the tree was leaning back on the side of the back cut and a small diameter. too small to be able to set a wedge into the cut with the bar of the saw still in the cut. so what you do is make your back cut first, set the wedge (but not giving it any lift) and then opening up the face cut. then in theory all that's left to do is drive the wedge in until the tree falls. this one just wasn't playing along...
For newbies: Humboldts are better for uphill since the help keep the butt log from sliding back at you. Also you want “stump shot” in that case, back cut a couple inches high.
in some cases, yes. the biggest safeguard to keep the tree sliding back across the stump is the raised back cut, no matter which method you decide to use. however, the raised back cut does pose a greater risk in fir for example of "barberchairing" as the pressure against the hinge can cause the bole to split... had it happen to me several times. there are also some hardwoods that can and will split and barberchair as well. the only real good way to deal with that problem is to throw a chain and binder around the bole just above the cut and cinch it down really good. guys down in california working in the redwoods have to do that a lot in the bigger stuff.
I build power lines and never claimed to be a logger in any fashion but I do use a chainsaw almost daily and have had to remove trees as well as cut down poles, looking at potentially logging some property and very thankful for any information I can find. I never really used wedges and usually was able to cut to fit or if supper critical used rigging (tree falling into energized or not, power lines) to get it done safely. I appreciate all the info you are sharing.
the backloaded cut is really helpful in small diameter trees that are often subject of removal along powerline rights-of-way. in alaska i used that cut extensively along a national park boundary and down in washington along a powerline right-of-way north of spokane. it's a lot of hard work as you're pounding wedges most of the working day, but it's a lot cheaper than paying for a downed power line or a service outage... thankfully i never had to, but i do know of a few guys that did...lol in this video the backloaded cut didn't go as planned as the crown of the tree wasn't heavy enough to push through the canopy. the recovery is a separate video. thanks for watching and commenting!! and hopefully you were able to get some useful info out the video!
Is it possible to use a tool called a porta-power hydraulic spreader ? I’ve seen them open very narrow seams in various materials . Just a thought rather than beating all of those wedges in place..
there are dedicated tree jacks that are deployed when you have a leaner that needs a bit more persuasion to bring it down. the porta-power spreader would only work in very small diameter wood. they just don't generate the kind of lifting power you need to bring a larger tree, say 10inches or larger, to fall and would most likely only break or bend the jaws. when it comes to using a dedicated tree jack (which are insanely expensive - north of $1500 for a one cylinder model) you still have to use wedges as to keep the seals from blowing out on the lift cylinder and pump. it's not unheard of to have 50 to 60 tons of pressure and even more pushing down on a tree jack or wedges. also keep in mind that if the crown is picking up any kind of a slight breeze you could be putting an additional 20 to 30 tons of pressure on the cut. there is a formula for figuring out just how much force is being applied, but it's been a while since i've had to do any math... lol not my strong suit... up in alaska i got to use a really good tree jack that had a pressure gauge on it and it redlined at 60tons. i hit that threshold pretty consistently and when pounding wedges for an assist you could see just how much relief was being introduced with each strike of the axe head on the wedge. it was crazy. a porta power jaw lift is designed more for pliable materials like sheet metal after an impact and deformation. i don't know how much they're rated for, but my enerpac is only rated for 10tons with a maximum stroke of 10mm or 3/8 of an inch. so i don't really think it would be the best option to use something like that. a big ass bottle jack for semis would be a better choice, you just have to cut out the appropriate size notch.
I'm not surprised there is a logging notch named after Humboldt Country, CA where I live now. When your dealing with MASSIVE coast redwoods that conventional cut would be loads more wood and loads more money lost. There's a place up here called trees of mystery and a place called confusion hill that have the history of logging and loggers and their super hero Paul Bunyan. The automated tools they had back then were huge but I bet they beat using a huge 2 man saw. The loggers here invented a steam donkey to lift the insanely large trees from valleys. One really cool place still around here is a place called the Samoa cookhouse which used to be a logging companies cookhouse for their workers. Come to think of it, logging really is a big part of California and the west in general. I've been to sugar pine railroad outside Yosemite national park, to where I live now there's at least 4 lumbermill's here in Humboldt I drive by on a daily basis and my brother in law works a mill over in the valley. Apparently it's just as essential in Alaska and probably Oregon/Washington as well.
to be honest i don't really know where the cut takes it name from, but i have heard about your version quite often so that's very likely where it came from. my guess is that it came about with advent of chainsaws. trying to chop a humboldt face cut with an axe is virtually impossible. the old timers in that neck of the woods left high stumps that a few outfits logged back in the late 80's because they still had enough usable wood in them that it was economically feasible. when PALCO went public and started clearcutting their holdings in order to liquidate their huge debts thanks to that slime hurwitz, the price of redwood lumber dropped sharply. the high stumps were left because of the crazy cross grain that goes about 10 feet up the bole from the base. that's why the old pictures show guys on springboards during felling operations with their 10, 12 and up to 14 foot long crosscut saws. the cross grain would pinch down hard on those long crosscut saws and so by going up a little further they would get into wood that didn't pinch nearly as hard. but they still used the conventional face cut when felling by hand. there used to be quite a few steam donkeys rusting away in the mountains of western washington and after mount st. helens popped off several of them were resurrected to help with the salvage of downed timber as modern equipment just isn't built to handle any wood that big. there are only one or two still in operational condition in museums, none that i'm aware of still in commercial use. while working for columbia helicopters, we had a job on the Tosten ranch near Garberville, CA where a third cut from a doug fir came in to the landing and the cat 980c couldn't pick it up.. so the operator rolled it around on the log landing and onto a truck that was sitting below the landing... the second cut and buttcut were too punky to send in so they get left out in the brush.. no telling how big they were but that 3 log load went to the mill 10 000lbs overweight. sadly, most of the mills in the western states are gone, the few remaining are barely hanging on. clinton and his goofy sidekick al gore gutted most of the forest and mining industry in the western states. during the last days of the reagan administration the forest service conducted large inventory surveys and found that more wood was growing than being harvested. so they came up with the sustainable forest initiative and were going to match the harvest to the rate of growth. that would have increased the cut by another 30% or so. the granolas went totally apeshit. again, we have PALCO to thank for most of that stupidity as they were harvesting their redwood stocks on sustainable basis, but when the Murphy family pulled their stunt and went public with the company, some wallstreet raiders bought up most of the stock, broke up the company, hurled it from 91mio in the black into 750mio in the red.. they started clearcutting and left nothing but a moonscape in their wake... anyway, i rant again.. thanks for watching and mostly: for commenting.. that makes a huge difference in how the content gets disseminated by the algorithm
I really enjoyed your videos on seasoning timber, it inspired me to go to trade school and train as a logger. I'm going back to trade school to do my second year with a paper in milling.
actually no. unfortunately the camera didn't pick it up, but the crowns of the trees are too close together. the tree had a strong lean down the hill and the diameter on the stump was too small to set a wedge in the conventional way. had it been later in the day when the winds pick up, the tree may have fallen due to the stirring of the crowns but then there would have also been the risk of it breaking off the hinge and going some other random direction. cutting out a tree in a dense stand is always tricky business and they usually hang up in situations like this one. and mixed stands are even worse because of the varying strength of the limbs that block the fall. also, this tree didn't have any real weight in the crown or in the upper reaches of the bole to generate enough downward pressure to break free of the interfering limbs. thanks for watching, commenting and critiquing!!
