LOGGING METHODS AND PROCEDURE 



143 



are found in the Northwest where they are frequently equipped with 

 shower baths, recreation rooms, and separate beds replacing the old 

 straw bunks. 



The location of the camp must be easily accessible to the work 

 and on dry ground, for health and sanitary reasons; it must be con- 

 venient for toting in men and supplies, and it must possess a continu- 

 ous and pure water supply. 



Woods labor in the Northwest camps is generally more skilled and 

 well paid because of the mechanical nature of logging. In other sec- 

 tions of the country, labor is not generally so well paid. The National 



FIG. 81. Logging ponderosa pine in Oregon. Motor trucks with or without 

 trailers are widely used for log transportation in all parts of the country. 



Industrial Recovery Act provided for improved wages, varying from 

 a minimum of 24 cents per hour in the southern pine and southern 

 hardwood regions, to 42% cents per hour on the West Coast and these 

 wages have generally been maintained ever since. 



Trees are generally felled by making a notch with an axe and fell- 

 ing the tree with a two-man crosscut saw. Much lower stumps are 

 being cut in order to save unnecessary waste. Spring boards, common 

 in the West, are being used less frequently. High standards of felling 

 practice are required on the National Forest timber sales. The usual 

 log length felled in the American forests is 16 feet, but on the West 

 Coast where power line and tractor skidding is used, log lengths of 

 20 to 60 feet are common. Recently several mechanical devices have 

 been introduced for felling and bucking up the tree into log lengths. 



