drinksloe

Seen the dreaded orange chips a few times when I worked on the railways. Saws were often carried in the hoppers as sometimes a long walk in Luckily never happened to my saw, usually just the rear handle got slightly chipped

Not sure if the barrier fencing will work, infact might just become a hazard to the deer if they carry on fraying their antlers. But the time for fraying could be almost over as most roe should be in hard antler shortly. U might get a small amount of fraying in 4 to 8 weeks time when bucks marking territories for the rut (breeding season) Often with territorial marking u often see a wee triangle off scrapped ground below the tree too. In the past when u had more forest rangers controlling deer they would actually leave the large bucks near vulnerable young tree crops, as they will hold a larger area and keep many small bucks away. Small bucks cause far more damage as often more of them competing showing off against each other. Modern deer management tends to be more about purely numbers so very few good mature bucks are left as a 'stand' buck Deer tend to always fray on smaller trees rather than mature 1s andd tend to favour willow, some old school foresters would plant sacrificial willow purely fort the deer to fray/mark Nic I've never heard of roe or fallow ring barking trees, but reds definitely will. Some will also bore score the trees too ( usually red, sola and occasionally fallow

Aye as woody said likely time for roe to be fraying the last off there velvet off there antlers

I think u might struggle to get owt out off the digger driver. U should off never gave him permission to use ur saw anyway Wot did u say to the boy at the time?? It might seem strange if u never said anything at the time. I would off been absolutely raging at the time. Might not be wot u want to hear if saw was still going well, but in reality if u have worked that saw hard for 10yrs it doesnae really owe u anything. Might have to take it on the chin and NEVER loan ur saw to anyone. Could off been worse could off been a new saw he flattened

Also remember u can only do a bat survey from may till sept ish' before they go to hibernate in winter roosts. So if u suspect a bat roost u will have to wait till then to see if active or not.

Just to get this thread straight ur calling these folk cowboys,, scum bags and thieves etc for doing exactly wot they priced for and doing a tidy job. How do u know they weren't just workers doing exactly wot was on there job sheet. And to be fair makes no odds wether boss or not as tennant doesnae have the right to tell u to cut trees down anyway,, they don't know if the owner agrees or not. Also not all trees in the hedge are part of the hedge, they could be standards. I imagine if the lads cut down these 2 hardwoods when there job sheets said only conifers etc they would have hell to pay if they complained about those trees being cut down. Ur calling these folk scumbags etc but u have admitted pricing EVERY job high just incase u get an extra job to do. Wot happens if u don't get that extra job I've just ripped them off. Seems massively hypocritical to accuse others of being thieves for not doing extra when upcharge extra to everybody all the time I bet u must be busy, doubt many mind reading gardeners around, know to add to ur quote for jobs u haven't been asked to do yet

It will depend on the moorland, not all would resort to woodlands. Plenty in Scotland that are unmanaged and don't resort to trees. As for proper muirburn, tends to be different for sheep or grouse. Sheep tend to be tartar bigger areas, whereas grouse will be loads of small areas. For the very reason open space mentions above young shoots as per to areas of old heather for cover, nesting. Also any muirburn should off been finished last month unless over 2000 feet. So all finished before bird nesting season. Plus with a muirburn ur only burning the vegetation when done right a natural burn can go deeper into the peat so resulting in losing stored carbon and erosion water contamination etc, so can take longer to recover from.

Chances are any wildlife value would be minimal due to everyone letting there dogs run off lead. At this time of year free running dogs can cause massive damage to ground nesting birds, doesn't have to kill them just disturbing them a few times is enough to make them desert a nest.

Matty is right it's just ascam. I bought a small area off woodland and even built a load of bat boxes for it, but never put them up as will just make any future management ackward and cost me money. Bizzarely thou if the bat box rots or falls off the tree the tree is no longer protected and there is no obligation for u to replace the box. So motto is use really crap string if u want to put 1 up

I think every district seems to have its own policy, or at least they did have. The district where I live only had 1 harvester/forwarder and then ended up with just a forwarder doing 40 hour weeks until he retired. But districts either side had quite a few each or at least did have Kielder used to have a squad off subby cutters/Brasher's that were there full time but that could be going back 10 years now. Think most districts did back then but doesnae seem as common now.