I learned to bore from FISTA when starting out. Now I do it almost exclusively and then put in a wedge. Definitely try that on the smaller ones. Eliminates futtsing with notch and hinge while releasing the tree and wedging. Hinge and notch always done first.
the pre-loaded back cut was a demonstration of the technique of how to fell a small diameter tree against its lean. there are often situations where you can't set a wedge in small diameter wood without the thing setting back on the cut and pinching your bar. there are plenty of scenarios where you simply can't dump the tree with the lean even after pinching the bar. i've done a lot of cutting along power line right-of-ways, next to houses and along national park boundaries. in those settings you simply do not have the luxury of being able to lay out the tree willy-nilly. that's where the back loaded undercut really comes in handy
thanks! i heard about him a long time ago when i was still working for columbia helicopters. Lou Childress, one of the loader operators i used to work with knew him personally and some of his songs. on rain days we'd sit around the fire on the log landing and i'd give him my gitt-fiddle and he'd whip out a few songs.. we'd be rolling on the ground laughing....
thanks! yes, that works too. i've done it both ways. there are situations where that comes into play. most guys don't know about the sight line on the case of the saw which helps in lining up the cuts. thanks for watching and commenting!
As an east coast guy I never used or learned a humboldt until I worked with a guy from Washington state. He used humboldt exclusively. I can’t do it, tried on stumps a few times and struggle getting the cut lined up. He does the straight gunning cut first then does the undercut, his line up great, I feel uncomfortable holding the saw at that weird angle.
practice makes perfect. i had a hard time at first too. when starting out, it's recommended that you start on timber your bar can reach thru comfortably. when you've cut a few dozen you'll start to get the hang of it. then you can move on to other timber sizes. as crazy as it sounds, smaller timber is actually tougher than larger stuff. thanks for watching and commenting!!
now here's a question i have been waiting for since i first started the series :-) in some species, it is easy to spot the stump rot. spruce has a distinct "bottle butt" that runs out where the rot runs out. normally spruce is fairly cylindrical in shape from the root wad all the way to the crown. so any abnormality in that shape can be a good indicator for hidden rot. the tree is trying to outpace the growth of the rot with growth of it's own and as the fungus spreads unevenly, the growth of the tree is also uneven. a cat face is another good indicator of rot in the butt. it usually happens when the tree is injured by skidding activity or another tree falling and striking another. burls and similar shaped growths can also be good indicators for hidden rot further up in the bole *now if the cat face/rot is in a location away from the direction you want the tree to fall, you may have to put in your cuts well above the the cat face/rot and then cut the stump down to a more acceptable size afterwards. cat face rot can go up into the bole quite a ways so you have to proceed with extreme caution and pay close attention to the thickness of the shell. and no matter what: never cut past the corners of the undercut. driving wedges in such trees to aid in the fall is almost impossible and not recommended. usually the shell is too thin to support the kind of weights and forces that are being exerted on the wedges and crushes them into the shell without affecting any kind of lift. so you need to be certain that the where you place the undercut is also where the tree wants to go and where you want it to go.* i've cut western hemlock in alaska that were over 4 feet in diameter on the stump, had the appearance of being totally healthy but only had an inch to inch and a half of shell. they would collapse and crumble into themselves as they started to fall. so it's pretty important to have an open escape route to get away from the stump if you such a situation. in instances like that, the tree will go wherever it damn well wants to, so make sure you know where it's going and be sure to get out of the way. another way to get a rot-butt tree on the ground is by "crippling up" the tree and using another to knock it over. that is a procedure that is extremely dangerous and should only be used by very experienced folk on occasions where no other option is available. using rigging to assist in the fall is also always extremely dangerous as well as any little wind gust can topple the tree as you climb up it attach any cables... big pucker factors there... you need lines that are much longer than the tree is tall and equipment that outweighs the thing by at least twice. i've seen yarders get pulled over by falling trees so i don't recommend it as a first line solution
Nice video , but you mentioned PPE ( Personal Protective Equipment) I see that you're wearing safety glasses but I dont see any gloves or hearing protection.
the ear plugs are hard to see. down on the stump the engine noise gets to be painful, but yes, i did have earplugs in. the earmuff type hearing protection makes me sweat like a horse. even in the dead of winter cutting at 20 below they get to be too hot for me so i have always opted for the earplugs. some guys like the earmuffs better, they reduce the noise about the same although some brands claim to lower it more than earplugs. i like the earplugs better when conditions are super brushy like we had over in Dayton, WA. we literally had to cut trail to each tree in places..so the last thing you want or need is ANYTHING snagging on the brush. gloves are, and have been an optional piece of gear. the only time they come out is when the chain flips off the bar and needs to be rolled back on. other than that they also get to be too hot for me. the T-mac hardhat is an obvious piece of protective gear, some of the other stuff i was wearing isn't readily visible such as the liners in the tin pants. some guys prefer chaps, which do work well and i wore them for many years as well but then i found liners and got away from chaps as they tend to snag on everything as well. cheers mike
22:10...this looks like everything not to do based on my tree felling book "to fell a tree complete guide to felling and woodcutting methods" amazon...i cant stress enough the info in this book...
stacking wedges is not any kind of safety violation or no-no. it is a very common practice to get more lift when a tree is either hung up like it was in this case or leans so hard that the lean has to be overcome with additional lift. hydraulic jacks are often used in instances like that as well and there is even specialized equipment purpose built for that as well. a tree jack is INSANELY expensive so when you're doing a one off tree like this, investing in one isn't really a viable option. while such books can be a good source of information, they often leave out tips like in this video out of fear of liability when some greenhorn gets himself into trouble, they are not as complete as they purport to be. even the users manual from husqvarna has some really good useful tips even one about springpoles that is really good. there is no substitute for experience, so i would recommend anyone who wants to pick up a saw to tag along with an old faller or even doublejack for a while if possible. the forest service puts on S212 wildland chainsaws which is a really good course. unfortunately they only allow people who are training as firefighters to enroll in it. the info in the printed part of the course is perhaps the best i've seen in printed form. while there are a point or two of contention i have with it, overall it's by far the best i've ever seen. and anyone who knows me, knows i am NOT any kind of fan of government publications or anything related to the feds. since i haven't seen or read the book you reference in your comment, i can't say how complete it is or if the info in it is valid or useful. no doubt there are some really good points, however bear in mind that such publications are ALWAYS incomplete as every felling situation is unique, otherwise the books would be thousands of pages long. there is no such thing as "textbook" situations out in the real world. there are some that come close, but again they are all unique in some way which is why i put this video together. also bear in mind that in a real world commercial setting, this video would have been a mere 5 mins or less long because of the speed at which a faller has to operate as not to go broke working. thanks for commenting and sharing a source of info that may benefit other viewers who read the comments!
