one to make a living though most will not like it after a few weeks some a few months if you stay longer than that you more than likely will never leave,, it gets in ya . Taylor Johnson

[Carl Russell]

Now Taylor, how am I supposed to follow that. You said it all man.

Our terrain is pretty variable, so the skid roads are more oriented to the landscape….like narrow passes through ledges etc. That poem on my Earthwise website, about The Old Logger, was about finding and following one of those old trails on a log job….I find it helps to see the landscape through the “old ones” eyes. I have several places on my property that are only accessible through one corridor.

Some trails are part way uphill…twitching single logs, or trees with a cart to a central header area. This is when I reach out 500′-ish to gather stems, then load them on the sled in a place where it is all downhill to the landing, where I can put on as much as 4x what I was pulling from the surrounding stand.

I also was raised around men who worked these hills with beasts and misery whips. Our sitter when I was young was married to a man who had lost his hand in a logging accident. He had a cuff mounted on his arm that had a pulp hook attached to it. He could also screw in a knife blade, and man could that guy whittle. Ball-in-cage, chains, you name it.

The man I bough my first horse from headed to the woods with his brother when they were 13 to go logging for themselves, with horses, axes, and cross-cut. His brother has a picture of him as a nine year old driving a team with 2MBF of hardwood on. He drove the team 5 miles down out of “Stony Brook”. He’d hike up in there after school and drive one team home for his dad who ran one of the biggest horse logging crews around here. This was before and during the depression. My neighbor’s Grandfather had a crew too. These guys kept quite a few men busy when they needed it most.Men would leave there homes at 4 am and walk ten miles to go work in the woods all day, and walk home…this during the winter.

Anyway, I must have grown up hearing these stories, so I never had any doubts about what I could do with animal power. There’s no doubt that it helps to get guidance, and it is a lot of physical work, but there is still a lot of knowledge already on the books so to speak as to how to get this work done without petroleum power.

I agree about how hard the work is. I am alway amused at how hard some professions think they work. The difference is that I love this work. I have been fascinated by cutting trees since I was a kid…started blocking wood at 11 with an old McCullock 35 gear drive…all I could do was pick it up and move it to the next cut. I thrive on the physical challenges. I’m intrigued by the intellectual solutions. I come home at the end of the day sweaty, covered with dirt, smelling like horses and tree sap, and I have every intention to live the rest of my life like that….

Oh yeah…gets in your blood.

Carl

[mitchmaine]

i like your crew, carl. some things never change, do they? life is good.

[lancek]

Yea its a wonder that people ever got anything done with them stupid animals why they would be allays causing problems and getting hurt its a wounder that man didn’t invent the tractor first! Or maybe except for a few the animals were smarter than the horses LOL!!!!!!
I too have seen the country that the old timers worked both in Vermont and in Wisconsin and the amount of wood that they moved is staggering I remember seeing pics in the restaurant there in Hayward of logs stacked 15 20 feet high and only four horses pulling it! and through some pretty rough terrain too it all in the conditioning of the horse and the breeding that we have lost so much of its a shame!

[TaylorJohnson]

I think being able to see the lay of the land and how to put your trails in is one of the biggest things modern loggers are loosing. Knowing how to start a job is as important as any thing you can do in the wood, it will be the difference of being productive or not. Being able to look at a job see how the hill , swamps, ravines , wood ,,,,, all lay out is very important. It is not as important when you are using machines that whey 50,0000 plus pounds.
Even some of the had cutters I see today just do not know how to lay out a strip , they work way harder than need be. That is one of the things I like about working horses / mules in the woods you have to work with nature to get anything done. If you fight it you will loose when using horse or mules. Taylor Johnson

[Matthew]

