How Were Trees Cut Before Saws?

[bitzer]

Cuts like the Coos bay cut is how they handled leaners so they didn't chair. Chop both sides perpendicular to the lean. The same concepts we use come from them. The mechanics are the same. It all depends on where and when you chop. Guys who did it for a living knew what they were doing.

 

[El Quachito]

I think the tools are the tied to the volume of wood needed. It is a marvel how people handled trees in history.

 

[huskyhank]

Here's some good information:

http://www.patc.us/history/archive/virg_fst.html

I can tell you one thing for sure - they were real men.
Look at the big white oak about 1/4 down the page.

 

[imagineero]

While I can't comment on the techniques, it obviously goes back a long way. Wooden ships for example were being built by egyptians as far back as 3500BC, so obviously the ability to fall and mill timber predates that. We often think that the 'dark ages' were anything before the 1900's, but life as we know it with a political system, water supply, education, trades and general civilisation goes back thousands of years.

 

[slowp]

I couldn't remember my Euro history so had to look it up in....that W place. For Europe

The 'Dark Ages' is a term often used synonymously with the 'Middle Ages.' It refers to the period of time between the fall of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the Italian Renaissance and the Age of Discovery. Many textbooks list the 'Dark Ages' as extending from 500-1500 A.D., although it should be noted these are approximations.

I'm not sure there were any dark ages until maybe when small pox was introduced and America "discovered". I'll bet one of the tribal members on our north coast or the coast of Beautiful British Columbia or S.E. Alaska could tell how they got trees down, or did they use blowdown for those canoes?

Meanwhile, I will assume there was some sort of directional felling technique known by axe users.

 

[Philbert]

Meanwhile, I will assume there was some sort of directional felling technique known by axe users.

How do we find out about these? Any of your old USFS contacts that might know?

Thanks.

Philbert

 

[Humptulips]

In the 60s my dad was climbing at Camp 14 on the Quinault Indian Reservation. Sometimes in the summer I would go out with him to work, mostly when there was a fire shutdown and he had fire watch. One time he took me out to a place where the Quinaults had cut canoe trees many many years ago. There were stumps with spring board holes that were square to put squared poles in to build a scaffolding. The stumps themselves were cut like a beaver all the way around. These cuts had the look of being cut with chisels. My Dad said there had been a roughed out canoe buried that was uncovered when it was logged. My memory is pretty fuzzy but I think these trees were like 5' or6'. Stumps were very high like 18'
You would think with all the timber around they would be along the river, not the case. My Dad said these were at least a mile from any water capable of floating a canoe. Must have been perfect canoe making trees there as there were a number of stumps. Dad said these were the only he had seen.

 

[northmanlogging]

I couldn't remember my Euro history so had to look it up in....that W place. For Europe

The 'Dark Ages' is a term often used synonymously with the 'Middle Ages.' It refers to the period of time between the fall of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the Italian Renaissance and the Age of Discovery. Many textbooks list the 'Dark Ages' as extending from 500-1500 A.D., although it should be noted these are approximations.

I'm not sure there were any dark ages until maybe when small pox was introduced and America "discovered". I'll bet one of the tribal members on our north coast or the coast of Beautiful British Columbia or S.E. Alaska could tell how they got trees down, or did they use blowdown for those canoes?

Meanwhile, I will assume there was some sort of directional felling technique known by axe users.

Just an aside, the "dark ages" just so happen to coincide with the Viking age... just say'n, twasn't so dark in the far north...

 

[ncpete]

Just an aside, the "dark ages" just so happen to coincide with the Viking age... just say'n, twasn't so dark in the far north...

That's because of the glare from all the snow.

 

[woodfarmer]

We had trained beavers up here

 

[ChrisIsThis]

http://www.archaeology.org/exclusives?slg=recreating-the-neolithic-toolkit

There is an interesting video in the link above which shows stone and bone tools being used to fell and work trees.

 

[Philbert]

Nice video. Thanks.

More and more, I think that the 'bigger/deeper-notch-on-the-side-you-want-it-to-fall-to' method was it. Now try to imagine how 'they' got to the 'face-notch-sawn-backcut' method we teach today. Must have been a lot of pinched saws!

And who realized how much a small wedge could do with a big tree!

Philbert

 

[dhskier2]

There's a 2010 documentary called "Happy People: Life in the Tiaga" about an indigenous village.
As I recall, there's some footage from one of the stories where a man is felling spruce trees to make skis. He fells and hand mills dimensional boards using an axe and a long wedge (also cut/shaped by hand). He has some comment that an axe and wedge are the only tools needed to survive in the taiga.

-- available on Netflix (at least US netflix)

 

[Philbert]

Heres's a couple of related photos pulled from a video.

Still think that there is a lot of directional, and 'special situation' information, out there that axe fallers had, which would be interesting to find.

Philbert

 

[Philbert]

This is a pretty small tree, but he describes some technique. Some of it should scale up to larger trees. Much deeper front notch. Takes a lot longer. No wedges, so directional control is probably more limited.




Philbert

 

[Philbert]

Some more info in this USFS PDF - "Using Axes":

http://www.fs.fed.us/t-d/pubs/pdfpubs/pdf99232823/pdf99232823Pdpi72pt06.pdf

Philbert

 

[bitzer]

Phil I think you should grab an axe and play around. Anything about hard leaners? I'm picturing notches perpendicular to the lean.

 

[Philbert]

Anything about hard leaners?

That's my real question. Falling with the lean, most of us could figure out with a lot of hard work. The deeper front notch makes sense, and the sequence of the chopping is interesting.

I am curious what they could do without wedges, or if they just left a lot of trees that experienced crews can handle now.

Philbert

 

[ChoppyChoppy]

They had a harness setup for a dinosaur beaver creature. Hold it up to the tree and it would go "nom nom nom nom" and then TIMBER!

Pretty sure I saw it on the Flintsones anyhow

 

[Sagetown]

OK, this is an amazingly simple question. I understand that before chainsaws we had crosscut saws. And before then we had steel, and bronze and stone axes. Does anyone know the techniques used to cut down large trees before saws (and before nylon ropes and steel cables and steam donkeys and . . . . . )?

I have read a lot about different types of saw notches and back cuts and bore cuts. Recently, I was watching some amazing YouTube videos showing PNW logging of monster trees by axe and crosscut saws. Two guys might spend a full day or more chopping out a notch with double bit axes on one of these trees. But they did the back cuts with a crosscut saw. So, before steel saws, how did they cut down large trees?

Did they just notch front and back and hope to get lucky? Could they still use wedges in some way? Anyone know? Could not find anything on the Internet, but might have just searched under the wrong terms.

Thanks.

Philbert

The Prophet Isaiah of the Holy Bible, was tied to a table, and cut in half with a crosscut saw. That leads me to think that ancient civilizations even had crosscut saws where trees were abundant.