We ate the Bear today.
As a matter of fact, we smoked that bears ass!
Got taken off the site, we are currently logging, and sent out to fell and buck 30 large Beech.
Richard stepped out of the feller buncher and came to help.
We were done after 6 hours
Richard started at one end, Anna and I at the other.
She felled and I jumped around like a white rabbit with a chainsaw, trying to get them bucked faster than she could fell them.
Fine, clear weather and no wind, perfect.
Best thing for me was seeing how fast Anna has grown as a faller.
These were 5 times bigger than anything, she has tackled before.
Biggest one was a bit aside from the rest.
I asked her to go drop it, while I finished bucking: " Right, where do you want it to land?"
My smile was a mile wide, when I watched her head off with the MS661 go to work on that tree, absolutely fearless.
Richard had one comment at the end of the day: " She would make a fine faller."
Everything thinner than 8" is cut to 4-6 meter lengths, forwarded and chipped and used in powerplants.
We've recently converted a slew of powerplants from coal to biomass, so chips are worth money right now.
We get paid by the cubic meter for falling, then get an extra 7% for cutting the tops down so they'll fit in a forwarder.
Works out ok.
We made some good money on that job.
Trees that size, the norm is 10 per person/day.
2 guys and an inexperienced gal doing 30 in 6 hours is real good.
I bet Anna is sleeping really good tonight, worn out from lugging the 661 around all day ( Her first try at a 90 cc saw) and satisfied as hell from performing so well.
Tomorrow it is back to the smaller ( 102 year old) stuff and I bet that after tackling the big ones she'll go through those like the grim reaper.
I'll probably have to ask her to buck some, or she'll run me ragged, trying to keep up.
Have I ever mentioned that I love teaching apprentices.
Must be Buckin the trees to log lengths - no way 30 trees of that size (pic) dropped and bucked to firewood 16”-18” lengths with 3 peeps in 6 hours .... even with everyone running ported saws
Really? What length do they buck them to in Denmark ? .... Besides, logging is WAY easier than dropping/felling , bucking and splitting into firewood by hand ... even a tinfoil hatter like me knows that !
Don't know about that. Logging is less cutting, and more precision. It's virtually impossible to screw up firewood. A bad logger could probably lose thousands a day if he wasn't kicked off the site.
The logging Stig is showing (felling a tree and bucking to length(s)) is WAY Easier from a physical standpoint than felling a tree and converting it to firewood on the spot especially if you are using hand tools (axes , mauls , can’t hooks) and of course ported saws ! Heck , even us tinfoil hatters got that rIght
We ate the Bear today.
As a matter of fact, we smoked that bears ass!
Got taken off the site, we are currently logging, and sent out to fell and buck 30 large Beech.
Richard stepped out of the feller buncher and came to help.
We were done after 6 hours
Richard started at one end, Anna and I at the other.
She felled and I jumped around like a white rabbit with a chainsaw, trying to get them bucked faster than she could fell them.
Fine, clear weather and no wind, perfect.
Best thing for me was seeing how fast Anna has grown as a faller.
These were 5 times bigger than anything, she has tackled before.
Biggest one was a bit aside from the rest.
I asked her to go drop it, while I finished bucking: " Right, where do you want it to land?"
My smile was a mile wide, when I watched her head off with the MS661 go to work on that tree, absolutely fearless.
Richard had one comment at the end of the day: " She would make a fine faller."
So, Anna had her first experience of a barber chair today.
Mild one, luckily.
Great teaching opportunity and as for the ruined log, the goddamned forest is full of them. ( she was a bit surprised to find, that was my take on it)
I had been on her case for making her face cuts to close. As in not open enough.
Then she forgot to gut the hinge.
That added up to a facecut closing too soon and too much hinge, plus a gust of wind pushing the tree over.
Barberchair.
It really doesn't take a skid steer in real life.
We had some wind come up around noon.
Caused Richard to have, what I would guess is the faller's worst nightmare.
He felled a tree next to a public road, had it commit, then a gust of wind stood it back up, snapped the hinge and it went across the road.
We got real busy setting the vans up as road blocks ( We have emergency flashers on them) and luckily we could redirect traffic through the forest and the forwarder was only 10 minutes away.
Having a good relationship with the forwarder drivers sure is a fine thing. When I called him and explained the situation, he set off at once.
He was hauling ass, fat plume of smoke behind him when he was coming up the road.
So we got the mess cleared up, and nobody but the MS462 was hurt.
Richard will have nightmares about this for a while, though.
One funny thing happened today.
I had been contacted by the Copenhagen furniture factory.
They were making a film about " tree to furniture".
Would I fall a tree while they filmed it.
Sure thing.
So two guys drove the 2½ hours down from Copenhagen.
I told them I'd drop one, then they could see what was going on and figure how to set up.
So I dropped a large one.
One guy came over and asked " Is that an oak?"
Nope, Beech!
Turns out the film was about oak furniture, but no-one had thought to mention that to me.
Not a single oak in the whole forest.
So they drove the 2½ hours back to the hub of civilization.
We all learn best from personal experience. All the explaining in the world won't stick as well as one honest to god unexpected screw up. Glad it was a cheap lesson.
As for Richard, he's probably beating himself up enough without us piling on. I just assume he knew better but had a lapse of judgement.
I have a mental library of my cock ups, every time I’m about to do something sketchy to save time, one of those come up on my Visual Rolodex and I remember the embarrassment and expense so I pull back and rethink it.
Doesn’t stop me all the time, but a lot of the time.
Great run of posts!! Sounds like we've all been there and lived to tell a tale or two
Should serve to make both Anna and Richard feel a little less chagrin.
End weight reduction on about 6 long for branches.
One branch was really 10-12" on the butt, and went straight out for a little ways.
Had my attention.
Wraptor ride to about 90'', then climbed another ways. I'd pre-placed a throw line when removing an adjacent tree.
Two SRT lines, trunk choked.
Didn't use my lanyard, as I was concerned about being tied in if the limb failed, from rigging, natural crotched, self-lowered or groundwoman lowered.
Had a couple of days work this week local to me. Removal of a Mature Birch, quite a few large Spruce trees, some stone dead due to beetle, plenty of odds and sods, self seeded crap. Medium Oak to lift and deadwood. A large Oak to lift and safety prune, 4 decent sized Scots Pines to remove and about 8 or 10 small trees at the entrance to a driveway to widen it.
All work is for a renovation project hence the clearing and managed to our share them to make the mature Oak a bit of a feature, hence the prune.
The property and plot backs onto Kommune woodland and there is a lot of Spruce Bark Beetle dead trees. 4 on this plot. After looking at the boundary markers it appears about 8 of them are in the Kommune woodland so select them.
Got another half day for two men next Friday to complete the project. So far 2 days with 2 men and tracked chipper.
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