Just came across your channel. Thanks, you do a thorough and clear job of explaining items. Have you done a chainsaw sharpening video? I'm still struggling to get a really sharp edge on mine.
yes, i do have a sharpening video planned. due some professional changes in the last year i had to put it off a little longer than i wanted to. if you have any questions about the subject in the meantime you can fire away and i'll do the best i can to get you an answer and help you get better results. cheers mike
@@HolzMichel thanks for the reply. No specific questions, i can just tell your chain is a lot sharper than mine! Looking forward to more of your videos.
Looks like you created a dutchman that caused your hanger. I always open my notches more, just feel better having more control over the fall. You definitely have skills, but I think you overshot your cut a tad.
no, the camera angle doesn't show how the limbs in the crown were intertwined and didn't allow it to fall out. not enough weight in the thing to allow gravity to do its job
no, not really. it might have been an option, however the tree in this instance was not cut across the hinge sufficiently to bring it to fall. when i went and tickled the hinge again with the saw it went over pretty easily. there were many factors at work here why this tree was a little tough getting it to go over. there was enough holdback with the limbs of the surrounding trees, the hinge again not being cut enough and then the rearward lean of the tree were all contributing factors. now, keep in mind that a fatter wedge will be much harder to drive into the cut as the pressure will many times more. that's why i stacked the wedges in the cut to create "a fatter wedge" when in fact i was only beating one in at a time and not the complete stacks of 2. by beating one wedge at a time, it was creating enough lift to get more tilt. as i mentioned in the video, a thinner, longer wedge will create more lift than a fat one because of leverage. it will take much less force to drive the thinner wedge into the cut than the fat one with the downward pressure being equal. another way to look at this problem: a thin bladed axe will penetrate much deeper on a swing than say a maul or an axe with a greater wedge angle on the cutting edge. which is why some axes have very thin cutting edges and others don't, they have very different purposes. once the tree leans past the center of gravity it will go over, the blue dotted vertical line was put into the shot to highlight that. a fatter wedge is also prone to bouncing out of the cut. one thing you can do to keep the wedges from bouncing out of the cut is to throw a little handful of dirt into the cut before inserting the wedges and also putting some in between the wedges before inserting them. this creates enough friction to hold them in place but still allows them to be driven in. wedges are usually textured for this purpose but that texturing doesn't always work as well as intended, especially in frozen sap wood. thanks for watching, commenting and throwing your question out there! all these sorts of interactions help the channel grow.
You've clearly been doing this for a long time and are confident in your experience and abilities. But, I would never work felling with you. I use methods and practices that are both safer and more efficient.
ya, sure... the only method that's safer and more efficient is a feller buncher. this video was a slow-mo demonstration of the process. under "normal" circumstances the whole thing would have been over in under two minutes. and that's not an exaggeration either. when you're out there busheling, a tree has to be hitting the ground every five to ten minutes. anything taking more time will cost you your job... as i mentioned in the video, every tree is unique, every felling situation is unique. the reason i was called in for this project was due to the size of the tree (the property owner is wise enough to realize the limits of his skills) and the complexity of getting the tree down. what looks like a garden variety situation, was anything but. this video was not intended to be a "how-to" video. it is intended to illustrate the process of the humboldt undercut and a variation of the normal face cut
I've watched maybe 50 felling videos and no one ever made a back cut below the hinge, no matter what direction of fall. Are you sure that was a good idea?
had you paid attention and read the subtitles in the video, the back cut fell below the hinge because i came around the tree going downhill. normally the back cut should be on the same plane as the under cut or slightly higher. when coming around and dropping down slightly the back cut tends to fall below the face cut. this is not optimal. it doesn't really affect the physics of the process in a negative way. so no, it's not a good idea...it's just the way things went
Sometimes lining the cuts up doesn't go perfectly, that's just how it goes sometimes. I don't know your experience level but if you are an amateur try it sometime, especially on trees bigger than the width of the bar...it's not as easy as you may think. You will find that it is an acquired skill to do a perfectly lined up back cut. It took me practice to get good at it.
i spent well over 20 years at it...it happens to ALL of us. if it doesn't then you're not doing much out there. it's the way it goes. rarely does a tree fall the way a guy wants it to. they come close often enough but you're always standing there at the butt end going: "shit... it needed to be just a little bit more off that away..."
Why did you do the back cut before the face cut? Ive never seen that before, all of everything shows and says you need the face cut first. And Why such an even hinge? It looked to be right inline with the face and back. Doesnt this defeat the purpose of a hinge?
The reason for making a back cut first is. If you have a tree especially a small diameter tree, that is leaning in the opposite direction of intended fall. It makes it possible to get wedges set before the tree sets back. As for making the hinge at the same level as the face cut. On a humdolt style face cut. It's less wood wasted and makes it easier to not cut past your hinge. However on a "farmers style face cut" also known as a conventional face cut. There needs to be a step up or what I call a stump shot about 2" up from the face. This will prevent the tree from slipping back off the stump. This is especially important when falling up hill. This is not as important on the Humboldt because a humdolt as the tree falls it pushes the tree (in most situations) away from the stump.
@@chrisnotyou in certain cases yes. But there is a lot of factors that go into deciding if it's safe to do. Such as how sound is the tree i.e. rotted, dead, half dead. Other factors are amount of lean, tree type and limb weight. It's not a way to cut a tree down. Unless you have a good amount of experience falling trees of different species and different wood structure. As this gentleman in the video said ever tree you come across is different and needs to be addressed as so.
You can also use a boring technique to establish your face cut and hinge first and still get your wedges in. This standard technique works unless tree is really small diameter.
@@jakel.2346 the boring technique is best done when a tree is leaning so hard, that it will barberchair as the chain gets closer to the hinge of the cut. especially in hardwoods, the tension can be extreme and the tree will split itself to pieces during the cutting procedure. since the faller is often right behind the saw during the cut, barberchairing is extremely dangerous as it often releases suddenly without any warning. once in a while you know it's coming when you see cracks starting to form running up the bole starting at the chain in the cut. that's when you know it's time to get off to the side and have to rely on your cleared escape path. some doofus at Silver Bay logging once came up with the notion to turn and run away from the falling tree in the opposite direction. since falling trees will throw all sorts of stuff as they fall, or in instances of barberchairing, this is NOT any kind of good idea.
@@HolzMichel ok I come from South Africa and on the farm in Knysna we had some tree chopped out the tree feller climbed up high and strapped the tree then used a truck to pull it to make sure it went a certain way as well as the facecut direction but i thought man if that tree had gone just a few degrees the other way their little truck would be thrown like a toy. He chopped down a beautiful cedar and a masssive bluegum The ceder chunks still smell amazing. I have been in our forrests in Cape Town when we had very very hot summer one year and a huge branch just fell off a very large tree. The forrest ranger said they do that they drop their own branches. Is this true?