The man who taught me about horses worked in the woods in Maine. They use to cut some saw logs but most of the wood was small. They would cut 4 foot hardwood pulp and softwood pulp, 50 inch bolt wood I think was ether a clear wood for floring or something else I can’t remember but thair good red oak was sold for building lobster traps.( Or lobstah depending if you are from Maine) They would cut wood in figure eights in the woods then go in with a four wheel wagon in the summer ,spring and fall and a sled in the winter. They would use the figure 8 because they could easaly carry the wood to the wagon or sled and go through the 8 and be turned around to go back to the landing. If you have ever seen the woods in northern maine you would understand how this would work well it is so thick you couldn’t throw a baseball ten feet. When they would get back to thair truck in the landing they would sort thair wood or load it on the truck in 1 cord stacks with a cable looped around the wood and a crane would off load them at the mill. I think they would load 4 or 6 cords on the truck. In the winter they would go into the swamps when they froze and cut white ceader with the same figure 8 and a sled. The sled had heavy bunks with chains that criss crossed the back of the front bunks to the front of the rear bunks to help it steer sharper. I remember they would put the sled on blocks every night so it wouldn’t freeze to the ground. After a snow someone would have to take the team and sled over the woods roads and doing this all winter would pack the snow so well the team would stay on the frozen packed road and not break through. These guys use to haul thair horses backwards on a open rack body truck, they would find a bank, back up to it and load the horses. I rember one old timer use to put a feed bag on the horses when it was extremly cold so they would breath warmer air on the back of the truck. On real cold days he said the horses would put thair heads down for the ride. Those men were tough and thair horses even tougher.

[TaylorJohnson]

My Dad and Uncles use to haul horses the same way . I think there is a pic of one of there old trucks on my web site . They did the same thing backed up to a bank and loaded them up and unloaded them the same way. I wish it was more like it use to be as far as what you could haul wood on and horses in ,,, well just every thing. Common since is being replaces by big ,faster , and dumber every day. I jut got a letter from the dot today wanting $75.00 for something or other that has nothing to do with me or what I do but they have decided to fleece us some more so they will. A dollar here a dollar there next thing you know they have it all and we have nothing but to know in our minds that they will want some more real soon so you better not ideal to long .
I wish contractual law still meant something in this country , if it did I could put at least 5 guys to work next week but it does not so I wont. Here I have the greenest game in town and they will not let me grow,, like I said big, fast , and dumb that is how they want us to work . Taylor Johnson

[mitchmaine]

carl, i found your website. took a little doing but i got it, and found your poem about your old logger. and the one about bobsledding. i didn’t know you were a poet, but i should have guessed. the post above is almost a poem. great stuff. don’t know anything about poetry, but i liked yours.

mitch

[lancek]

boy I have got stop writing theses things late at night I really butchered that lats one up I meant to say the hoses were smarter then the men!

[Carl Russell]

TaylorJohnson;18976 wrote:

I think being able to see the lay of the land and how to put your trails in is one of the biggest things modern loggers are loosing. Knowing how to start a job is as important as any thing you can do in the wood, it will be the difference of being productive or not. Being able to look at a job see how the hill , swamps, ravines , wood ,,,,, all lay out is very important. It is not as important when you are using machines that whey 50,0000 plus pounds.
Even some of the had cutters I see today just do not know how to lay out a strip , they work way harder than need be. That is one of the things I like about working horses / mules in the woods you have to work with nature to get anything done. If you fight it you will loose when using horse or mules. Taylor Johnson

I have been wanting to return to this comment for a few days… Taylor this has been a big part of my enthusiasm about working in the woods. I love to take in all the variables on a site. For me it is not about skidding wood with animals, it’s about working animals in the woods, and that has a lot to do with reading the landscape. There is no doubt that many people today don’t have a clue, or they are machine-blind because they think they can just crawl over it.

For years now I have been confused why when using machinery loggers can’t do a better job. With all that power and functionality, they should be able to take even more advantage of the land than I do. But hey, I just watch them working against the land.

It is really part of the art of working with animals, and it may also be one of the reasons some people have difficulty using animals. Growing up in a machinery world, some people think that they can use animals while disregarding the lay of the land. If you clear the right trails and cut the right trees first, then everything is a lot easier.

Carl

[lancek]

You hit the nail right on the head Carl most of these guys want to fight everything not only the land and thats why they have a hard time of it, its production at all cost and its drilled into them from the start! Some of the best loggers I know both machine and horse are the one willing to go slow an steddy and work with the terrain and not fight it. They are the ones that are always the steady producers and the most sensitive in the woods !

[Author]

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