Lumbering started on the west coast about 1850, in the days of the Gold Rush. Sawmill machinery was brought around Cape Horn from the East in sailing vessels. The first mills were for medium and small-sized timbers. Logs were furnished by farmers and land clearers from the timbered areas that adjoined navigable waters wherever it was cheaper to put them in a stream than to pile them for burning. Much of this was done with the ax, saw, and log jack, toil and sweat, grunt and groan.

The start was small but, step by step, production increased, and machinery was built to saw the larger logs. This called for more power in the woods.

Timber was abundant—much too much for the early settler, whose first thought was food and whose first problem was to find unforested areas or clear fields for farming. Fire was the great land clearer, and in the early 1850's great forests went up in smoke. Soon the timber line receded, and the ox team and skid road came into being. The big timber started moving to the crack of the bull whip and the roar of the puncher.

Horses followed the ox team; as production increased, speed as well as power was needed. The proper application of gravity was the influencing factor in logging with the ox and horse team. Grades favorable with the load were necessary, but logging shows were plentiful, and no great engineering skill was needed.

A good woodsman—usually the foreman—did the locating. Rough ground and poor timber stands were bypassed. Only the high-quality timber was cut, and only the best logs were removed. The margin between costs and recovery value was low, and low-grade material could be handled only at a loss. Fire ravaged much of the lands that were so handled; some remained in fair condition, and new growth was started; practically all reverted to the counties for nonpayment of taxes.

As the demand for lumber increased and transportation facilities (such as adequate ports for seagoing vessels and transcontinental railroads for land shipments) became available, domestic and foreign markets expanded. More production was needed. In logging this meant greater increases in speed and power. In the early eighties there was much timber near the mills, but some of it was on ground unsuitable for ox-or horse-team logging. Of the various steam-powered machines that came into use, the most successful was the donkey engine, which had a horizontal drum and a vertical-type boiler.

Because it had been a slow and laborious job to haul the felled and bucked timber to the skid roads, the first donkey engines supplanted the horses and oxen in this work. They were strong enough to pull logs out of canyons with little application of blocks, which often were necessary when horses and oxen were used. For some time the animals were still used for skid-road work and for hauling the logs to the water. The donkey engine yarded the big logs to the road and made up the turn for its trip to the water. It was soon found that a machine could do it faster, however, so roading donkeys were built. These machines were bolted to huge log sleds, which made good foundations and made the unit easily movable in the woods. The unit was moved by hanging a block some distance ahead and running the main drum line out through the block, then back to the sled; it was made fast on the sled runner. By applying steam to roll the drum, the unit would be moved toward the block. It simply pulled itself by its own power.

The roading donkey was built with huge drums, which had a great line capacity. When the roading distance got greater than the line capacity of one machine, often one and sometimes two more machines were added to relay the logs to the water. The building of donkey sleds and skid and pole roads became a craft of importance. The skid-road builder sometimes assisted the foreman in making the location. Straight roads on easy grades were most desirable.

Such logging was successful in limited areas of timber, but soon the length of haul compelled a different line of action.

The demand for lumber was good. In 1899, Douglas-fir lumber was averaging almost $9 a thousand at the mill. Eastern lumbermen were becoming interested in the big timber of the West. Large consolidations were under way. By 1905, timberland homesteads were being picked up for $5 or so an acre. At the turn of the century railroad logging was starting. The need for logging engineers was recognized. Until colleges supplied the training, some of the best logging engineers in the early days were trained woodsmen, self-educated in civil engineering. Logging railroads became the principal medium of transporting logs to the mills; it still is considered the cheapest for hauls of more than 50 miles when transportation by water is not possible.

Always original and ever a pioneer, the logger did not follow the road specifications of the regular railroad systems. Because his capital was more limited, he kept construction costs at a minimum, even at the sacrifice of operation. Seven-percent favorable grades and 20° curves were common; so there was need for the geared engine, which sounded, when traveling 15 miles an hour, like a passenger train going 60. It probably has delivered more logs to waterways at lower cost than any other piece of transportation equipment.

