28 LOGGING 



Piling and burning brush after logging has not proved as 

 satisfactory as the above method, because of the added labor 

 charge. It has some advantages because the piles can be built 

 in the roadways and on skidway sites where there is no timber 

 or reproduction to damage. 



In the Minnesota National Forest brush was piled after 

 logging and burned on calm days when the ground was damp. 

 Burning commenced on the leeward side of the cutting. The 

 fires were started in alternate piles in the same row, which left 

 a cold air space between them, lessened the draft and reduced 

 the danger of damage to seedlings and standing timber. When 

 these piles were reduced to embers the alternate ones in the 

 same row were fired. Each successive row was burned in this 

 manner. A sufficient force of workers equipped with fire-fighting 

 apparatus was kept on hand to hold the fires in check. The 

 area burned over by this method was 7 per cent of the total. 



A contractor in Minnesota states that in stands composed of 

 equal parts of white pine and Norway pine he has burned brush 

 for 20 cents per thousand during open winters, and 35 cents per 

 thousand during severe winters. The average cost in the region 

 is from 20 to 25 cents per thousand feet. 



Hardwood brush is more difficult to burn and costs from 30 

 to 40 cents per thousand feet in the Lake States when the brush 

 burned is less than 6 inches in diameter. 



Broadcast burning is cheaper where protection is desired only 

 for logging equipment and green timber; where the area is clear 

 cut; and in yellow pine forests in the South, where timber is 

 left for a second cutting to be made in fifteen or twenty years. 

 Broadcast burning is the only feasible method in the Douglas 

 fir region because of the great quantities of slash that must be 

 handled. On areas where the stand runs as high as 100,000 feet 

 per acre, the debris is often 10 feet high. The method recom- 

 mended by a National Forest officer^ is to burn off at one time 

 areas of from 20 to 40 acres which are selected with reference to 

 topographic features. Burning should begin before large areas 



1 Munger, Thornton T.: The Growth and Management of Douglas Fir in the 

 Pacific Northwest. Circular 175, U. S. Forest Service, 1911, pp. 17-18. 