I'd 2nd wot SP said above, all out on the new nightmare tendering system. I know a couple off lads that used to work full time exclusively for FC doing all new roadsides and brashing inspection racks or mountain bike tracks etc 1 lad has had the contract for the same district for years if not decades not sure if he got back in this time. In this area most FC harvesting work is subbed out or wood bought standing so the contractors will just pay the boys the usual rates as they would elsewhere. Don't think the local district has a single cutter left despite the amount of bodies Inthe office, far too many chiefs and no Indians. Really wonder how they justify the staffing levels esp when woods not managed that we'll in first place compared to other landowners

Probably the best advice given is leave alone if not confident, up to landowner/shoot to get someone in that can do the job safely. A lot could easily go wrong with a tree like that esp when surrounded by so many others. Hang it up u could have real problems. The ratchet strap is good advice, ur idea about putting cut in higher is also good, but guessing from photo might be too high so cutting at a dangerous hieght Really without a winch that tree will only fall 1 way hard to tell from photo if that way is clear and away from pen Must admit I'd tell the keeper to leave it more hassle than it's worth the chances off it falling down in the 2 weeks birds are actually in the pen is very slim

The 1 or 2 problems u will still have is electric winches are still not designed for constant or regular use and are sore on battery. I'd be worried if ur using the winch to drag brash us burn motor out and/or flatten the pick up battery. I know when I used to do more snow ploughing on a quad constantly lifting the plough would really strain the battery and lights would dim and gear changes slow down ( electric shift gears) after an hour or so. And that's with the bike running constantly and very short light pulls, nothing like the long drags ur talking about

We had them on tracked chippers on the railways years ago Used them more for accessing dodgy areas (up/down) seriously steep slopes and occasional pulling trees over. If u have anchor point high enough surprising wot it pulled. Electric winches are hard on the battery if winching a lot. Possibly I'd look at a hydraulic winch and take a feed of the rollers or buy a petrol 1 as mentioned

Must admit know little about horses but think they would really struggle, done a lot of cutting on peatwork sites. Not easy walked It might depend exactly wot vegetation is on top of the peat. Dunno how big he woods are or how much timber u have to come off but if the amount is small enough that horses could cope may be other lgp vehicles could cope. I'd imagine an argo and log arch would pull a similar amount to a horse. Or soft tracks, haaglund, glen almonds etc could ferry it to roadside with out a track

Do those photos links still work. Can"t get anything to come up although on a new tablet thingy which I"m struggling to work. If have a look on ABS services site they make skyline systems and I see they do sell those fancy carriges things although I've never seen any crews using them. The few I've seen have all been the digger type with the extension on the job.

I'd 2nd wot others have said about the massive expense of post and rail plus horses chewing it. Electric is brilliant on a fence. But most of the serious horsey bits round me ( racing horse breeders trainers) started using a type of fence I don't even know wot u call it. A sort of rubber material about 4-6 or even 8 inch wide that u thread HT wire along top and bottom. Looks quite well and visible to the horses. Fixed on posts with flat bracket things If u do go for post and rail u I've seen them run either a plain wire or metal banding strip along top off rail to stop thechewing

I've cut for them before and a mate owned 1 fora while Quite often the 360/skyline wasn't on site. I could be wrong but never heard of uk skylines using the fancy carriges like in America/TV. The principles aren't that complicated really and in UK most I've seen are converted 360's. Usually don't have all the many guy ropes u see in america, Also they don't use the tooters either, just a radio to boy in cab who controls everything. Used double drum winches and once a proper skyline in ' high lead ' set ups, which is just a drag line with a back haul on the 2 nd drum. For a true skyline set up is really need at least 3 drums ( sky line, in/out lines) Been looking at making myself a set up but gets into big money quite quickly and not sure the real demand. Most of the skylines I know spend more off their time parked up in yards/woods than working Starting a job this month where a mini skyline would be handy Got to abseil down 2 cliff faces/steep sides felling all the trees mainly Havel and some bigger ash and sycamore. Stil not 100% sure how I'll get timber out yet, will figure it out thou. Access is a bit tricky to say.least

Alright Was just wondering how people over come any issues of rubber tracks on steeper inclines esp in wet/soft/greasy conditions?? The tracked barrow (with chapper conversion) and mini digger (with chapper on boom) have been sliding all over the place last few days, been on some very steep ground and u can see the slide marks. The boss must of had a good 30m slide yest when i was cutting elsewhere and had a good 1 last week and slid onto the road down a 4ft near vertical drop, how never rolled/damaged machine i'll never know. I was scared just watching it. Have any of u tried somehow attaching forestry type grousers to the tracks to give a bit more grip and try to stop the top turf just letting 'go'?

