Anyone doing any logging this winter?

[Dave Shepard]

What are you harvesting, and what method and equipment are you using?

I will be cutting oak, cherry, and hard maple. I will be using a Kubota L48 w/winch and a Timberjack 208D w/grapple. I know the markets are low, but the landowner wants to do it anyway. :-\ I was just wondering if anyone else was going to make a go of it despite the low market.


Dave

[Burlkraft]

I've been waitin' ta see if Quebecneuf is doin' any loggin yet.... ;D ;D

[SwampDonkey]

Me to.  ;D  The man (and his wife) sure has milling in his blood to go through what he has to, to get them logs back home on the back of a toboggan.  ;)

Gonna let my trees grow another 25 years or so. 

[ScottAR]

One of my logger customers is cutting a small patch south of me...  They
have not worked on it in a few days due to bad weather.  Hardwoods.

[Mooseherder]

I finally cut 5 Pine Borer trees down with the nicer weather. ;)
4 outta the 5 fell exactly where I wanted them to.  Da udder went in da wrong side of the yard but I quickly sawed and picked up before my neighbor noticed.   Got a few more leaners to go.  Decided to wait until I got some rope because they are leaning towards neighbors yard.
My other dilema was my bigger cheapo saws are in Maine and I only got a small Homelite brush saw down here.  I sharpened chain each tree just to make it fair. ;D

[Gary_C]

I hope to get started later this week, if I get all the equipment fixing done. I will be cutting all pulpwood, no sawlogs, with a harvester. I have three small jobs lined up with the first job having 60 cords of European Larch (Tamarack) and 25 cords of Pine. Next job is a pine thinning with 125 cords of Red Pine. The third job is about 120 cords of Aspen. I should be done with all three by the end of January.

After those three, I have another small job, but it is back up north and contains a lot of worthless basswood pulp and I may just leave it till the summer when I start a large pulp job (970 cords) nearby. So I will probably go back to sawing hardwoods at home and I sure have enough of that to keep busy.

[a old timberjack]

yup, the dirt buisiness came to a hault, so i have a few loads of tie logs i have to do. not the best stuff, but you got to do what you have to do. oak and maple

[Cedarman]

Started on a state job yesterday. Must log between mid Nov and end of March.  Worst time of year for mud, but the Indiana bats must be protected.  I use a tractor and Farmi winch to get them gathered to the skid road and use an old 440 JD that has been stretched, a log bunk added and a Patu knuckleboom.  We can haul a good load of cedar out with it and load onto the trucks.  Keeps mud to a minimum on the logs.  Got 310 cedars to cut and about 80 hardwoods and that will be it on this job.

[Rick Alger]

I'll be cutting spruce and fir after Christmas - small patch cuts with the horses. Gearing up for sleigh rides on the farm right now.

[Ed_K]

 I have 30 mbf of white pine, 4x4 Landini tractor w/Tajfun winch,forestry trailer and a hay wagon frame to haul 12'14' & 16'ers. The skidders going to sit a while its 6 degs this morning and it won't start >:(.Coming soon (Pine Shadow Farm)its the new business name w/web site and all  8) .

[arojay]

Beetle killed spruce, mostly firewood and no end to it.  No big money just paying the bills and making a little wage, but it keeps me close to home.  Hand felling and line skidding with the 440B.
Minus 34 C this morning, a bit sketchy for starting the skidder so I'll clean up on blocks and burn on landings.

[okmulch]

i have got a 55 acre tract of eastern red cedar to clear cut . looking at another 60 acres tomorrow to cut.

i use a CAT  tracked 277 skid steer with a tree terminator shear and a l  CAT 268 wheeled loader with grouser steel tracks and a doughtery tree saw to cut with. we then put grapples on and move trees

[JV]

I have some cleanup work to do, a couple of trees standing that the power company trimmed for me (an ash and a walnut).  Neighbor has a hickory and a cherry he wants me to get.  I'm in better shape equipment wise than ever.  I recently purchased a MF 50E 70 hp 4wd with industrial loader.  I'm going to put a grapple on the bucket when I get it home.  I'm going to put my Farmi 501 on it.  I have been doing some scratching on a CAD program thinking about converting an old AC 600 planter frame into a log arch and trailer.
I recently received a phone call from a landowner south of us about thinning a small walnut grove, sawing and marketing the lumber.  That got the adrenalin pumping as I was looking forward to working with him.  Then the bad news, the local concentration yard isn't taking anymore lumber from anyone other than their oldest mills.  Seems they are setting on 20 million board feet, effects of the housing bust.  Maybe next year.   :-\

[Ron Scott]

I've one sawlog and pulpwood selective harvest of 240MBF and 260 cords cutting now 60 miles north and another one about to start cutting, probably after the holidays, of 115MBF of only sawlogs. The landowner wants all the pukpwood for his own families firewood on this one. This job is only about 12 miles away.

