MOUNTAIN 



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LEGEND 

 Board- foot capacity per 10-hour day 

 1,000-9.000 u 20,000-39,000 



L 10,000 -19,000 uj 40,000 AND OVER 



Location within counties is approximate 



Logging 



Cutting practices vary widely on logging operations 

 in North Carolina, but as a rule a high proportion of the 

 saw-timber volume in trees larger than 10 inches is har- 

 vested. The methods of skidding and transporting the 

 logs are not particularly destructive to the growing stock- 

 On most operations the logs are skidded and bunched 

 in the woods by animal power. Tractors are used for 

 skidding on about 10 percent of the operations in the 

 Coastal Plain and piedmont, but they are rarely used in 

 the mountains. In the Coastal Plain skidders are some- 

 times used to log the swamps and the less accessible pine 

 land. Light power skidders geared to a truck engine are 

 used on the smaller operations but the larger outfits use 

 steam skidders. 



Logs are hauled short distances to the mill with high 

 wheels or wagons, and up to 35 or 40 miles on trucks. 



Figure 35. — Location of sawmills 



Trucks are used for the long haul on practically all ot the 

 operations in the Coastal Plain (fig. 34). Almost one-half 

 of the mills cutting over 20 M board feet per day obtain 

 logs also by water haul and about one-fourth ot them use 

 common carrier or logging railroads. In the piedmont 

 the small sawmills are usually set up in the timber tract 

 being logged, and most of the logs are either skidded 

 directly to the mill or hauled to it by team. The larger 

 mills, cutting 10 M to 20 M feet per day, are moved less 

 frequently and logs are carried to most of these by truck. 

 In the mountain region small mills are often set up in 

 the valley bottoms and the logs skidded by team down 

 the slopes directly to the mills. Trucks are used on the 

 larger operations and a few of the largest hardwood band- 

 saw mills bring in part of their logs by railroad. Where 

 hauling is necessary, the average distance in the piedmont 

 and mountains is about 3 miles in contrast to 11 miles 

 in the Coastal Plain. 



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