40 BULLETIX 111, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, 
inches too long. The loss on these logs because of improper lengths 
is estimated at 13,230 feet, or 1.7 per cent of the scale. Assuming 
that the average value of the logs per thousand feet was $9, the total 
loss on the basis of 523 logs was $119, or $0.15 per thousand feet. 
Employing an efficient head bucker undoubtedly results in a 
saving. Often a bucker has a measuring stick of the proper length, 
but, finding it takes more work to clear the brush away from a log 
or to do some extra wedging or undercutting, cuts the log longer or 
shorter than it should be. One of the most progressive operators of 
the region, finding that his company was sustaining considerable loss 
because of improper lengths, gave his head bucker an assistant, so 
that the log lengths could be marked off with a tape line. It was a 
very difficult bucking show. 
DISREGARD OF QUALITY. 
The buckers should exercise care in apportioning the boles of the 
trees, so that logs of the highest grade, or logs that will yield the 
largest amount of high-grade lumber with the minimum of trimming 
waste, will be obtained. It is no uncommon sight to see logs graded 
and sold as Xo. 2, or merchantable, which would have been graded 
as Xo. 1 logs had they been cut a few feet shorter. As Xo. 1 logs 
may be worth $12 per thousand feet when Xo. 2's are worth $9. it is 
clear that too much attention can'not be given the matter of bucking 
for quality. 
Proper supervision will help out greatly. Most buckers have good 
intentions, but are not well informed about log grades. 
MISCELLANEOUS CAUSES. 
Considerable waste not infrequently results from not utilizing as 
much of the tops as is practical. The bucking of crooked trees in 
the wrong place also results in waste, but in this region, where the 
trees are large, the amount is small. The same thing is true of the 
waste that results from cutting too far above or below the crotch 
of forked trees. Sawing too -far below the break in broken timber 
may result in a small loss. The major portion of waste in bucking 
is probably due to inefficient or careless buckers. In large timber 
and rough ground failure to take out the bind of trees through a 
properly located initial cut. indifferent wedging, and carelessness 
in putting in props results in a comparatively heavy loss, logs not 
infrequently being slabbed or split for a considerable length. Split- 
ting in hollow-butted cedar logs not infrequently results from cut- 
ting them too short or from not providing sufficient sound material 
to hold them intact. 
