Michael, thank you for your comment. It's always very gratifying to receive favorable comments from experienced woodsmen. I do envy your ownership of a small dozer. That's one very useful piece of equipment. I fully appreciate, as you obviously do, that each additional piece of equipment carries the curse of maintenance and breakdowns, and expect that you, like me, find the trade-off between the time and annoyance of implement change-outs and the time, cost, and annoyance of owning and maintaining multiple pieces of equipment hard to gauge. And yes, leaving the legacy to future generations brings priceless satisfaction. Be safe in the woods! Vince

Thank you, Peter. My videos do differ, and deliberately so, from the plethora of KZfaq videos made for entertainment or for what I consider video versions of Facebook by which the filmmaker's obvious intent is just to let the world know what he or she might be doing at the moment. Before embarking on a project, I first recognize what I consider to be an educational need not already satisfied by quality educational videos. Because my purpose is education, I see no value in duplicating what somebody else has already done a good job producing. Furthermore, my goal is not to gain a large popular following but to provide quality education to a rather narrow student body. After that, I work out a written lesson plan along with a video shooting script before ever turning on the camera. I worked on this three chapter tractor logging tutorial over a period of four years before publishing it on KZfaq, and it means a lot to me to receive comments from serious student woodsmen, like yourself, who have learned something valuable from the series. Thanks again, and be safe in the woods! Vince

I hope you found them useful! Be safe in the woods! Vince

Kelly, good to see that you viewed the entire trilogy. There are many more acres on Bombadil Tree Farm, not seen in this video series, helped along with a chainsaw and tractor back in the 1980s, that now form a stunningly beautiful late succession or old growth forest that, at about 100 years of age, is only now entering middle age. During a wonderful festival atmosphere Forestry Field Day we hosted back in September 2022 to celebrate receiving Maine's Outstanding Tree Farmer of the Year award, a forester friend led an inspiring tour through parts of that stand. Too bad you didn't know about it. I think that you would have enjoyed joining Ashlee's tour. Be safe in the woods! Vince

Thanks, Vince. If I'm ever up that way I'll give you a ring. I would love to see it. @@bombadiltreefarms314

Thank you, Oli. I'm always very happy to learn when another lover of the forest finds my videos helpful, and I'm certain that your "unlucky" nickname is applied in jest. Appears to me that you and your family have been blessed with a very hopeful start-up enterprise. My best wishes to you for happiness and success. Above all, be safe! Vince

If you are my neighbor, please come to the Forestry Field Day this Saturday 10 Sep. Details found at www.mainewoodlandowners.org/forestry-field-day#:~:text=This%20year's%20Forestry%20Field%20Day,Bombadil%20Tree%20Farm%20in%20Ashland.

I am glad that you found the series valuable and even inspiring. The world's forests need a knowledgeable and devoted next generation to carry-on the kind of stewardship that you commend me for. Perhaps you will be among them. And yes, I am still well and continue working in the woods performing my annual winter harvests among other things. The reality that human life is short hangs over me as I approach my 70th birthday in a few short weeks. Nonetheless, I hope that I can continue what I do in the forest, even if that means at a slower pace, for another ten years. Another fifteen would be a wonderful blessing.Thanks again for your comment. Vince

Hi Clayton! First, please accept my apology for not replying sooner. I did not notice your comment until today and especially regret my delay because that comment came from a retired RCAF comrade. In 2012 I retired from the USAF after 25 years and moved back home to northern Maine. Regarding the "gobbledygook" that you refer to, do you realize that only three countries in the entire world still use the antiquated British system of measures? They are the USA, Liberia, & Burma. As a Canadian you must be well aware that your neighbors to the south can often be slow learners. Even the UK went metric back in the 1960s. Anyway, you must have caught that rarely did I fail to convert to metric in my videos. Be safe in the woods, and enjoy your retirement! Vince

Dale, I'm very happy that you found the video valuable and appreciate your kind comments. I wish the same to you and your family. Vince

Hi Glade! I am glad that you found them useful. Am I correct that you are on the drier side of the Cascades where Douglas fir and hemlock predominate? Even there, your west coast trees make our largest look like house plants in comparison and I can't say how applicable the system described in my video trilogy would be. That will be up to you to discover and hopefully fine tune to your local conditions. Please keep me posted on your progress and above all be safe! Vince

