Marking trees for first thinning

[Mrblue5000]

I have a felling license got for first thinning a small woodland with roughly half Norway and half Sitka spruce. I have already selected trees that I want to keep, these are painted with an orange band at roughly dbh. My question is what is the best way to mark rack lines and forked trees that will be coming out at first thinnings within the next 12 months or so?

 

Are there specific colours for trees that are to be felled. Would a blaze mark with an axe or billhook be better than a colour? I searched on the site but the threads on the topic are over 10 years old.

[Stubby]

1 minute ago, Mrblue5000 said:

I have a felling license got for first thinning a small woodland with roughly half Norway and half Sitka spruce. I have already selected trees that I want to keep, these are painted with an orange band at roughly dbh. My question is what is the best way to mark rack lines and forked trees that will be coming out at first thinnings within the next 12 months or so?

 

Are there specific colours for trees that are to be felled. Would a blaze mark with an axe or billhook be better than a colour? I searched on the site but the threads on the topic are over 10 years old.

Red angled slash type mark round here . 

[Will C]

What ever works for you, as long as everyone on site knows the score.

[Stubby]

2 minutes ago, Will C said:

What ever works for you, as long as everyone on site knows the score.

This .

[Vedhoggar]

You could mark your racks with biodegradable marking tape which comes in various colours (70m roll £3.95 plus vat) or PVC tape which also comes also in different colours (£3.45 plus vat for 46m roll) if tape likely to be on trees quite a while, there is no standard colouring used for racks or marking trees. Trees to be felled can be marked on two sides with tree marking paint being consistent with sides marked, any colour will do be some colours stand out better than others. Trees to come out can of course be blazed with a hatchet but physically easier with spray paint (a dot each side of tree will do), if you change your mind you cannot remove a blaze mark and have damaged the tree where as paint can be normally be scraped off.

[Brushcutter]

Marking trees is a personal thing. I swap between using tape and spray. I really dislike blazing because it's easy to miss one when cutting. 

 

When choosing your marking colour choose something that contrasts nicely against the tree. Don't mark Pines and Larches in reds and orange as the don't show up well. Watch out for red and green as colourblind cutters might not see all the marks(true story).

 

If marking a big area I do like using the Finnish marking system which uses tape. Red is the boundary if the knot on the tape faces you, you are within the boundary. Corners have two red ribbons on. You should be able to see ribbons down the line of trees.

 

Blue ribbon marks environmental features. Could be waterways to avoid, nesting birds etc don't cut or cross into blue tape area.

 

Orange is for racks when you were marking them. Tape on every 5 to 10  or so tree so you can see where the rack goes.  Depending on if you are rack distances are somewhere between 5 and 7 rows normally slightly wider if hand cut.migjt be some ghosting racks in there. Basically if you have a 10m crane on the harvester he will reach 10m ish from that rack. The next rack will let the machine reach back to almost the same point.