Cutting bushel is hard!

MatthewMMeckley

TreeHouser
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Feb 1, 2015
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Southside of Chicago
Mad respect to anyone on here who has cut bushel on the coast. Holy cow I’m smoked and I only cut 5,000 boards. I took it slow being the first day, I know I’ll get faster just trying to figure the reds and nasty ground out. Who knew the coast was steep 😂 hour and something hike in with ropes and mosquitoes. Any insight would help, Or stories would be awesome!
 
Yeah Matt it's a hard gig busheling but it all depends on the timber you're in to. Day rate is generally safer and that's why a lot of outfits have moved that direction. Columbia was still busheling up here when they last operated in southeast AK, as far as I know. Fallers tried to cut around 20 mbf per day.

Bugs are the least of your worries...(grin).
 
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Matt, besides the steep ground, the brush, the hang-ups, the huge stumps to work around, and mosquitoes, to add insult to injury, the companies just don't pay enough anymore to fall timber by the bushel.

Working for a small gypo logger on private timber land here a faller can do much better. That's the only reason I continued falling timber on the coast up to the year 2001.

It sucks, and it's been that way on the coast since the 1980s. For your hard work, sweat and daily risks you're far better off working in the forest service lands. Not here on the coast.

That's why I said earlier, "Most Sierra fallers have told me, "You can have it."
 
Matt and Katelyn are actually working for the heli (Columbia I think?). Still a logger. In which case they have to take the bad with the good. You can't always have the good.

Bad strips and low pay happen when you work for any logger. You just cross your fingers there's enough good paying strips to average out a descent seasons pay by the end.

Falling timber is hard work. There's no getting around it. And having bad strips back to back can be really discouraging.
 
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We’ll I should be done with my two bad strips, I’m just trying to prove myself and show my worth. It’s hard for climbers to break into the timber industry. All the old timers love us so we will just keep learning and working our birds off. I’ll tell ya though, these redwoods on the steep ground with little to no shots are hard. I’m scratching my head a lot to thread the needle which is impossible because of the tight canopy and delisting of trees. I am cutting my buns of with little timber and averaging 6,000 boards so far. These limb locked trees can really ruin your day 😂 I litteraly over gunned and took this shot as tight as I could get to have the tree deflect and go straight for a co dom in the middle. The bullbuck just laughed. I’ve saved almost all of my trees out and even got two 33s out of the co dom center punch.
 
Redwoods, redwoods, redwoods. Limb-locked second-growth: sucker clumps and co-dominant trees. Yeah, they can be a real puzzle for a timber faller.

Some foresters mark trees in the clumps and will tell you to cut only the marked trees. But those trees are limb-locked in others and will not fall out, even when the marked tree is cut completely off the stump. It's dangerous as hell to work on a strip with limb-locked, hung-up trees on the slope looming over you. The wind can work such trees loose at anytime. And believe me that happens.

Other foresters will mark a limb-locked tree in a clump or codom, and tell you (expect you) to cut whatever else is necessary to get the marked tree down safely. It's their strategy, so to speak, to thin the clumps.

OK, but when the whole damn clump is limb-locked what do you do? You fall the works, or you leave it. Walk away, go on to the next puzzle. Don't waste your time or risk you well-being over such a tree. It don't pay.

Remember, a human being can only do what a human being can do.

Having spent a career on the coast I've cut thousands of limb-lock scenarios. And one thing I learned is trying to do a good job (cut only the marked trees) doesn't pay. Sure, you can do it, but the company just doesn't pay enough (bushel) to take the time to do it. Go on to the next tree. Get what you can. Don't waste your time. You're there to make money without killing yourself in the interim.

It's a mind-set, Matt. When I started falling timber to make money (professional) I went broke fast. Working my butt off cutting 5 or 6 bushel a day. While all the other fallers were cutting 10 to 15 bushel a day. WTF? They kept telling me, "Jer, don't waste your time with those trees, cut short logs off the butt, and don't work the tops. Leave the crap for the landing man.

My friend Andy Dockham once told me, "Jer, timber falling is the only job I know where shitty work pays better." And it's the sad truth.

Another thing, (hot tip) in redwood sucker clumps a long handled axe is just about worthless, because so often there's no room behind the trees to swing a long handled axe, because the old-growth stump is in the way! If you try choke-up on the handle to drive a wedge hard... the head of the axe may accidentally glance off the old-growth stump, and in turn the handle will lever from your grip on it, and the bitter end hit you in the nuts or strike you in the teeth. A short handled axe, say 20 to 24 inches, works much better in the clumps. And besides, it saves on the nuts and dentist bills, too.

Luck, care, Matt.
 
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God dang you are right. All of my mentors in cutting were bushelers and told me I would do good. They said it will take a bit but don’t get discouraged and it’s the luck of the draw on who goes where or who shows up first. I’m going to give it 110 percent. I know it will get better and I’m learning more and more on each stump. It just blows my mind on how true to the gun they are but how they can be persuaded to not stay true will all the brushing up in the canopy. When I’ve climbed redwoods I thought the limbs popped off lol. I’ve learned that’s it’s good to use the others to slow them down but if they are right by each other and not a lot of forward lean. Lookout and it usually won’t go where you gunned. I’ll be giving you a ring this week Mr. B
 
Nope, it refers to being paid by the amount of wood you fall, limb and buck, instead of an hourly wage.
I'm a bushel faller.
... what is a Bushel ? , here ... say the independent loggers working on International Paper Lands get paid "by the thou" or multiples of one thousand bf. How many board feet in a bushel ?
 
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