In the western woods this was the age of steam. Three notable western machinery builders expanded into the heavy logging-equipment field, and the competition brought about great advances in the construction of the donkey engine.

DONKEY ENGINES were generally listed by diameter of cylinder and length of stroke in inches. One of the first prize machines was a 7 by 9 inch, with a single drum. A line horse was used to pull the cable line and the choker—a length of cable with a flat hook on one end and an eye in the other to be passed around the log and fastened to the main haul line—back to the woods.

On rough ground the haul-back job became too hard for a horse, so an ingenious mechanical engineer designed the haul-back drum. A line smaller than the main line was found sufficient for this work, but it had to be more than twice as long, because it went out to a corner haul-back block at about the main-line length from the donkey engine, over to a lead haul-back block. From there it was strung to and hooked on the main line at the fair leads, on the end of the donkey sled. The haul-back line had first to be pulled out through the blocks by hand and hooked to the end of the main line. From then on, steam did the work until the line needed changing to reach more logs. Laying out the haul-back line was an arduous task and all hands were called to help. To speed up the job, an additional drum was added to the machine. This held what is called a straw line; about three-eighths inch in diameter, which was easier strung out by hand and was used to string out the haul-back line. On simple yarding donkeys this is the drum arrangement in use today.

The yarding donkey, sitting at a point near where the logs were to go in the water, on a skid road, or on cars, dragged the logs in a straight line from a distant point. Immovable objects, such as stumps and trees in the line of travel, had to be avoided, or the log rolled or kicked around them with the main line. The logger's term for these obstacles was "hang-ups." A poorly chosen skid road caused the rigging slinger to remark that he had been fighting hang-ups all day. The more hang-ups, the fewer logs hauled out. The selection of good donkey settings and skid roads greatly influenced the log production and marked the worth of the crew boss, or hook tender.

ASSEMBLING LOGS to facilitate loading on cars was important to a smooth-working operation. It was necessary to accumulate enough logs at one point so that a well-balanced carload could be formed. This was done by building inclined log-crib landings with jump-up approaches so the logs would be hauled first to the higher part of the landing and then rolled toward the front.

These landings served only the timber on one side of the tracks and the setting was half of a circle or square. The selection of landings was influenced by timber and topography. Because some of the small operators located their roads to conform with these previously chosen landings, expensive mistakes in railroading often resulted. The operators who controlled larger bodies of timber did more intensive planning of the railroad system, built main lines to more exacting specifications, and depended on spurs to reach landings that had been chosen in advance.

Loading in the west coast fir region—a region on the Pacific slopes that is representative of two distinct types—was done by the gin-pole crotch-line method. The loader was set parallel to the track facing the landing. The gin pole was set across the track from the landing and leaned toward it so that the lead block was about plumb with the outside rail. In the early setups, the main line was shackled to two loading straps of equal lengths, and on the end of each was an L-shaped loading hook. The loaders pulled the slack of the main line as they carried the loading hook to the ends of the log for hooking. The loading engineer placed the log as the head loader required by hoisting it and judging its swing. Soon the addition of a haul-back drum lessened the work of getting the hooks back over the log as well as regulating its placement on the car. A third drum was added for use in spotting the cars for loading when the train crew was away. A somewhat similar loading method was used in the ponderosa pine region—another Pacific slope region—although not so extensively.

It was soon found that logging by the ground-lead method resulted in less hang-up delay when the logs were pulled uphill by the donkey. The log tended to follow up the side of a stump and shear away from it. More power and speed were needed, which the machinery builders supplied when they turned out the 10- by 12-inch and 11- by 13-inch compound-geared yarders with extended firebox boilers. Noting the speed-up resulting from fewer hang-ups, a versatile logger experimented with fastening a heavy yarding block on a high stump. The idea caught on at once. By 1918, camp after camp had gone to the air, in a manner of speaking.

HIGH-LEAD LOGGING was under way, and the lay of the ground brought out various adaptations to fit the problem.