@@johnpontes812 sorry about the late reply, yes, some tree species can and do drop limbs although most succumb to some form of rot when they drop off more than being a phenotypical trait. other species have really brittle limbs that break off during wind or severe precipitation events such as snow. forks can also break since they are often a weak point in the tree and more often than not a source where fungi can enter the bole and weaken it.
It's not banned in Europe per say but people just aren't in the habit of it. A topic of vigorous debate but the truth is I just don't know why. Our machinery for extraction in the past was years behind Americas so stumps had to be as flush to the ground as possible that's the only real reason I can think of. That being said people have Been cutting trees for thousands of years just fine before the humboldt
I thought you did an excellent job of instructing how to cut down the first tree. On the second (smaller) tree you cut down you should have also used a 90-deg cut on the uphill side since that is where you intended it to go. Also, you should NEVER have stood downhill of that tree when it became hung up in the canopy, and the only thing holding it while it was leaning was the hinge. There is no way for you to be 100% certain the tree is not rotten or hollow in the center. Take a good look at that cut on the uphill side of the cut/stump while it is leaning. At that moment while the tree is leaning, IT IS READY TO PLOW DOWNHILL. And quite possibly pin you or someone else to to the ground. Also, the back cut is not 2" above face cut. That is not a light tree. I really think this second example is a bad one on how to cut a tree uphill. Been sawing/felling trees over 40 years. Nice video.
thanks for the critique Glen, as you know there is more than one way to skin a cat. the second tree wasn't going anywhere, and it was a tad difficult to see in the footage. it's one of those instances where you had to be there. the camera doesn't always show the specifics which is why i put the disclaimer in the first part of the video, each tree, each situation really is unique in its own rite. check out the second video about how we got the dirty pig down.. it didn't go anything as planned determining rot in the butt of a spruce is really straight forward. one: look for bottle butt, and two: look for discoloration in the chips on the face cut and back cut. the lean on the tree was so slight it couldn't push off the stump even with gale force winds.. it didn't pick up much lean even after getting it off the stump. in the end we pulled it out with the winch on the tractor and brought it to fall that way. that wasn't recorded so there wasn't any footage. my bad it was also my intent that the tree slide back off across the stump once it broke off the hinge which is why i kept the face cut shallow. uphill felling is always tricky at best, there is no magic formula or set rule on how to do it safely. it also appeared there would be enough weight in the crown to push it down through the canopy and backwards off the stump.. it's been an awful long time since i've cut in a truly mixed stand. out west it's all conifers and very little if any deciduous timber so that plan went south as soon as the thing hung up... and putting a step in the back cut would have also nixed the plan. keep in mind that in a commercial setting you have literally seconds to gauge the situation, come up with a cutting plan and execute it. you don't have half a day to doddle around and figger out where you're gonna put your lay in...you'll either go broke or get fired. if you're only making $25/MBF, a tree has to be hitting the ground every 5 to 8 minutes or you can pack up and go home... i cut commercially in the pacific northwest for well over 20 years from southeast alaska all the way down to southern california and am not a proponent of raising the back cut above the hinge. i've had many a second growth grand fir, western hemlock and lodge pole pine barber chair on me doing just that, after the forest service and OSHA came out and mandating we do that. there is so much stored energy in small timber which makes the most dangerous of class sizes to cut. every greenhorn or newby underestimates it, more guys have been killed in little wood than you can shake a stick at. what is sometimes called "safe" turns out to be not safe at all. i don't want to get into a pissing contest here, but some of the asinine things OSHA has come out with over the years often defies any reason or logic. i view this more as an attempt of political activists to push people out of the woods with their stupidity rather than a real improvement of safety. i have yet to meet an OSHA inspector or anyone in that outfit who has ever cut timber commercially for a living. every one them i have ever met has been nothing more than a desk jockey who had a hard time telling spruce from fir. i have also trained many a landing sawyer and a few fallers in my day and have never had a single injury on my watch. only one pair of nicked chaps on the student logging crew at Uof I on the Nokes property fire break project in McCall ID that were still serviceable after being turned in at the end of the season. there will be a safety video in the lineup. it's a subject that is deep and broad. the gear i use has withstood the acid test of the most brutal and remote conditions in a logging setting. you don't survive southeast alaska by counting on luck. some of my comrades didn't make it home in one piece and i've had to help pack out some of them as well... so yes, safety is a big issue.
@@jakemesa3211 the name doesn't ring a bell. but it's certainly possible. there was a whole bunch of guys i worked with in alaska for silver bay logging whose names i never did catch, likewise with columbia helicopters. i do vaguely recall an older guy by the name of Phil who got his leg pinched in between a stump and the butt end of a log and blew his whistle for several hours before someone finally heard him and cut him out. that accident happened right after silver bay implemented new "safety" rules where we had to turn our backs on falling trees and run away. it wasn't long after that another guy named dennis was struck by a hemlock that split like a banana as it was falling and he was running away. he did survive, but his timber cutting days were over. Phil never came back either.
@@HolzMichel that may have been him. He worked for silver bay for a while in the mid 90's and broke his small toe in a similar sounding incedent. He also worked for a company called high country timber. And they where contracted to cut a lot of heli ground for Columbia. Did that all through the late 90's and early 2000's. From cresent city down to Central California. No matter any way. Just thought maybe you had worked with him at some point. Since you both have seamed to work a lot of the same areas. Thanks for the reply!
Looks like that (backcut first) was closed on that Dutchman. All and all, nice job. Thank you for taking the time to share the knowledge
the tree was leaning back on the side of the back cut and a small diameter. too small to be able to set a wedge into the cut with the bar of the saw still in the cut. so what you do is make your back cut first, set the wedge (but not giving it any lift) and then opening up the face cut. then in theory all that's left to do is drive the wedge in until the tree falls. this one just wasn't playing along...
For newbies: Humboldts are better for uphill since the help keep the butt log from sliding back at you. Also you want “stump shot” in that case, back cut a couple inches high.
in some cases, yes. the biggest safeguard to keep the tree sliding back across the stump is the raised back cut, no matter which method you decide to use. however, the raised back cut does pose a greater risk in fir for example of "barberchairing" as the pressure against the hinge can cause the bole to split... had it happen to me several times. there are also some hardwoods that can and will split and barberchair as well. the only real good way to deal with that problem is to throw a chain and binder around the bole just above the cut and cinch it down really good. guys down in california working in the redwoods have to do that a lot in the bigger stuff.
@@HolzMichel Midwest/eastern “game of logging” bore and trigger techniques relieve the danger of ‘chairs🤙🏻
Beatiful felling.. kind grettings from Europe! Keep on the good work!
