Anyone mark their log ends for ID purposes?

[bitzer]

A couple of weeks ago my mill sub-ed out some hauling because their guy was busy up north. They took two loads off of my landing and one load from a nearby landing. I got a call the next day from the forester telling me he got a call from the yard manger who wanted to make sure whose logs were whose. I have always been a little wary about just sending my logs off into the world. Well, I decieded to make myself a stamp with my company's intials on it. I took a square of 1/4" steel and welded it to the back of an axe. Two thick weld beads for a base and three or four thinner beads on top of that plus a little grinding and shaping and I've got something legible. A little spray paint on the stamp and a whack and there it is clear as day. I know loggers used to do this back in the day. Does anyone else do this now or am I really that ####ing crazy?

 

[Gologit]

It's still done. Quite a bit of it on private ground and almost always on FS sales. Ask SlowP about what happens if you don't brand your logs.

 

[madhatte]

Saw some poles on a truck heading north in I-5 today with the most elaborate floral design on the butt end I've ever seen. Didn't catch a name, but I imagine those are money logs or they wouldn't be marked so distinctively.

 

[bitzer]

I kind of figured as much. I feel like we are a little behind the times in a lot of logging aspects here. Which is wierd considering this state was nearly cut over before cutting really began out there.

 

[slowp]

I told the Cheesland loggers how lucky they were. And here you go wrecking it for them.

Branding and Painting--the eternal fight. In this area, because we are close to the export markets, the poor loggers have to brand both ends of every log over 7 inches on the small end, and one end if it is smaller.
Then they have to put a yellow paint dab, I think the spec is a 1.5 inch minimum circle on both ends. They used to sometimes write words and draw pictures but loggers are not as rich as they used to be and paint is expensive. :smile2:

They tend to wait till the logs are loaded on the truck. Then the chaser gets to do the job, usually. He gets to clamber all over the load. I have heard of an occasional chaser riding the load to the mill, because they forgot he was on top of the load...not really, they got the truck stopped before the mill.

The forester has to check a load every week, or give a good try. It isn't rare for a truck to come down and be checked whilst he/she is tightening wrappers, and to be found to be insufficiently branded and painted. Hopefully, they are in radio contact with the landing, and then someone is sent down with hammer and paint.
Bad words may be exchanged between the two.

Also, they have to have a load ticket staple, staple, staple, staple, fold and stapled on the driver's side front bunk log. That too, is difficult for some drivers to do. That is why FS foresters are not allowed to carry firearms on the job.

Trucks get parked, and haul gets shut down if things don't improve. It is taken quite seriously, but is a PIA for all involved.

Here is a chaser, performing the despised deed. He has two cans of paint, normally he'd have a hammer in one hand and the paint in the other. Oh, and branding hammer design. Some companies have sadistic people who make the branding hammer. I found one once that I used to beat open a gate with one time. That was how heavy it was. Some companies are smart, and put the brand on the end of a regular carpentry hammer.

The brand is registered with the state, and has to be cancelled before it can be used on another sale.

This lad is on top of the logtruck load. He did not try to go to the mill that day.

View attachment 222537

 

[slowp]

Here is a load that was entered in the Morton Logger's Jubilee parade several years ago. We had to fill out more paperwork than usual because it wasn't going to be scaled on the same day. It was branded and painted perfectly, and you will see the load receipt properly stapled. It is the little Pin...ooops salmon colored tag on the bunk log.

This truck won in the division of best working truck.

View attachment 222540

 

[Humptulips]

Branding logs is or at least used to be pretty much universal everywhere I've worked.

Slowp gives a pretty good description of FS rules. We all know any problems are their fault:tongue2:

If that sounds bad though consider how it used to be on the Quinault Res. It's divided into allotments either 40 or 80 acres. Each allotment had it's own brand and with a dozen or more sides shipping logs to the sorting yard that makes for a lot of brands to check.