Must admit i'd rather be the oppisate, putting ur felling cuts into a tree with a winch already attached and getting the hell out off the way before any pressure/movement put on the dead tree. Don't get me wrong i wouldnae fancy battering hi lifts in to get it over for the exact same reason But putting the cuts into a static tree isn't much more dangerous than walking/standing under it Been around load sof softwood harvesters and when there pullig trees down they put a lot of pressure on tree limbs and soft woods dont tend to snap off generslly. I have heard of odd limbs/widow makers spearing down into harvester cab roofs. Usually not that much real wieght in them, but certainly wouldnt fancy a major ash limb coming down on the roof (possibly it might shatter, but still be changing boxers time) I'm not a harvester operator but i imagine if ur reaching up when u sever the tree ur digger arm will be supporting the whole wieght of tree 4-5m's? off ground, it would wnt to come vertically down fast. Dunno i ur hydralics would be strong/quick enpough to swng it to the side the way harvesters do with softwoods at ground level. Would imagine could easy tip the digger if u get it wrong. Or crown could catch on the 4-5m high tottem pole u've just left knocking it over or crown shattering everywhere or creating some sort of barbers chair/see saw type thing?? I've seen full sized harvesters have to let go of trees when doing some bigger stuff incase it would take them over bankings (but i may be wrong as like i said not a harvester driver)

Will a problem with machine harvesting not be the machine is directly in the danger zome if any big branches come off as it wrestles it to the deck?? I have to admit not familar with harvester in hardwoods or ash dieback yet (fortunately) But i wouldn't fancy being sat in a machime directly belwo some big brittle dead limbs just waiting to fall as u pull it down throu the canopy

It all depends on the timber but i often split logs around the 500mm (just over 18") mark with an axe, don't get me wrong sometimes can be a pain with big beech rings so usually cut the shorter now, plus u can hardly move them at the bigger size. I treated myself to a Fiskars X27 and a great investment for the money (about £50) just effort less to use i genrally fil my 6T dumper skip in about 1hr. With ur 500mm burner, do logs have to be that size? ie could u cut everything to 250 and build 2 logs into ur burner instead of 1? Can u use gravity to help u anyway? I dump my logs on top of a banking, i then welded up a saw horse that is very narrow and can take 2-3 quad trailer fulls of logs in 1 go, strap them all down then just cut throu all the logs together (not saying best paractice for H&S thou) they then roll down hill to wher ei have a splitting bench dug into banking. So splitting logs at waist hieght, never have to bend down (esp if using a tyre or similar) and logs all above me usually just pul them down with the axe. In the process of planning/building a 'log slide' for the wee'er timbe rthat doesnae need split. Same log horse and the idea is cut timber will drop of onto a corragated/box profile tin slide and straight down into dumper skip. In theory Getting it al to roll down might be a problem The way i look at it if i can minimise handling as much as possible esp lifting of deck/bending down the better. Esp if gravity can do the lifting for me

Must admit i've only ever used semi chisel. Got a few proper saw shops round me still selling mainly to pro forestry cutters and thats wot they sell on the counter rolls unless u ask for something else. On my wee'er saws i think it is a 21/22 (depending on saw colour white or orange or even red) i think LP is the letters, but really haven't a clue. I just buy wot they give me, buy it all local anyway so they know me and wot i do. Only ever used oregon chain, its not that dear and it end of day no point in having a grat saw if ur using sh*te chains tryin gto save a quid or 2. Did u not used to buy tungeston? tipped chains, we're a bit dearer but lasted longer esp on dirty wood, mind an old boy i used to work for years ago running them for respacing work for FC, (cutting wee trees/natural regen out of thicket stage crops/ really thinnings of timy trees, but would hit soil rocks quite a bit due to the nature of job, weren't doing felling cuts) i was young and too tight to buy them then (now i'm old and still too tight ?)

Andy is a top bloke

Sorry no probs