Standing Stem Logging

[RC0]

If you've never heard of this. The selected trees in a forest are stripped, topped and appropriately flagged. They are then cut at the bottom all for a strip of holding wood in the centre....and picked by sky crane helicopter at a later date. A better alternative to clear cutting I believe. Some climbing and topping footage. Western red cedars upto about 150ft x 5ft dbh.

 

Use HD setting. Thank

 

[atree]

Great experience Reg,How many trees where you doing a day?

[paddyvero]

Cool spot Reg. Were you using a wire core cinched up by the topping cut to mitigate any risk of the stem splitting?

Thanks

[Gray git]

540xp then back to a 201 what's going on 😉

Cool work, looks tiring up N down on spikes like that but at least no tidy up.

[MattyF]

Cool work reg, a friend of mine was talking about going out and doing this a few years back but said how many you were expected to do in a day and I thought Hmm could probably manage it for one day then need a week off.

[Dinan]

Cool, second growth cedars are good to climb, the old growth big old veterans are tough. The bark will catch your strap on the other side of the tree, than you have to walk around and free it, all the time. Trees that are like 6-8 ft. at the butt (after the swell).

I windfirmed on the Charlottes (Haida Gwai) for a while, same kind of thing. You guys do swing from tree to tree do you not? Guys I know used claws to swing, like a grappling hook. We would rappel down say 70 ft. from 150 ft. then kick off and catch a branch from a tree beside us, and then pull ourselves over. We were not allowed to use a hook.

Working out in the bush on a heli show is fun. Kind of miss it.

[Andrew McEwan]

Great vid, link below to an article on the harvesting

 

http://depts.washington.edu/sky2001/proceedings/papers/Cleaver.pdf

 

Be good to see the sort of grapple they use on the helicopter

[Tommy_B]

Reg, Do you have any involvement in the cutting at the base for removal? If so can you elaborate on the cuts used?

 

Thanks

[treequip]

Great vid, link below to an article on the harvesting

 

http://depts.washington.edu/sky2001/proceedings/papers/Cleaver.pdf

 

Be good to see the sort of grapple they use on the helicopter

 

I would like to see that grapple to

[RC0]

Thanks

 

You get 6 hours up there....or supposed to. We never seemed to get enough time before having to down tool and make haste back to the heli pad for pick up. How many youd get done depends on how far you had to hike to and between each tree. If you had 6 x 100ft trees stood together you might get all 6 done. But many of the big ones were 4-5 ft dbh and 150ft tall. So 3-5 on average. very steep ground and 2 feet of snow the first couple days. We had so much gear to pack to and up the trees....because theres no help on the ground. Getting to some of the trees was often harder than the climbing itself.

 

Much of the time I was climbing and cutting with just a single flipline. Climbline packed away until I needed to rappel at the end. When I got into thinner wood Id use a second flipline, as it didn't hinder me so much and made it a little safer in case I gaffed out. So when I went to top the trees Id often detach the second flipline but leave it around the stump, which is probably what you saw paddy.

 

A friend lent me the 201tc to try out. That's why you see flashes of it.

 

Dinan. That hill had never been logged previous. But the head guy who has the contract referred to it as hurricane growth. Thereby the original forrest had been mostly levelled by a storm a few hundred years ago, and since grew back. Still some 8-9 ft dbh trees left up there, but they were al spared.

 

The stringy bark on some of the bigger wide trees was a nuisance, yes. Because your flipline is totally maxed out, so you cant leave it loose, and then it cuts in at the back like you say. Yes we clawed a few that within reach. Saves a lot of effort, even you you just get to bypass the first 50ft on the bigger trees.

 

I'm due back there next week