It gets worse. Often a unit would be layed out so that you would end up yarding across an allotment line or even a couple lines. Now each one of these logs had to be branded with the proper brand so the right owner could get paid. They had branders that would work with the cutting crew and brand logs as they were fell. If the cuts didn't seperate enough they would snipe the end a bit to get a brand on the log.
Now when they get to the landing the chaser had to figure what brand to put on the other end of the log. They would have two or even three different branding hammers. The log often was drug through the mud and the corners broomed a little but it was up to the chaser to figure out what to whack the end of the log with.
Curse words did fly.

 

[Gologit]

The forester has to check a load every week, or give a good try. It isn't rare for a truck to come down and be checked whilst he/she is tightening wrappers, and to be found to be insufficiently branded and painted. Hopefully, they are in radio contact with the landing, and then someone is sent down with hammer and paint.
Bad words may be exchanged between the two.

Also, they have to have a load ticket staple, staple, staple, staple, fold and stapled on the driver's side front bunk log. That too, is difficult for some drivers to do. That is why FS foresters are not allowed to carry firearms on the job.

Trucks get parked, and haul gets shut down if things don't improve. It is taken quite seriously, but is a PIA for all involved.

That's also why truck drivers are not allowed to carry firearms on FS sales. The tags and branding are usually on the logs before the truck leaves the landing. Technically it doesn't have to be done while the truck is still within the sale boundary but it's just easier to do it right there...before anybody forgets. And SlowP is right about the staple thing...the use of thumbtacks might be an acceptable alternative in an emergency but using 6 penny nails, push pins, or duct tape to afix the FS tag to the wing log causes the forester to get grumpy. Grumpy foresters are bad news...they tend to say NO! more often when they're grumpy.

Climbing on the load is frowned on down here. The first round of trucks usually loads before daylight and climbing on the load, even under the loader lights, is a little dicey. There actually have been instances of the the landing rat still being on the load when the truck takes off. That usually causes a lot of yelling, arm waving, frantic radio calls, and some bad words between the log rider and the truck driver. If there's time, the chaser or knot bumper usually brands the logs while they're in the deck.

When the FS people inspect our loads they usually look at our shovel and our axe. The axe is almost always in good shape because it gets used to trim stuff, but the shovel might go for years and never leave it's holder in the headache rack. When you pull it out of the rack and the handle breaks off from wood rot it tends to irritate the forester. They claim we might need to use the shovel to fight fires. Most of the drivers are so out of shape that an hour of frantic line clearing with a shovel would probably give them a heart attack. One of our drivers told the FS person that, too, as he was picking up the pieces of his shovel handle off of the ground. I think his words were..."I don't do shovel".

Usually, accountability checks are done where the trucks come out onto the road or in a good wide spot where the driver stops to make sure all the wrappers are tight. Sometimes it's fun, especially if the FS people are dweebs that you've dealt with before, to stop and then, as they approach the truck to start their inspection, drive off. Sometimes they'll get back into their pickup and follow you. The truck drivers have little contests with each other to see how many times they can make the FS people stop and try to do their inspection before they give up and look for a more cooperative driver.

 

[slowp]

How times have changed. Back in dur days of real trees and real clearcuts, ve used to hire a seasonal to do truck checks. You'd put up a real sign, on one of two wide spots which were paved and had been designed for that purpose, and all log trucks had to stop there and get checked.

Both spots were about as far away from the landing as you could get. Even though they were on fairly flat stretches. you'd have to listen to the truck drivers whining about how hard it was on their brakes to come to a complete stop, in a safe place.

One person we hired had no tact. Unfortunately, they also had a poor work ethic and were sent down the road. The next person was perfect. He was a former local cop, and could BS with the best of them, and we would hear complaints about him on the CB which usually ended with, "But you know, he's right." We knew we had a good 'un.

One logger, who had a long haul, that would take some time to follow was constantly bugging me to follow his dad's truck over the hill to the mill. That was 2 or 3 hours one way, depending on the snow. I didn't. I stayed on the sale and checked stuff.

Another guy, who was an extremely good logger and good to work with, told his chaser that no truck was to leave the landing without the ticket "properly attached" and the chaser was to throw his body in front of any truck that did not have a ticket on the load. That was after I'd stopped a truck down the road, off the sale, with the ticket in the driver's pocket. Never again was it a problem. The chaser survived.