I build power lines and never claimed to be a logger in any fashion but I do use a chainsaw almost daily and have had to remove trees as well as cut down poles, looking at potentially logging some property and very thankful for any information I can find. I never really used wedges and usually was able to cut to fit or if supper critical used rigging (tree falling into energized or not, power lines) to get it done safely. I appreciate all the info you are sharing.
the backloaded cut is really helpful in small diameter trees that are often subject of removal along powerline rights-of-way. in alaska i used that cut extensively along a national park boundary and down in washington along a powerline right-of-way north of spokane. it's a lot of hard work as you're pounding wedges most of the working day, but it's a lot cheaper than paying for a downed power line or a service outage... thankfully i never had to, but i do know of a few guys that did...lol
in this video the backloaded cut didn't go as planned as the crown of the tree wasn't heavy enough to push through the canopy. the recovery is a separate video.
thanks for watching and commenting!! and hopefully you were able to get some useful info out the video!
Is it possible to use a tool called a porta-power hydraulic spreader ? I’ve seen them open very narrow seams in various materials . Just a thought rather than beating all of those wedges in place..
there are dedicated tree jacks that are deployed when you have a leaner that needs a bit more persuasion to bring it down. the porta-power spreader would only work in very small diameter wood. they just don't generate the kind of lifting power you need to bring a larger tree, say 10inches or larger, to fall and would most likely only break or bend the jaws.
when it comes to using a dedicated tree jack (which are insanely expensive - north of $1500 for a one cylinder model) you still have to use wedges as to keep the seals from blowing out on the lift cylinder and pump. it's not unheard of to have 50 to 60 tons of pressure and even more pushing down on a tree jack or wedges. also keep in mind that if the crown is picking up any kind of a slight breeze you could be putting an additional 20 to 30 tons of pressure on the cut. there is a formula for figuring out just how much force is being applied, but it's been a while since i've had to do any math... lol not my strong suit...
up in alaska i got to use a really good tree jack that had a pressure gauge on it and it redlined at 60tons. i hit that threshold pretty consistently and when pounding wedges for an assist you could see just how much relief was being introduced with each strike of the axe head on the wedge. it was crazy.
a porta power jaw lift is designed more for pliable materials like sheet metal after an impact and deformation. i don't know how much they're rated for, but my enerpac is only rated for 10tons with a maximum stroke of 10mm or 3/8 of an inch. so i don't really think it would be the best option to use something like that. a big ass bottle jack for semis would be a better choice, you just have to cut out the appropriate size notch.
Thank you for your thorough explanation.
I'm not surprised there is a logging notch named after Humboldt Country, CA where I live now. When your dealing with MASSIVE coast redwoods that conventional cut would be loads more wood and loads more money lost. There's a place up here called trees of mystery and a place called confusion hill that have the history of logging and loggers and their super hero Paul Bunyan. The automated tools they had back then were huge but I bet they beat using a huge 2 man saw. The loggers here invented a steam donkey to lift the insanely large trees from valleys. One really cool place still around here is a place called the Samoa cookhouse which used to be a logging companies cookhouse for their workers. Come to think of it, logging really is a big part of California and the west in general. I've been to sugar pine railroad outside Yosemite national park, to where I live now there's at least 4 lumbermill's here in Humboldt I drive by on a daily basis and my brother in law works a mill over in the valley. Apparently it's just as essential in Alaska and probably Oregon/Washington as well.
to be honest i don't really know where the cut takes it name from, but i have heard about your version quite often so that's very likely where it came from. my guess is that it came about with advent of chainsaws. trying to chop a humboldt face cut with an axe is virtually impossible. the old timers in that neck of the woods left high stumps that a few outfits logged back in the late 80's because they still had enough usable wood in them that it was economically feasible. when PALCO went public and started clearcutting their holdings in order to liquidate their huge debts thanks to that slime hurwitz, the price of redwood lumber dropped sharply.
the high stumps were left because of the crazy cross grain that goes about 10 feet up the bole from the base. that's why the old pictures show guys on springboards during felling operations with their 10, 12 and up to 14 foot long crosscut saws. the cross grain would pinch down hard on those long crosscut saws and so by going up a little further they would get into wood that didn't pinch nearly as hard. but they still used the conventional face cut when felling by hand.
there used to be quite a few steam donkeys rusting away in the mountains of western washington and after mount st. helens popped off several of them were resurrected to help with the salvage of downed timber as modern equipment just isn't built to handle any wood that big. there are only one or two still in operational condition in museums, none that i'm aware of still in commercial use.
while working for columbia helicopters, we had a job on the Tosten ranch near Garberville, CA where a third cut from a doug fir came in to the landing and the cat 980c couldn't pick it up.. so the operator rolled it around on the log landing and onto a truck that was sitting below the landing... the second cut and buttcut were too punky to send in so they get left out in the brush.. no telling how big they were but that 3 log load went to the mill 10 000lbs overweight.
sadly, most of the mills in the western states are gone, the few remaining are barely hanging on. clinton and his goofy sidekick al gore gutted most of the forest and mining industry in the western states. during the last days of the reagan administration the forest service conducted large inventory surveys and found that more wood was growing than being harvested. so they came up with the sustainable forest initiative and were going to match the harvest to the rate of growth. that would have increased the cut by another 30% or so. the granolas went totally apeshit. again, we have PALCO to thank for most of that stupidity as they were harvesting their redwood stocks on sustainable basis, but when the Murphy family pulled their stunt and went public with the company, some wallstreet raiders bought up most of the stock, broke up the company, hurled it from 91mio in the black into 750mio in the red.. they started clearcutting and left nothing but a moonscape in their wake...
anyway, i rant again.. thanks for watching and mostly: for commenting.. that makes a huge difference in how the content gets disseminated by the algorithm
I really enjoyed your videos on seasoning timber, it inspired me to go to trade school and train as a logger. I'm going back to trade school to do my second year with a paper in milling.
that's awesome! hope it works out well for you. best of luck!
That Last tree was a hanger because you left alot of uncut wood and you had a little dutchman there that's why it traveled little and then stopped.
actually no. unfortunately the camera didn't pick it up, but the crowns of the trees are too close together. the tree had a strong lean down the hill and the diameter on the stump was too small to set a wedge in the conventional way. had it been later in the day when the winds pick up, the tree may have fallen due to the stirring of the crowns but then there would have also been the risk of it breaking off the hinge and going some other random direction.
cutting out a tree in a dense stand is always tricky business and they usually hang up in situations like this one. and mixed stands are even worse because of the varying strength of the limbs that block the fall.
also, this tree didn't have any real weight in the crown or in the upper reaches of the bole to generate enough downward pressure to break free of the interfering limbs.
thanks for watching, commenting and critiquing!!
@@HolzMichel thanks for sharing and making the time to respond.
Nice seeing a pro at work. I picked up some good tips.
I learned to bore from FISTA when starting out. Now I do it almost exclusively and then put in a wedge. Definitely try that on the smaller ones. Eliminates futtsing with notch and hinge while releasing the tree and wedging. Hinge and notch always done first.
the pre-loaded back cut was a demonstration of the technique of how to fell a small diameter tree against its lean. there are often situations where you can't set a wedge in small diameter wood without the thing setting back on the cut and pinching your bar. there are plenty of scenarios where you simply can't dump the tree with the lean even after pinching the bar. i've done a lot of cutting along power line right-of-ways, next to houses and along national park boundaries. in those settings you simply do not have the luxury of being able to lay out the tree willy-nilly. that's where the back loaded undercut really comes in handy
Many thanks for sharing your knowledge.