You are very welcome! Vous êtes les bienvenus ! Vince

Sarah, Thanks! Vince

Thank you, Brad. As I have commented to a couple other viewers in the past, my entire purpose is providing quality education that is not already out there. I have no desire to duplicate something already well done by somebody else. Nor do I have any interest in producing what I call video versions of Facebook, videos for casual entertainment based upon "see what I'm up to today." Such videos are often very popular and many contain valuable bits and pieces of educational value but too often also contain misleading information and promote dangerous practices. I am always pleased to receive comments such as yours from kindred spirits who are out in their working forests safely and conscientiously enjoying the many benefits a well managed forest offers. Be safe! Vince

You are very welcome, and I thank you for your feedback! Vincent

Steindorf Math Club I JUST FOUND HIM. Really awesome stuff.

You are very welcome, and I hope that you found it useful. Vince

Derek, I'm happy that you found the tutorial valuable. I will check with a couple terrific professional foresters I know with the Maine Forest Service (MFS) and see what they might already have in the line of a tree identification video. MFS does have a good field guide, now in its Centennial edition, available in hard copy through the offices of MFS district service foresters and online at www.maine.gov/dacf/mfs/publications/handbooks_guides/forest_trees/index.html. It may or may not adequately suit your needs. Concerning more detailed discussion and demonstration of felling techniques, please give me some time to see if somebody else already has a good tutorial out there on that topic. If not, it sounds like a good project for me during the coming winter. It may be a few weeks before I get back to you. Thanks again for your feedback.

Hi Derek, I've spent some time looking and have not found what in my opinion is a quality tree ID video for trees found in the forests of Maine. Nor do those couple terrific MFS foresters I referred to know of any. I just might make one this autumn and winter concentrating on the half-dozen or so principal forest trees of northern Maine. Regarding felling techniques, many videos are out there but I believe nothing beats a terrific set of tutorials covering all aspects of chainsaw safety, use, and maintenance found at www.stihlusa.com/information/videos/chainsaw-safety-operations-maintenance-videos/ Be safe! Vince

Thank you for your help, i am stationed at Minot AFB right now so i have a few years to do research and get set up. I look forward to any more videos you get the chance to make, i miss the forests of the north east.

Derek, So you are either a missileer or a member of the B-52 mafia. Great! I spent a little over 25-years in the USAF. My best wishes, and yes, the open prairies of North Dakota, beautiful as they are, can make a forest lovers heart lonely. Vince

Thank you for your kind comment. However, my videos will be few and relatively far between because I focus on education that has not already been well developed in videos by other producers. For example, there are many valuable KZfaq videos, and even more not so educationally valuable that are more "look at what I am doing today" video versions of Facebook, that focus on logging with farm tractors. However, when I started working on my three chapter video tutorial more than seven years ago, I could not find any video, quality or otherwise, that discussed the system as a whole. The National Board of Forestry, Sweden, produced such a film about forty years ago but had cleaned out their archives and could not locate a copy. Hence my three chapter production. I did post a video this past February that targets a very narrow audience, small woodlot owners who share my own gut level aversion to clearcuts but may have such a degraded forest that that might be the best option in beginning a turnaround. So long as I am alive, I plan to produce yearly updates that follow regeneration of those clearcut stands. Should you have interest in that topic, the link is kzfaq.info/get/bejne/puB6hqt6tL_TaIk.html. Thank you again! Vince

Hi Robert, You are very welcome. Be safe! Vince

Thank you, Jesse. Vince

Hi Tom. Glad you found the videos useful. Above all, be safe! Vince

You are very welcome. Be safe in the woods! Vince

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Thanks 👍

David, Thank you for your comment. If you plan to build a forwarding trailer with a grapple, you must take a look at the guidelines on doing just that in Milton Nilsson's book. "The Farm Tractor in the Forest" by Milton Nilsson and illustrated by Nils Forshed is available online for free courtesy of the Maine Forest Service in the U.S.A. The link is www.maine.gov/dacf/mfs/publications/general_publications/farm_tractor_in_the_forest.pdf, or you can just Google "The Farm Tractor in the Forest" and find the link at or near the top of the search result list. Please send an email to dacf@maine.gov thanking the Maine Forest Service for this generous service . Be safe in the woods! Vince

