LOGGING COSTS FOR LUMBER 185 



Briefly, then, all lumber goes thru the following lour steps in 

 passing from tree form to finished board : 



1. Felling and bucking. 



2. Skidding. 



3. Hauling or driving. 



4. Milling, including seasoning. 



In some operations numbers two and three are combined as, 

 for example, in the New England portable sawmill type of logging 

 but these four steps are in general typical of the average logging 

 operation the country over. 



FelUng and bucking are commonly considered together because 

 it is usual to have the same crew do both, tho here, again, usage 

 varies in the different parts of the country. The simplest form 

 is a two-man crew who notch, fell, buck, bump, and pile brush all 

 as one operation and their methods will exempHfy the principles. 

 The first step in felhng a tree is notching it so that it will fall 

 where it will do the least damage to itself and the young timber to 

 be left standing. Since this is an operation which demands con- 

 siderable skill and judgment it is usually done by the more 

 experienced member of the crew. It is not, however, a task which 

 takes much time. Ordinarily 10 to 15 per cent of the total time 

 per M is used. The actual sawing off from the stump after the 

 tree has been notched with an axe takes double the time. But 

 what determines the cost per M more than any other item is the 

 time required to saw the felled tree into logs or " bucking." This 

 usually requires one-half to two-thirds of the time and explains 

 why the cost of feUing and bucking varies directly with the size 

 of the timber. In other words, the larger the trees the less the 

 cost per M. To illustrate this by examples at the two extremes, 

 the cost of this step on the Pacific Coast in the heavy stands of 

 redwood and Douglas fir has been 50 cents per M while in the 

 second growth stands of New England the usual contract price was 

 $1.50 per M before the War. Expressed in man hours the costs 

 are one and one-half and three man hours per M respectively, or 

 expressed in another way, two men in the Douglas fir region will 

 fell and buck 10 M in a day as against four to five M in the north- 

 east 