You are correct about European health and safety
Awesome music. I learned a whole new genre today. Buzz Martin is now on my playlist!
thanks! i heard about him a long time ago when i was still working for columbia helicopters. Lou Childress, one of the loader operators i used to work with knew him personally and some of his songs. on rain days we'd sit around the fire on the log landing and i'd give him my gitt-fiddle and he'd whip out a few songs.. we'd be rolling on the ground laughing....
Nice job. Me personally, I always make the angle cut first on a face/humboldt cut. I just find it easier to get things lined up that way.
thanks! yes, that works too. i've done it both ways. there are situations where that comes into play. most guys don't know about the sight line on the case of the saw which helps in lining up the cuts.
thanks for watching and commenting!
Brilliant song well done
As an east coast guy I never used or learned a humboldt until I worked with a guy from Washington state. He used humboldt exclusively. I can’t do it, tried on stumps a few times and struggle getting the cut lined up. He does the straight gunning cut first then does the undercut, his line up great, I feel uncomfortable holding the saw at that weird angle.
practice makes perfect. i had a hard time at first too. when starting out, it's recommended that you start on timber your bar can reach thru comfortably. when you've cut a few dozen you'll start to get the hang of it. then you can move on to other timber sizes. as crazy as it sounds, smaller timber is actually tougher than larger stuff.
thanks for watching and commenting!!
What do you do when there is rot in the trunk and one of the cuts may be removing the only strength member?
now here's a question i have been waiting for since i first started the series :-)
in some species, it is easy to spot the stump rot. spruce has a distinct "bottle butt" that runs out where the rot runs out. normally spruce is fairly cylindrical in shape from the root wad all the way to the crown. so any abnormality in that shape can be a good indicator for hidden rot. the tree is trying to outpace the growth of the rot with growth of it's own and as the fungus spreads unevenly, the growth of the tree is also uneven.
a cat face is another good indicator of rot in the butt. it usually happens when the tree is injured by skidding activity or another tree falling and striking another.
burls and similar shaped growths can also be good indicators for hidden rot further up in the bole
*now if the cat face/rot is in a location away from the direction you want the tree to fall, you may have to put in your cuts well above the the cat face/rot and then cut the stump down to a more acceptable size afterwards. cat face rot can go up into the bole quite a ways so you have to proceed with extreme caution and pay close attention to the thickness of the shell. and no matter what: never cut past the corners of the undercut. driving wedges in such trees to aid in the fall is almost impossible and not recommended. usually the shell is too thin to support the kind of weights and forces that are being exerted on the wedges and crushes them into the shell without affecting any kind of lift. so you need to be certain that the where you place the undercut is also where the tree wants to go and where you want it to go.*
i've cut western hemlock in alaska that were over 4 feet in diameter on the stump, had the appearance of being totally healthy but only had an inch to inch and a half of shell. they would collapse and crumble into themselves as they started to fall. so it's pretty important to have an open escape route to get away from the stump if you such a situation. in instances like that, the tree will go wherever it damn well wants to, so make sure you know where it's going and be sure to get out of the way.
another way to get a rot-butt tree on the ground is by "crippling up" the tree and using another to knock it over. that is a procedure that is extremely dangerous and should only be used by very experienced folk on occasions where no other option is available.
using rigging to assist in the fall is also always extremely dangerous as well as any little wind gust can topple the tree as you climb up it attach any cables... big pucker factors there... you need lines that are much longer than the tree is tall and equipment that outweighs the thing by at least twice. i've seen yarders get pulled over by falling trees so i don't recommend it as a first line solution
Nice video , but you mentioned PPE ( Personal Protective Equipment) I see that you're wearing safety glasses but I dont see any gloves or hearing protection.
the ear plugs are hard to see. down on the stump the engine noise gets to be painful, but yes, i did have earplugs in. the earmuff type hearing protection makes me sweat like a horse. even in the dead of winter cutting at 20 below they get to be too hot for me so i have always opted for the earplugs. some guys like the earmuffs better, they reduce the noise about the same although some brands claim to lower it more than earplugs. i like the earplugs better when conditions are super brushy like we had over in Dayton, WA. we literally had to cut trail to each tree in places..so the last thing you want or need is ANYTHING snagging on the brush.
gloves are, and have been an optional piece of gear. the only time they come out is when the chain flips off the bar and needs to be rolled back on. other than that they also get to be too hot for me.
the T-mac hardhat is an obvious piece of protective gear, some of the other stuff i was wearing isn't readily visible such as the liners in the tin pants. some guys prefer chaps, which do work well and i wore them for many years as well but then i found liners and got away from chaps as they tend to snag on everything as well.
cheers
mike
22:10...this looks like everything not to do based on my tree felling book "to fell a tree complete guide to felling and woodcutting methods" amazon...i cant stress enough the info in this book...
stacking wedges is not any kind of safety violation or no-no. it is a very common practice to get more lift when a tree is either hung up like it was in this case or leans so hard that the lean has to be overcome with additional lift. hydraulic jacks are often used in instances like that as well and there is even specialized equipment purpose built for that as well. a tree jack is INSANELY expensive so when you're doing a one off tree like this, investing in one isn't really a viable option.
while such books can be a good source of information, they often leave out tips like in this video out of fear of liability when some greenhorn gets himself into trouble, they are not as complete as they purport to be. even the users manual from husqvarna has some really good useful tips even one about springpoles that is really good.
there is no substitute for experience, so i would recommend anyone who wants to pick up a saw to tag along with an old faller or even doublejack for a while if possible.
the forest service puts on S212 wildland chainsaws which is a really good course. unfortunately they only allow people who are training as firefighters to enroll in it. the info in the printed part of the course is perhaps the best i've seen in printed form. while there are a point or two of contention i have with it, overall it's by far the best i've ever seen. and anyone who knows me, knows i am NOT any kind of fan of government publications or anything related to the feds.
since i haven't seen or read the book you reference in your comment, i can't say how complete it is or if the info in it is valid or useful. no doubt there are some really good points, however bear in mind that such publications are ALWAYS incomplete as every felling situation is unique, otherwise the books would be thousands of pages long. there is no such thing as "textbook" situations out in the real world. there are some that come close, but again they are all unique in some way which is why i put this video together.
also bear in mind that in a real world commercial setting, this video would have been a mere 5 mins or less long because of the speed at which a faller has to operate as not to go broke working.
thanks for commenting and sharing a source of info that may benefit other viewers who read the comments!
Just came across your channel. Thanks, you do a thorough and clear job of explaining items. Have you done a chainsaw sharpening video? I'm still struggling to get a really sharp edge on mine.
yes, i do have a sharpening video planned. due some professional changes in the last year i had to put it off a little longer than i wanted to. if you have any questions about the subject in the meantime you can fire away and i'll do the best i can to get you an answer and help you get better results.
cheers
mike
@@HolzMichel thanks for the reply. No specific questions, i can just tell your chain is a lot sharper than mine! Looking forward to more of your videos.
the video on sharpening chain is up and running in case you haven't seen it yet!