Through the years many changes have been made in loading devices in order to conform to the progress in high-lead and high-line systems of logging. Among these various methods are the McLean boom, the single tong boom, and the duplex system.

In the early 1890's logging in the pine region developed in a big way. Logs rolled out in an almost endless procession of splendidly matched four-horse teams and big wheels.

Railroad logging outfits had their logs loaded on cars with speed and precision by use of a steam jammer, and large production was maintained. The steam jammer is one of the fastest log loaders in use even today and, although in more general use in the pine region, it has also found favor among some of the heavy fir-log producers.

The greater flexibility brought about by the use of logging trucks demanded greater flexibility in loading. The rapid movement necessary for gathering right-of-way logs brought about the converted shovel loader, and finally the more mobile rubber-tired loader of today.

Generally speaking, logging in the pine region has followed a different pattern than in the more rugged country along the coast. Some use has been made of tight-line skidders, but the small volume from an acre called for a more mobile type of equipment. The first logging trucks with hard rubber tires required hard, dry soil conditions in the woods. Because they could only be used on good roads, they did not go well with the industry. It was still necessary to have a railroad for an all-year operation. Steam logging continued to a large extent with the use of railroads. Urged by the persistence of high-ball loggers, who demanded more and more speed and power, the machinery manufacturers built enormous high-lead units, interlocking skidders, and slack-line machines. Only a railroad could transport those heavy machines, and large settings were necessary for their success. With these machines, the then loggable timber was swept from large continuous areas. Very little reserve timber was left for a seed supply, and a surge of public resentment influenced a change in cutting methods.

Near the middle 1920's, logging with steam equipment commenced to wane. Gradually gasoline and Diesel-powered drum units, tractors, and pneumatictired trucks came into being; they brought with them better trained and more skillful mechanics or, as the loggers said, monkey-wrench artists. Instead of words like valve oil, gear dope, donkey doctors, boiler flues, and ash-pans, we now hear terms like cycles, torque converters, hydrotarders, tolerances, sludge, and floating power.

Soon the smaller patches of timber left by the early horse loggers and ground-lead operators drew the attention of operators with little capital—the "gyppo loggers." By building truck roads and using lighter equipment, the gyppo started the era of truck logging. With the pneumatic-tired light truck, he found he could operate on fairly low-standard, cheaply built roads. His first drum units were about the size of those used on the old 7- by 9-inch steam donkey and, by sprocket and chain adaptation, connected to a farm-type tractor. The wheels were removed from the tractor and the whole unit mounted on a log sled. This was light enough to haul on a small logging truck and made a quite mobile logging unit. With this beginning—a jump from heavy steam equipment back to light, mobile, internal combustion-driven donkey engines—a great change was made in logging methods.

As the most accessible of the scattered small bodies of timber were logged, builders of machinery were again urged to turn out heavier units. Better roads, bigger trucks, rougher ground, and a fight for more production and lower costs have brought about the larger equipment of the present.

THE OPERATION least affected by change of methods and equipment probably has been the process of getting the tree down on the ground.

The tree is still being cut off at the stump and allowed to drop. The falling equipment has changed somewhat. In the early days, the single-bit pole ax was the only tool, and the trees were guided to their fall by skilled choppers. Later the ax, improved to a double-bitted falling ax, was used only in making the under cut, and the crosscut saw supplemented it. Then falling of timber became a two-man job. It is still that, but now one or two other men, called buckers, cut the tree into log lengths. In many camps, power-driven chain saws have supplanted the crosscut saw but, except for skillful control of the direction of the fall by cutting and wedging, no concerted attempts have been made to let the tree down other than allowing it to crash. Expert fallers use other trees to some extent for braking power to lessen the impact on the ground. Sometimes a nesting place of level ground or windrowed slash is prepared to receive the trees.

As the valuable, large, high-quality trees become scarcer, one can expect the development of improved timber-falling units that will cut and let timber down in places more accessible for cutting into logs and moving to yards.

