New member here.

[Motor Devil]

Hi all, my name is Chris, I'm 24 and from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.  I do a lot of forest work on the outskirts of the city.   I specialize in light logging and firewood.  I do a lot of hardwood thinning for firewood and cut a lot of cedar as well.  As of now I cut and split about 200 bush cord per year as well as doing other logging jobs as well.  So, I'm pretty busy!!  I got started doing residential tree service when I was in high school.  I worked for a small local business and got hooked.  I did residential work for a couple years then got hooked on logging, especially thinning type work.  I love walking away from a job and having the forest look better than when I got there.  All limbing is done in the forest, logs are skidded out with a 4wd Kubota tractor.  All firewood is blocked in the forest in the summer and brought out in an old army trailer.  In the winter I skid all the firewood out to the landing and block it there.  In my area quality wood is in high demand so the prices make the work very lucrative.  I mostly use a 60cc saw built by a company called Sachs-Dolmar.  I've had it for 4 years now and it never let me down.  Knock on wood.  I like to try to evolve the way I do things to be more efficient, basically I always want to learn more.  In the end, the more I make, the more the landowners that I work for make.  And word of mouth advertising always works well for me.  I am only 24 and have a thirst for knowlege, hence why I am on this site.  I've been thinking of buying a small cable skidder in the next year or so.  I'd like something older, in the 50 or 60 hp range.  And have replacement parts awailable still.  The tractor works well but it's limited to one big tree or two or three smaller ones at once.  I'd like to be able to haul out 2 or 3, 20 inch plus trees in one shot to speed up productivity a little.  I don't want to go too big though, people know me for doing low impact work and that's how I want to keep it.  Anyone with any ideas on anything, feel free to share, I'd love to hear them.  I'll hopefully get some pics of my work up shortly, if I can get the picture thing to work!!  Anyhow, I'm gonna keep reading and learning, this is a great site.

-Chris

[chet]

Welcome aboard Chris. 

[Motor Devil]

Thanks Chet!   ;D

[maple flats]

Motor Devil,   welcome aboard! 8) 8)

[Barkman]

Yes, welcome Motor Devil!  Your story sounds quite similar to my own.  Although, I do logging and tree service work nights and weekends only and have a regular job weekdays.

I have a skidder, see picture in my post, it's a Tree Farmer C3.  Same size as the more common C4, just older.  You mentioned parts availability being important to you in a skidder and for that, older Tree Farmer, Timberjack, or Franklin skidders tend to be pretty good.  The parts are often interchangeable between them and some of the parts are common with truck parts and can be purchased at auto parts stores.  For example, the clutch master and slave cylinders on my skidder are common to a Ford pickup of that time.  I don't have any experience with Clark skidders, but they might fall in the same category.A lot  of people love their JD 440's for a smaller machine, but parts tend to be a little more pricey and often you can only get them from a JD dealer.

Again, welcome and I'd suggest spending some time reading some of the old posts.  If you're looking for knowledge, ideas, and experience in this business, you will find large quantities of it in there.

[Rob]

Hey Chris Welcome to the Forum !

              You will find tons of info on the site regarding forestry and logging and alot of great people .. I will soon be 24 as well and have been logging for the past 10 years or so , started running skidder and chopping , then ran feller buncher and now back to skidder operator running a 525B Cat Grapple and a 545 Cat grapple larger machines way to big for what your looking for.. I ran my own timber harvesting biz for roughly 4 years owning a 1976 C4D Treefarmer cable skidder and a HydroAx 411 Shear , and multiple saws etc.. but sold all of it except for the saws of course as the bigger operations down my way drove the price of stumpage through the roof . I was paying roughly $125 US for White Pine on the stump per mbf and over the past 2 years that price is as high as $310 they can pay that I cant , as I was a one man operation with part time help on occasion..

           Lets use this as a example I did a 15 acre select cut that took me 3 weeks to do alone , as friend I have can do the same job in a 4 days and be on to his next harvest so they are getting depending on size of harvest job 4-6 harvest done in the time it takes me to do one , so they can afford somewhat to pay the outrageous stumpage price and keep working the equipment. So any way I sold my equipment and went to work for a large land clearing outfit running skidder . Still plan to go out on my own again just not right now in a few years.

         As for a small skidder I'm a Deere fan but Barkman is right the parts for Deeres get exspensive , I would suggest a small TJ cable machine like a 225 or 230 , or a smaller Franklin or Clark skidder they are all good . Well Chris I wish you luck in your venture and hope you find what you are looking for..

                                                      Rob

[Norm]

Good to know you Chris, welcome to the FF.

[SwampDonkey]

Welcome to the forum Chris. I know of a few folks this way that do low impact and they are always busy, but the stumpage prices make it a little tight on some jobs. Land owner is still lookin for the highest price.

cheers

[tnlogger]

Chis welcome to the forum  just remember larger is not always better  just a thought.

[thedeeredude]

Howdy Chris.  Welcome to the forestry forum.

[OLD_ JD]

welcome in chris
did u ever think about having a small trailer log lodder 4 ure kubota? low impact,cheap running cost and will keep ure firewood log clean ;),one like i have (is a metavic 1200) a can load 5 face corde on it ;)..or u can always think about some small track machine like bedford or F-4 Dion but they are expensive to by and maitenence :(..
                                                                   hope that can help ;) JD

[populus]

Welcome, Chis!  This is really a wonderful community and it's good to have you here.

[leweee]

Welcome Chris ;D Great to hear from another Canuck Lots of great info shared here 8)


ps. How did you come by that handle ???

[Woodhog]

Welcome..
I used to skid all my wood, until the distance became un-productive..Also some of the mills were growling about grit and dirt on the logs...
Also firewood cistomers didnt want the dirt either..
I also went to the Forestry Trailer/Loader Combo.

I just use a winch for short hauls in thinning operations, then I haul to the main landing
witht he trailer.