David, Thanks for your comments. The Canadian manufacturer of my forwarding trailer offers a powered drive option for the wheels of its trailers much as you describe. Yes, that would make for some added traction where footing is loose as in the sand hills where you operated. Payeur/Metavic also offers a steerable set of trailer wheels for operating where it is difficult to lay out straight skid trails. I could not agree with you more! We can work with nature. It just takes knowledge, respect, and the right balance. It is obvious that the Swedes, as the original innovators and educators of the logging system I detailed in my tutorial, have appreciated this ethic for decades. Thanks again for your comments. Vince

Vince ,the trailer was made in Sweden I'm guessing in the late 70s to 80s .It was well used when I used it in the early 90s . It also had a long squirt boom .This gave it the ability to get the trees well of the track . You could slide the trailer left + right at the front for cornering in tight spaces and more stability when loading . We could keep the turning tracks the same width as your straight tracks .Was only unstable when empty so if there were large stems it paid to pick them up later in the load . The setup didn't look much but it did a job few other setups could match , in its ability to use small tracks + little damage to the forest . I think it would have been a high end setup with the 85 -90 landini tractor bush setup tractor for its day . It would keep up with around 10 guys on saws . Dave

David, Sounds like a very impressive piece of machinery. If, by chance, you have any old photos or preferably video clips it would be great if you converted them to MP4 format and published a video of your operation on KZfaq. If you do, please let me be the first to hear about it! Vince

Keith, you are very welcome and thanks for your kind wishes for the future. Be safe in the woods! Vince

You are very, very welcome. Be safe! Vince

Thank you for your comment, and I hope the videos make what you do in the forest safer and more efficient. Be safe! Vince

Hello, Niklas. Yes, Milton is 92 years old and lives not far from Östersund. I have exchanged several letters with him. The illustrator of the book, Nils Forshed, is in his late 70's and doing very well. My wife and I visited Nils this past summer in Sweden, and I feel very proud to now have his autograph in my copy of "The Farm Tractor in the Forest". Unfortunately, we did not meet Milton due to problems with his health. Nonetheless, I have had the pleasure of expressing my thanks in the letters I have sent him. May I ask you for a small favor? Neither Milton Nilsson, Nils Forshed, nor Royne Anderrson, the editor that I contacted at the Swedish Forest Agency, have been able to locate a copy of the film that the National Board of Forestry, Sweden produced to accompany the book. Mr. Anderrson did tell me, "All films have been used in the extension service in past days. The library we had at the head office in Jönköping is also closed. Also to be mentioned is that the organization has been changed several times and offices have been moved or closed so it’s a needle in a haystack to find it out in the districts." The small favor that I ask of you is, at your convenience, to check with your local library or extension service and perhaps be lucky enough to find a copy of the film. If you find one, I will pay to have it converted to digital format and posted on KZfaq. I am confident that it will provide wonderful education. Thank you again for your comment. Vince

Thanks! Be safe in the woods! Vince

Rich, thank you for your comment. I'm very pleased that you found the tutorial informative. Be safe in the woods! Vince

I'm going to add the front diagonal cage members to my tractor as you dicribed. I since saw them on a 1968 Timberjack Log Skidder, just as you described. I fabricated the whole roll cage on my tractor so I might as well for safety sake. All accidents can be prevented! Thanks again d;-)

Rich, you are very welcome! And you won't regret adding the sloping front cage members. If you fabricated your whole protective cage, then adding those two members will be an easy job for you. I cannot agree with you more about safety. Working in the forest is beautiful and satisfying but dangerous. Safety can never be overemphasized. Vince

Hello Guy, Thank you for your comment. Unfortunately, you are very correct about the common failure of my compatriots here in the U.S.A to convert units of measurement from the antiquated British system to Metric. Same goes when it comes to languages other than English, although I believe that we are slowly progressing in this regard especially when it comes to Spanish. Curiously and also frustrating, at least to me, is that the entire world with the exception of the U.S.A., Burma, and Liberia are on the Metric system. Even the UK saw the wisdom of going Metric over fifty years ago. Thanks again! Vince

Thank you for your very informative comment. Vince

Thank you, and I hope that what you learned makes your work in the woods safer, more productive, and more respectful of the forest. Vince

Hi Brian, I should know you if you are talking about the hardwood mill in Portage, Maine located in what used to be the Great Northern Paper Company repair garage. Regardless, I'm glad that my tutorial brought back some fond memories for you. Be safe! Vince

Bombadil Tree Farms thanks. Yup that’s the one. I started there when E.J.Carrier was just selling it to Georgia Pacific. I worked there for 11 years and got done about three years ago. My father still works there loading chip trucks with the front end loader.