Loggers have done much more ingenious things than that, and when the challenge becomes acute, they will meet it; they will perfect some device that will eliminate breakage and allow them carefully to analyze the tree, cut it to quality sections, and recover the poorer grades in sizes that are easy to handle. Our logged-over areas, covered with large-diameter broken chunks, mixed with small poles, have been and still are the eyesore and the shame of the industry and the public. Things will be changed, I am sure.

SO, ALSO, must the wood-using industry be ready to welcome change, because it is affected by a growing demand for products from the forest. In this, the handling of raw products of the forest is always the challenging problem. Research in forestry has pointed the way to greater yields on forest lands; research in chemistry has enlarged the scope of utilization; next must come the economical harvesting of, forest wastes. Those who preach the unfailing abundance of forest supply may have overlooked the steady increase in world population and the growing demands for products from trees.

To meet these demands and keep the lands productive, the logger is face to face with the need for more intensified harvesting of lower-quality material, on rougher ground over longer hauls. For that, he has the help of forest technicians and civil and mechanical engineers. The science of forestry must be linked more closely to the mechanics of logging if forest land is to produce its maximum growth.

Logging remains a problem in transportation, with good roads a controlling factor. The life of a road is its foundation and drainage system. For years operators have built railroads and truck roads with a view to later abandonment, because they were built only to serve the timber the operators themselves owned. Often permanent construction was unnecessary, but as public timber becomes more in demand and truck logging more universal, permanent roads will be more common and requirements of base and drainage more exacting. As hauls get longer, heavier loading is required and higher speeds demanded; therefore, heavy-surfaced roads have to be built.

Further, a well-built road system, the foundation of good forest management, makes possible the removal of overmature timber; closer utilization of low-grade material, which is a requirement of good forestry; more orderly cutting; and the seasonal harvesting of the higher-elevation timber in summer and the lower-elevation timber in winter. Species in demand can be cut when needed and the others left for future harvesting. The cutting systems necessary to the practice of good silviculture and good fire protection can then be used more successfully.

Years ago, it was found that better equipment was needed to speed up road construction. The pick and shovel and wheelbarrow were replaced by the power shovel now in common use on construction jobs. In 1925, while constructing roads on a forest project, technicians of the Portland office of the Forest Service fastened a revamped grader blade on the old tractor in such a way that they could push dirt with it. They proved that this arrangement would greatly exceed the grading work done by several horse teams working with Fresno scrapers. Their experimental piece of equipment was the forerunner of a great development in dirt-moving practice—the bulldozer, one of the most valuable pieces of logging and road-building equipment now in use.

Hand in hand with the road system is planning the method of cutting that is best for continued forest growth, a method that takes into account the ideal control of the fall and less damage to reserved trees. In the west coast fir region, damage in falling and skidding is serious, because the accompanying species are apparently more susceptible to fungus attack than is ponderosa pine. Also, the stands are so much denser in the fir region that damage is greater.

THE METHOD OF CUTTING by the operators of private timber in the west coast fir region has been to clear out the areas considered recoverable at a profit. In the early days, when no high lead was used, it was possible to remove the larger timber and leave a certain amount of smaller trees to continue growing. The remaining trees often reseeded well. Much of the land, abandoned to the counties for taxes, has since been purchased by small operators, and, in some cases, by large pulp concerns. Now the remaining large trees are being removed and the areas networked with roads so that younger growth can be logged as needed.

When the operators took to the air, so to speak, with high leads and skyline logging, they ended the system of heavy selection cutting. From 1918 to 1934, clear cutting meant taking the timber that was operable at a profit and leveling the rest in the process. One often sees logged-off land on which 10,000 board feet or more of good, sound timber an acre has been left to rot or to be burned. Timber fallers were instructed to leave timber less than 20 inches in diameter because it did not pay to handle it. Pulling in the larger logs with the high lead knocked over most of these smaller trees. Where two-storied stands were common, this waste of small timber became enormous. These smaller trees had reached an age where the annual growth layer was of high-quality material. Everyone recognized that cutting methods had to be changed.