The branding, painting, and ticket thing is a headache. I would not wish it on the Cheeseheads. Most of the loggers Up Nort load short logs on trucks sideways, in one length, so it would be easier, I guess.

 

[Gologit]

How times have changed. Back in dur days of real trees and real clearcuts, ve used to hire a seasonal to do truck checks. You'd put up a real sign, on one of two wide spots which were paved and had been designed for that purpose, and all log trucks had to stop there and get checked.

Yup...I haven't seen one of those formal checks, with the signs and everything, for a few years. The last one I heard about had only two people doing the checking, both summer employees, and they had trucks backed up for a quarter mile. There was a lot of yelling and phone calls and an eventual meeting because of that little fiasco.

 

[bitzer]

Yeah I kind of feel like a dope doing it, marring up pretty looking logs and all. I have seen other loggers paint their ends and happened to see some italian guy's last name painted on an end in a gas station last summer. I'm sure its just like anything else, make it mandatory and its a pita that is scrutinized to the T. My natural distrust of the world coupled with the fact that I've heard that some logs have been stolen off of landings around here recently has increased my paranoia. Tomorrow night after I split every one of them is getting a whack. It will be interesting to hear what the trucker/yard manager/forester says. Down here all of my logs are fit together like a puzzle the long way. I think we have typically bigger logs than they do up north, but we have shorter trees. I can't imagine if you'd have to mark a load of 100" pulp sticks. Thanks for all the info everyone! So does this mean I may be ruining the quaint logging industry of WI forever?

 

[madhatte]

Just remembered something. Last year, when I was involved in the court proceedings for that timber theft case in Portland, the victim of the theft told me about thing that I have never seen before. The thief was using a brand not currently registered with the state of Oregon, so the victim took a wax casting from a log on the impounded deck, had a hammer made, and registered it. This was one of the details that made the thief's insurance company decide to settle rather than follow through on the case. I'm still disappointed that the company paid out instead of letting the bastid fry.

 

[slowp]

So does this mean I may be ruining the quaint logging industry of WI forever?

Yes. Now you'll have to hire a chaser. Cuz branding and painting is the job nobody wants to do. :eek2:

 

[bitzer]

Yes. Now you'll have to hire a chaser. Cuz branding and painting is the job nobody wants to do. :eek2:

Well its a done deal. I'm sure word will spread like wild fire.

So if I hire said chaser does this mean I can apply for the next season of axemen? I do swear a lot as a habit and I probably could start throwing my hard hat more often. He could sit on the log pile while smoking and grumble about what an ####### I am.

 

[Gologit]

Well its a done deal. I'm sure word will spread like wild fire.

So if I hire said chaser does this mean I can apply for the next season of axemen? I do swear a lot as a habit and I probably could start throwing my hard hat more often. He could sit on the log pile while smoking and grumble about what an ####### I am.

You might want to give it some thought. Do you really want to piss off a guy who has a hammer in one hand and a can of spray paint in the other.? :eek2:

 

[madhatte]

You might want to give it some thought. Do you really want to piss off a guy who has a hammer in one hand and a can of spray paint in the other.? :eek2:

If it were just the hammer, I'd take my chances.

 

[floyd]

Brands are registered in OR. Proves ownership of the log.

Same with livestock except goats. They can still be shot on sight Might piss the owner off a little.

It would piss me off if you shot mine.

Unless they were eating ANOTHER crop tree.

 

[slowp]

If it were just the hammer, I'd take my chances.

Have you seen the variety of hammers out there? If you had, you would take back your post!:smile2:
Some hammers resemble sledge hammers--because they are, with tiny letters and numerals welded onto the head. Beware the hammer!

I met a guy who got chased off the landing and up the road a ways by a temporarily insane chaser who was going to use the branding hammer in a manner for which it was not intended. :msp_ohmy:

 

[Gologit]

I met a guy who got chased off the landing and up the road a ways by a temporarily insane chaser who was going to use the branding hammer in a manner for which it was not intended. :msp_ohmy:

LOL...was the guy who got chased a government employee?

 

[slowp]

LOL...was the guy who got chased a government employee?

Yes. What made you think of that? I don't know if the cops were notified. I think not. The chaser apologized the next day and said it had been a bad day for him.