ax men/western logging ??

[snowman]

   I don't know if it's still true or not, but the original old growth was cut with high stumps because of high resin content near the ground. Could it be high resin in these trees that will dictate a higher stump? I don't know the answer, but there has to be a valid reason.

      Original old growth stumps were felled with crosscuts, you stood to do that so you get waist high stumps.

[badpenny]

   Some where, I remember seeing spring boards used to elevate fallers up in the air 6-8 feet, and the reason given was to get above the hard-to-cut resinous base of the tree trunk. I will have to do some digging around to find where that idea in my head came from.

[Ed]

   Some where, I remember seeing spring boards used to elevate fallers up in the air 6-8 feet, and the reason given was to get above the hard-to-cut resinous base of the tree trunk. I will have to do some digging around to find where that idea in my head came from.

Springboards are used to elevate the timber feller above the butt swell of the log. This is usless wood because it flares out so much it makes handling and processing the log difficult. They are also used when the tree is growing on a very steep slope and there is nowhere to stand to fell the tree.

Ed

[pappy19]

   Some where, I remember seeing spring boards used to elevate fallers up in the air 6-8 feet, and the reason given was to get above the hard-to-cut resinous base of the tree trunk. I will have to do some digging around to find where that idea in my head came from.

Springboards are used to elevate the timber feller above the butt swell of the log. This is usless wood because it flares out so much it makes handling and processing the log difficult. They are also used when the tree is growing on a very steep slope and there is nowhere to stand to fell the tree.

Ed

He's got it right. If you get a copy of Natural Timber Country, you will see the first moving pictures of spring boarding with a cross cut, plus bucking and skidding with steam donkeys, RR, etc. It's an unknown film, but for anyone interested in old time logging, it is a must see.

[zackman1801]

hmmm, just the other day i passed a sight where they had used mechanical logging (not common for where i am, almost everything is conventional...so thats why i paid more attention) but they had left all of their stumps about 12" off the ground. i had thought that this might be because they were planning to put in houses, or mabey just for some other reason. does anyone have an idea?

[thecfarm]

I talked to one guy that was using a havester and he was trying to stomp down the snow around the trees with the head.Maybe that's why they are about a foot high.

[badpenny]

   I was just watching logging tech on the History channel, a show from 2003, where they were showing spring boards being used to elevate the timber cutters above the butt flare and resinous part of the tree. Just knew I had seen it somewhere. Could the resin in the lower part of today's trees be the reason for leaving a high stump? Just asking the question here, not saying that it is the reason. There has to be a logical reason for the stump height.

[zackman1801]

im not sure, although i do remember hearing on one episode of ax men when they were doing the small backyard job at that womans house that they were leaving the high stumps because there was metal in the trees from old fence lines and nails that had been driven into the wood.