In the pine region also, operators seemed to favor clear cutting. The initial stand per acre was small, and the operators felt it necessary to remove most of it to amortize the opening-up costs. Soon, however, it was found that high mortality losses necessitated the coverage of the area in a shorter span of time in order to remove first the trees most susceptible to this damage.

In both regions, the necessary changes in cutting methods required changes in equipment. Getting over the ground faster meant more roads of a permanent character; so the loggers turned to trucks and truck roads. The development of tractor logging got under way and at first found its greatest success in the pine region, where the timber is less dense, the slopes easier, and the ground drier.

In the fir region, tractors were first tried by smaller operators. Their use has been limited by conditions of topography and soil. Some larger operators use them on favorable shows during the drier seasons. As was the case with the donkey engine, it was soon found advantageous to have an upward pull when dragging in the log. To attain this the logging arch was designed as an attachment to the farm and industrial tractor. The logging arch is cumbersome and rather unwieldy, and its use results in considerable yarding damage to reserved trees. On steep slopes it is sometimes impossible to get the empty arch to the log, in which case the implement is unhooked and the logs are dragged on the ground behind the tractor.

Sometimes, when the logs have previously been piled at a central point, the tractor with arch is used on well-defined roads to relay the piles to loading-out points. This practice is called roading. Some operators surface these roads where the volume of logs in the piles warrants. In the pine region, the accepted cutting method is individual tree selection, and spectacular skidding on extremely rough territory is still done with horses or tractors. In the west coast fir region, the extremely rough territory is almost universally clear-cut and yarded with drum units mounted on sleds or tractors.

On national forests, various cutting methods have been tested through contractual requirements in timber sales. Individual tree selection in the ponderosa pine region, with varying degrees of cutting to meet the silvicultural requirements, has been for some time a required practice. In the west coast fir region, where silvicultural and mechanical problems are more complicated, more and more diversification is to be found. It is easier to determine the undesirable cutting practice than to determine the most desirable one to avoid the waste of timber that comes with clear cutting large acreages and leaving unused material on the ground and to avoid the loss of production if the cut forest is riot restocked by planting.

To clear-cut small spots on which the trees are preponderantly overmature groups is considered good silviculture for Douglas fir, which does not tolerate shade and thrives best in open areas. When the cut spots are small, fires that start in the slash are more likely to be controlled. Small cut-over areas stand a good chance of being reseeded naturally from the closely adjacent timber. The Forest Service requires cutting by this method or the tree-selection method on its sales in the west coast fir region, depending on the silvicultural problems confronted. Many sales of both types on national forests have been processed recently.

Great strides have been made in logging equipment and cutting methods; many problems remain unsolved. One of the greatest is the salvage logging of broken chunks, decaying wood, small sizes, and stumps. Some progress is being made in removing this type of material. More progress will come when industrial plants needing wood waste become so numerous that the supply of mill waste will not keep them operating to capacity. Chemical research has made possible the converting of practically all logging waste to valuable products. The gathering, transporting, and processing of this material into clean chips is yet the job that commands the greatest effort. Costs eventually must be lowered to meet the competition of mill waste; that will require ingenuity on the part of the logger. Steps made in the advancement of transportation facilities for logging the virgin timber will, of course, greatly assist in harvesting the so-called salvage material. The equipment and knowledge required to get the material to the road at reasonable cost will follow. We can feel sure that a new era is here and that much better use of the wood on the land can soon be realized.

Percentage Of Operatin Acreage In Properties And Working Circles Being Cut On A Sustained-Yield Basis, United States, 1945
		Percent on sustained yield by grade of cutting1
Ownership class	Total	High order	Good	Fair
Public:	Pct.	Pct.	Pct.	Pct.
National forests	71	10	47	14
Other Federal	44	6	23	15
State and local	23	1	21	1
Private:
Large holdings	39	5	20	14
Medium holdings	9	1	3	5
1Cutting rated poor or destructive excluded as property from the sustained-yield classification.