Nice channel! Cool music also!
Looks like you created a dutchman that caused your hanger. I always open my notches more, just feel better having more control over the fall. You definitely have skills, but I think you overshot your cut a tad.
I know I am quite off topic but does anybody know of a good site to stream newly released series online?
@Chandler Moshe flixportal :)
@Cruz Krew thank you, I went there and it seems to work :) I really appreciate it!!
@Chandler Moshe glad I could help :)
no, the camera angle doesn't show how the limbs in the crown were intertwined and didn't allow it to fall out. not enough weight in the thing to allow gravity to do its job
14:40 would a bigger wedge have been better to get the tree to go or is the same size wedge better? Awesome video by the way, I learned so much
no, not really. it might have been an option, however the tree in this instance was not cut across the hinge sufficiently to bring it to fall. when i went and tickled the hinge again with the saw it went over pretty easily. there were many factors at work here why this tree was a little tough getting it to go over. there was enough holdback with the limbs of the surrounding trees, the hinge again not being cut enough and then the rearward lean of the tree were all contributing factors.
now, keep in mind that a fatter wedge will be much harder to drive into the cut as the pressure will many times more. that's why i stacked the wedges in the cut to create "a fatter wedge" when in fact i was only beating one in at a time and not the complete stacks of 2. by beating one wedge at a time, it was creating enough lift to get more tilt. as i mentioned in the video, a thinner, longer wedge will create more lift than a fat one because of leverage. it will take much less force to drive the thinner wedge into the cut than the fat one with the downward pressure being equal.
another way to look at this problem: a thin bladed axe will penetrate much deeper on a swing than say a maul or an axe with a greater wedge angle on the cutting edge. which is why some axes have very thin cutting edges and others don't, they have very different purposes.
once the tree leans past the center of gravity it will go over, the blue dotted vertical line was put into the shot to highlight that.
a fatter wedge is also prone to bouncing out of the cut. one thing you can do to keep the wedges from bouncing out of the cut is to throw a little handful of dirt into the cut before inserting the wedges and also putting some in between the wedges before inserting them. this creates enough friction to hold them in place but still allows them to be driven in. wedges are usually textured for this purpose but that texturing doesn't always work as well as intended, especially in frozen sap wood.
thanks for watching, commenting and throwing your question out there! all these sorts of interactions help the channel grow.
HolzMichel Holy cow. Thanks for taking the time to answer my question. Subbed and liked, hope your channel grows in popularity
You've clearly been doing this for a long time and are confident in your experience and abilities. But, I would never work felling with you. I use methods and practices that are both safer and more efficient.
ya, sure... the only method that's safer and more efficient is a feller buncher. this video was a slow-mo demonstration of the process. under "normal" circumstances the whole thing would have been over in under two minutes. and that's not an exaggeration either. when you're out there busheling, a tree has to be hitting the ground every five to ten minutes. anything taking more time will cost you your job...
as i mentioned in the video, every tree is unique, every felling situation is unique. the reason i was called in for this project was due to the size of the tree (the property owner is wise enough to realize the limits of his skills) and the complexity of getting the tree down. what looks like a garden variety situation, was anything but. this video was not intended to be a "how-to" video. it is intended to illustrate the process of the humboldt undercut and a variation of the normal face cut
HolzMichel Very professional response. I’m new to tree felling and just wanted to watch a informative video thank you for making it.
I've watched maybe 50 felling videos and no one ever made a back cut below the hinge, no matter what direction of fall. Are you sure that was a good idea?
had you paid attention and read the subtitles in the video, the back cut fell below the hinge because i came around the tree going downhill. normally the back cut should be on the same plane as the under cut or slightly higher.
when coming around and dropping down slightly the back cut tends to fall below the face cut. this is not optimal. it doesn't really affect the physics of the process in a negative way. so no, it's not a good idea...it's just the way things went
Sometimes lining the cuts up doesn't go perfectly, that's just how it goes sometimes. I don't know your experience level but if you are an amateur try it sometime, especially on trees bigger than the width of the bar...it's not as easy as you may think. You will find that it is an acquired skill to do a perfectly lined up back cut. It took me practice to get good at it.
i spent well over 20 years at it...it happens to ALL of us. if it doesn't then you're not doing much out there. it's the way it goes. rarely does a tree fall the way a guy wants it to. they come close often enough but you're always standing there at the butt end going: "shit... it needed to be just a little bit more off that away..."
Why did you do the back cut before the face cut? Ive never seen that before, all of everything shows and says you need the face cut first. And Why such an even hinge? It looked to be right inline with the face and back. Doesnt this defeat the purpose of a hinge?
The reason for making a back cut first is. If you have a tree especially a small diameter tree, that is leaning in the opposite direction of intended fall. It makes it possible to get wedges set before the tree sets back. As for making the hinge at the same level as the face cut. On a humdolt style face cut. It's less wood wasted and makes it easier to not cut past your hinge. However on a "farmers style face cut" also known as a conventional face cut. There needs to be a step up or what I call a stump shot about 2" up from the face. This will prevent the tree from slipping back off the stump. This is especially important when falling up hill. This is not as important on the Humboldt because a humdolt as the tree falls it pushes the tree (in most situations) away from the stump.
@@jakemesa3211 Danke, so back cut on a leaner first?
@@chrisnotyou in certain cases yes. But there is a lot of factors that go into deciding if it's safe to do. Such as how sound is the tree i.e. rotted, dead, half dead. Other factors are amount of lean, tree type and limb weight. It's not a way to cut a tree down. Unless you have a good amount of experience falling trees of different species and different wood structure. As this gentleman in the video said ever tree you come across is different and needs to be addressed as so.
You can also use a boring technique to establish your face cut and hinge first and still get your wedges in. This standard technique works unless tree is really small diameter.
@@jakel.2346 the boring technique is best done when a tree is leaning so hard, that it will barberchair as the chain gets closer to the hinge of the cut. especially in hardwoods, the tension can be extreme and the tree will split itself to pieces during the cutting procedure. since the faller is often right behind the saw during the cut, barberchairing is extremely dangerous as it often releases suddenly without any warning. once in a while you know it's coming when you see cracks starting to form running up the bole starting at the chain in the cut. that's when you know it's time to get off to the side and have to rely on your cleared escape path.
some doofus at Silver Bay logging once came up with the notion to turn and run away from the falling tree in the opposite direction. since falling trees will throw all sorts of stuff as they fall, or in instances of barberchairing, this is NOT any kind of good idea.
So what happened to that hanger?
check out the next video in the series ;-)
@@HolzMichel ok I come from South Africa and on the farm in Knysna we had some tree chopped out the tree feller climbed up high and strapped the tree then used a truck to pull it to make sure it went a certain way as well as the facecut direction but i thought man if that tree had gone just a few degrees the other way their little truck would be thrown like a toy.
