THE "HAND-LOGGERS" OF BRITISH COLUMBIA. 



By Louis Margolin. 



A unique form of forest exploitation, little known outside of 

 the region where it is practiced, is the so-called "hand-logging" 

 in the immediate coast region of British Columbia. Trees, often 

 from 5 to lo feet in diameter, are felled, bucked, shot into the 

 sea and made up into booms or rafts without the help of any ma- 

 chinery or animals such as are commonly used in logging opera- 

 tions. This method of logging receives its sanction from the 

 Provincial Government under Section 60 of the "Land Act," 

 which reads substantially as follows : 



"The Chief Commissioner may, upon payment of the sum of 

 twenty-five dollars therefor, grant a general license to cut tim- 

 ber from Crown Lands, not being timber limits or leases, and 

 within such area as may be specified or designated in such license 

 or lease; but such license shall be personal, and shall only grant 

 authority to the person named therein to cut timber as a hand- 

 logger, and such license shall be in force for one year from the 

 date thereof, and no longer. 



"The holder of a license granted under this section shall not 

 use steam power or machinery operated by steam power, in car- 

 rying on lumber operations under such license." 



The most peculiar feature of the above section is the prohibi- 

 tion of the use of steam or steam-power machinery in the opera- 

 tion, whence the term "hand-logger" is derived. Nothing is said 

 in the act about the use of horses or oxen but the topography of 

 the country is such that the use of animals in logging is practi- 

 cally precluded. Before proceeding with the description of the 

 operations, it may be well to describe briefly the physiography and 

 the forests of the region under consideration, which make hand- 

 logging possible. 



The coast of British Columbia consists of an almost uninter- 

 rupted chain of mountains rising directly out of the ocean, and 

 having an elevation of from one or two hundred to several thou- 

 sand feet. Flat land in the immediate vicinity of the sea is so 

 scarce that logging camps, and even entire settlements, are some- 



