Swamp Loggers ?

[diggerdave1958]

Thanks, mitch504. Now i know how they cut them to length. I have been thinking about this for awhile we see them throwing the butts of the logs into piles and i don't think they have shown the saw? Also what is Corbertts part of this, they buy the land or the trees and hire Bobby to cut/process/truck them to the mill do they own the mill? or are they a middle man between Bobby and the mill ??

 

[mitch504]

I have never dealt with any of the Corbett companies (I do work for other dealers in that area)but there are two listed with the NC Div. of Forest Resources; Corbett Package Co., which is a hardwood sawmill and crate and pallet manufacturer; and Corbett Timber CO., which seems to be a typical wood dealer. I am not sure how closely related the two are.
Normally the way it works around here, and it fits with what I've seen on the show, the dealers find standing wood, cruise it to determine how much wood is on the tract and how valuable it is, and then buy the wood from the landowner, either as a lump sum sale, or per ton with different prices for the different grades recovered. The price the landowner gets depends on many variables such as whether the dealer or landowner is responsible for such things as, replanting, road construction or maintenance, deck cleanup, and site prep(making the tract ready to plant again).
Once the dealer gets the contract he usually has to get all the permissions from the landowners whose land they have to cross, and then will call someone like me to build or repair the road, and then get a logging contractor like Bobby to fell and delimb the wood then cut and sort it into the different grades. Right there is where the loader operators determine if the dealer makes a profit or not. The logger is usually paid a flat rate per ton shipped regardless of grade. The fastest and easiest wood to process is the pulpwood (Bobby's probably usually goes to International Paper at Riegelwood NC) because the standards are much less strict, but the dealer and the landowner probably only gross $3-7/ton each. Then there are different grades and species of logs that the dealer gets various prices from. It is not unusual for there to be 6 or 7 different products going to 4 or 5 different mills off one deck. A pallet mill like Corbetts usually just buys the cheaper hardwoods and then other mills buy the pine and higher hardwoods. It is the dealers responsibilty to negotiate the best price from all the products, and it is not unusual for it to change from day to day what mill is taking what or who has the best price.

It is common for a dealer or mill to own some timberland but not near enough to supply 100% of their production. Even the giants like IP and Westvaco only took some of the wood off their land to their own mills. The rest was sold to whoever offered the best price.

There was an earlier question about quotas. The quota is given to the dealer who may have 2 to 20 loggers. When quotas are tight the competition among loggers under a dealer can get fierce. Probably what happened on that show was another Corbett contractor stuffed that mill with that grade of wood to get all that quota. When quotas are tight you see bunches of loaded log trailers outside the mill gates and then at the moment the quota resets you'll see trucks dropping and hooking trailers like mad, sometimes filling a weeks quota by lunchtime.

I hope I didn't tell you way more than you wanted to know. rofessor ointhead

 

[tippatone]

That's it exactly, the buck saw lays beside the loader and is connected by hoses. It has a frame to measure the logs against (because on doubledeck sawlogs most mills only give a 3" tolerance on length) and a large chainsaw bar(the one in the pictures is 42")



What you're thinking about is a CTL (cut-to-length) harvester, which cuts the trees to log length in the woods. They are common in the northeastern US but rarer than hen's teeth in the southeast. I have worked in and around the timber industry for over twenty years and have only seen one and it was a demo.
The three step process you're describing is typical of a dry land logger here but swamp loggers also have shovel machines which are very similar to the track log loaders he uses on the deck. The shovels have several duties. When the cutter goes through the woods his first pass is made where they want the skidroad, and the first trees cut are layed down to make a road that the wheeled skidders can run on. The shovels help make this road and then when the cutter moves out away from it they move the trees back to the road so that the skidders can reach them cause if the skidder gets off the log road the shovel has to recover it. The clambunk skidder, (which is the big one that carries the logs above the rear axles instead of pulling them behind), can't pick up it's own logs so the shovel has to load it. The shovels are also constantly repairing and patching the skidroad as the logs move from the skidders dragging logs over them. Swamploggers will start pulling the logs from the back of the tract, (farthest from the deck) and as the operation gets closer to the deck the shovels pick up the back of the skidroad so those logs can get used.

Pictures of a bucksaw, also called a groundsaw. The chainsaw bar is housed in the vertical box on one end and is driven and lowered hydraulically from the loader cab.

Thanks for the correction and clarifing the the functions of the logging equipment:drinkup

 

[diggerdave1958]

Thanks, mitch504. Never to much info, i like to learn how they do things around the country.