[adirondack harvester]

Cutting a tract of about 260 acres that hasn't been touched in 60 years.  BIG pine on the job (24"-40" DBH)and it's all the JD 440B can handle.  About 1 tree per trip sometimes on the 1/3 mile drag.

[johnjbc]

I've got about 40 Oak/Hickory logs waiting at the mill site, 3 big wind blown Hemlock, and 4 wind blown White Pine that are getting old. Also found about a dozen White Pine with either Skidder Damage and/or/ Wood Pecker Holes that will go bad if I don't get them cut.
I retired last May and between new knees, a daughter with two grand sons that moved home and all the things that I " Put off until   : Retirement" I'm bogged down at home.
With a little luck, next year I'll catch up at home, get the logs sawed, and finish the cabin foundation I started in 01 :-[

[Jeff]

I wish I had a chance to get back up to De Tour and get some photos at my Neighbor Lou's place this next couple weeks. He's having a 40 acre habitat clear cut being done. He said the dozers came in yesterday to plow the snow out so they could freeze an access road in this week. Lou has several hundred acres so clear cutting this 40 doesn't even dent it. This is mostly over mature aspen, much of which is starting to fall over, with a mix of very nice spruce, Tamarack and some cedar.  This looks to be shaping into a perfect winter to do this as the snow is really piling up and the deer are yarding close enough that this will provide feed for them if it gets tough this winter.

[slowzuki]

Storing my trees on the stump since I don't know how soon the mill will be fired up in the spring.  Took the winch off and put the blower on.

[thecfarm]

I will be cutting some on my grown up pasture.I will kinda have to plow the snow out of the way.Tractor I think will go through OK,but when I get a few trees behind me,that will be the hard part.When the trail gets frozen this will be a big help.I will reallly be working in one area.Won't be running all over the woods.I haul them out limbs and all to the brush pile and than I limb the trees out.I'm trying to get this back as a field.Might have to cut the stem off and go with that and than come back and get the tops.We'll see how it all goes.This is all just firewood for me.There are hardly any trees log size.I don't run chains either.Should of bought some chains 15 years ago.Makes it hard at time,but I manage.

[Woodcarver]

I have a little aspen that should be cut.  I have to call the fellow who hauls it for me.  He has the contract with the mill.  Last year they gave him a quota of 10 loads for the first quarter of the year.  He had that much cut already when he got the quota. He quit cutting and I didn't cut any.

I doubt if the market for aspen will be any better this year.  I noticed that some of you mentioned cutting popple.  How are the markets in your areas?

[Sunfield Hardwood]

I have about 60MBF of walnut, cherry, maple, and red oak to cut, divided between 4 different jobs. I had to wait till after deer season on each one. Been working on equipment getting ready to start right after christmas.

[bull]

Hopefully starting a small cordwood cut after christmas, will keep all butts 6" and up for lumber mostly black oak,some birch and soft maple...... est 25 cords and 2500 bfd.

[Ken]

We are still forging ahead with some logging work this winter although it is quite discouraging knowing that a decent days pay is hard to come by in these market conditions.  If logging was all I did for a living I'd have to have my head examined for keeping with it. 

Our harvest is consisting largely of hardwood and birch pulpwood although we pick out whatever veneer and sawlogs we can find.  The softwood component of the  stand is being left standing until the markets improve.   We'll move somewhere around 100-125 cords/week from now until spring breakup. 

The operating conditions are just about ideal right now with our roads froze up hard and about a foot of snow cover which helps to level out the skid trails.  The only downfall to the early snow is that the ground has not frozen very well and any soft spots make skidding a bit of a challenge. 

I hope everybody has a Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Cheers
Ken

[BBTom]

I have about 140 maple trees to take down and saw this winter.  Hoping to find some veneer in it, to help offset the lower green prices. 

[Frickman]

I'm doing a fair amount of logging, along with the sawmill it's my primary source of income. We cut a good bit of special orders and farm type lumber and those markets are holding up well.