He chopped down a beautiful cedar and a masssive bluegum
The ceder chunks still smell amazing.
I have been in our forrests in Cape Town when we had very very hot summer one year and a huge branch just fell off a very large tree.
The forrest ranger said they do that they drop their own branches.
Is this true?
@@johnpontes812 sorry about the late reply,
yes, some tree species can and do drop limbs although most succumb to some form of rot when they drop off more than being a phenotypical trait. other species have really brittle limbs that break off during wind or severe precipitation events such as snow. forks can also break since they are often a weak point in the tree and more often than not a source where fungi can enter the bole and weaken it.
This guy is dangerous
lol
That isn't fair. You don't deal with the hanger when that's the biggest challenge.
that's why it's whole separate video...
Good videos! 👍
Yes
It's not banned in Europe per say but people just aren't in the habit of it. A topic of vigorous debate but the truth is I just don't know why. Our machinery for extraction in the past was years behind Americas so stumps had to be as flush to the ground as possible that's the only real reason I can think of. That being said people have Been cutting trees for thousands of years just fine before the humboldt
The American way definitely seems to have a ruthless efficiency to it
I thought you did an excellent job of instructing how to cut down the first tree. On the second (smaller) tree you cut down you should have also used a 90-deg cut on the uphill side since that is where you intended it to go. Also, you should NEVER have stood downhill of that tree when it became hung up in the canopy, and the only thing holding it while it was leaning was the hinge. There is no way for you to be 100% certain the tree is not rotten or hollow in the center. Take a good look at that cut on the uphill side of the cut/stump while it is leaning. At that moment while the tree is leaning, IT IS READY TO PLOW DOWNHILL. And quite possibly pin you or someone else to to the ground. Also, the back cut is not 2" above face cut. That is not a light tree. I really think this second example is a bad one on how to cut a tree uphill. Been sawing/felling trees over 40 years. Nice video.
thanks for the critique Glen,
as you know there is more than one way to skin a cat. the second tree wasn't going anywhere, and it was a tad difficult to see in the footage. it's one of those instances where you had to be there. the camera doesn't always show the specifics which is why i put the disclaimer in the first part of the video, each tree, each situation really is unique in its own rite. check out the second video about how we got the dirty pig down.. it didn't go anything as planned
determining rot in the butt of a spruce is really straight forward. one: look for bottle butt, and two: look for discoloration in the chips on the face cut and back cut.
the lean on the tree was so slight it couldn't push off the stump even with gale force winds.. it didn't pick up much lean even after getting it off the stump. in the end we pulled it out with the winch on the tractor and brought it to fall that way. that wasn't recorded so there wasn't any footage. my bad
it was also my intent that the tree slide back off across the stump once it broke off the hinge which is why i kept the face cut shallow. uphill felling is always tricky at best, there is no magic formula or set rule on how to do it safely. it also appeared there would be enough weight in the crown to push it down through the canopy and backwards off the stump.. it's been an awful long time since i've cut in a truly mixed stand. out west it's all conifers and very little if any deciduous timber so that plan went south as soon as the thing hung up... and putting a step in the back cut would have also nixed the plan.
keep in mind that in a commercial setting you have literally seconds to gauge the situation, come up with a cutting plan and execute it. you don't have half a day to doddle around and figger out where you're gonna put your lay in...you'll either go broke or get fired. if you're only making $25/MBF, a tree has to be hitting the ground every 5 to 8 minutes or you can pack up and go home...
i cut commercially in the pacific northwest for well over 20 years from southeast alaska all the way down to southern california and am not a proponent of raising the back cut above the hinge. i've had many a second growth grand fir, western hemlock and lodge pole pine barber chair on me doing just that, after the forest service and OSHA came out and mandating we do that. there is so much stored energy in small timber which makes the most dangerous of class sizes to cut. every greenhorn or newby underestimates it, more guys have been killed in little wood than you can shake a stick at.
what is sometimes called "safe" turns out to be not safe at all. i don't want to get into a pissing contest here, but some of the asinine things OSHA has come out with over the years often defies any reason or logic. i view this more as an attempt of political activists to push people out of the woods with their stupidity rather than a real improvement of safety. i have yet to meet an OSHA inspector or anyone in that outfit who has ever cut timber commercially for a living. every one them i have ever met has been nothing more than a desk jockey who had a hard time telling spruce from fir. i have also trained many a landing sawyer and a few fallers in my day and have never had a single injury on my watch. only one pair of nicked chaps on the student logging crew at Uof I on the Nokes property fire break project in McCall ID that were still serviceable after being turned in at the end of the season.
there will be a safety video in the lineup. it's a subject that is deep and broad. the gear i use has withstood the acid test of the most brutal and remote conditions in a logging setting. you don't survive southeast alaska by counting on luck. some of my comrades didn't make it home in one piece and i've had to help pack out some of them as well... so yes, safety is a big issue.
@@HolzMichel Thanks for the reply. I understand things can look different on camera. Thanks.
@@HolzMichel have you ever cut with a guy named Phil branstetter? Seems you have cut a lot of the same places?
@@jakemesa3211 the name doesn't ring a bell. but it's certainly possible. there was a whole bunch of guys i worked with in alaska for silver bay logging whose names i never did catch, likewise with columbia helicopters. i do vaguely recall an older guy by the name of Phil who got his leg pinched in between a stump and the butt end of a log and blew his whistle for several hours before someone finally heard him and cut him out. that accident happened right after silver bay implemented new "safety" rules where we had to turn our backs on falling trees and run away. it wasn't long after that another guy named dennis was struck by a hemlock that split like a banana as it was falling and he was running away. he did survive, but his timber cutting days were over. Phil never came back either.
@@HolzMichel that may have been him. He worked for silver bay for a while in the mid 90's and broke his small toe in a similar sounding incedent. He also worked for a company called high country timber. And they where contracted to cut a lot of heli ground for Columbia. Did that all through the late 90's and early 2000's. From cresent city down to Central California. No matter any way. Just thought maybe you had worked with him at some point. Since you both have seamed to work a lot of the same areas. Thanks for the reply!
Not a hanger
well unfortunately that dirty pig was hung up but good.. the next video will show in how i got it off the stump... lol
Yeah had a couple hang up good on me this year.Only good thing about a hanger less chance of busting up the tree your cutting.
if you're not hanging one up once in a while you're not doing much...lol it's all part of the game. they're a pain in the ass no matter what tho...
Nice cutting
Never seen anyone cut below the undercut also I think you had too much holding wood with a Dutchmen
19:50. Cut first, clean after.
For real?
yup, for real. guess you get 'em on the ground on the first try every time and are the top feller in your area?
@@HolzMichel no, but I always clean up the joint before working.
Shoot yourself as an example.
That branch is blocking the view and is irritating me 🤨
yeah...i didn't see it setting up the camera. my bad
Love the video tho i just practice that cut yesterday
Your face cut closed up and that’s what caused the issue. Should have cleaned out the undercut