Logging on Lot 40

This page shows the logging operation, taking out 55 diseased trees, and chipping on the Samuels / Larson  Lot 40 in The Ruby Ranch, on June 28, and 29, 2006.

Mark Morgan from Morgan Timber Products from Bellvue, CO, who has very specialized and expensive pieces of equipment came in and took out 55 trees. Except for a couple of trees on a slope which were chain sawed, this was basically a 2 person operation, Mark running the machine that sheared the trees, and Zip who ran the chipper.

The two pieces of equipment can be seen here on Emerald Road:


The shearer is in the foreground on its way to our lot, and the chipper is parked further down the road.

The shearer looks like it could be used in a science fiction or horror movie.

The bottom part of the machine acts like a giant set of hydrolic scissors:


Shearer in Action

The following pictures show the shearer in action:
Here is is approaching a tree



Here the upper part of the machine with the arms to grab and lock on start to close:

Note the scissors are still open

The scissors close:



 The tree is lifted off and will be put into a pile of other trees:





and the stump remaining:


Chipper

The next day the chipper, which is on steel tank treads came in to make short work of the felled trees:






The chips left in some cases are deep and I will have to move them to spread them out, but for the most part, the chips are about two inches deep.

On paper this is the correct treatment as the bio-mass is returned to the forest floor. In practice, though, I have to wonder, as I still see clearly the chips from 9 years ago when our house was built. Decay at 9400 feet is very slow. But by chipping in place rather than trucking out, the cost per tree is half what I have paid other loggers for.


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This page last updated July 7, 2006