A small world it is! I invite you to stop by my operation. The entrance to our woodlot is located 3.5 miles west of Ashland on Hwy 163 directly across from Aroostook Fiber Works where they process alpaca fleece into yarn. Our home is the second gated driveway west of there. When the gates are open I am there. Right now I'm at our operation in northwest Georgia and will not return to Ashland until late August or early September. Hope to see you then. Vince

Bombadil Tree Farms yea that’d be great. I know exactly where I actually drove by today on my way to see my parents. Thanks. I’ll see you when you get back.

Hi Justin. Yes, I have thought of it but as you suspect not only is the tongue weight but the gross loaded trailer weight (about 10,000 lbs or about 4,500 kg) is far too heavy for safe attachment to anything mounted on my tractor's 3-point hitch including the logging winch. It must be attached to the draw-bar or a specially fabricated weight distributing mount on the tractor's frame. I do have a removable receiver that does attach to my winch (a newer Tajfun, not the winch in my videos) that handles farm and utility trailers up to about two tons (slightly less than two tonne) with tongue weights less than 220 lbs (100 kg) quite well. My tractor's specs limit the weight on the lower links to 1,760 lbs (800 kg) and my winch alone without winch cable, choker slides and other rigging weighs 772 lbs (350 kg). I estimate that the tongue weight of my forwarding trailer empty exceeds 1,000 lbs.You report doing well with a mount on your box blade that allows you to handle gross trailer weights of 8,000 lbs. I suspect that your tractor is larger than mine and that the tongue weight of your trailer is far less than that of my forwarding trailer. I hope that this detailed reply answers your question, and I'm very happy that you found my videos useful. Be safe in the woods! Vince

Thank you, Mark, for your comment. It would break my heart to be in your position watching helplessly as the emerald ash borer wreaks havoc. I have never figured out why the introduced pests and diseases invariably go after the most beautiful and valuable species. Why not poison ivy? Be safe in the woods! Vice

Et un très beau bonjour à toi aussi, mon ami. Yes, the recent several days in Cozumel were very fine, and I am now back in the forest for this winter's harvest. Today, however, I am indoors catching up on a few things and waiting for this snowstorm to end so that I can clear the haul road leading to my log landing. I hope all is well with you, and I wish you and your family a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 good to hear that beers at the beach are done by now LOL . Maybe we will see further vidéos ! Merritt Christmas to your family !!

Adam, I'm glad that you found it useful, and best of success with all that you embark upon at the top of New Hampshire. Be safe in the woods! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Thank you very much Vince! Likewise, all the best to you in the North Woods.

Thanks, Richard, for your comment. I especially enjoy questions from folks like you who manage their woodlots for purposes different from my own. Learning from others never tires me out. First, I must admit that I will never develop anything close to George's finesse with a loader. There is also some very sad news. George has been battling cancer over the past year and is no longer hauling logs. Such a rugged and good-hearted man who doesn't smoke, drink, or have any other unhealthy habits. I supply three large mills within 25 miles of my forest. Two run on spruce and fir to produce what is called "dimension lumber" meaning 2 by 4-inch, 2 by 6-inch, and 2 by larger-inch construction lumber. The third mill runs on aspen to produce 4 by 8-foot sheets of OSB (oriented strand board). I also sell smaller amounts of white pine and larch to a couple small mills run by Amish buddies, and an occasional quality hardwood log to either a nearby hardwood sawmill or to a veneer mill. Approaching any of them is easy. With the big industrial mills, you just call and ask for the "log buyer" or "log procurement manager" who will tell you if the mill will buy directly from you or if they will only accept your wood through one of their contracted suppliers or wood yards. Small operations like the Amish mills invariably operate directly with me. Every mill, regardless of size, will supply you with their "spec sheet" that provides details on lengths, diameters, species, allowable defects, and the like. Such spec sheets from veneer mills clearly guide you in determining what trees have the potential to eventually produce high value veneer logs. One large mill that I sell to directly deposits into my bank account payment in less than a week from load delivery. When I sell through a contracted supplier, I work out an arrangement that suits us both. One that I have dealt with for many years pays me after he receives payment from the mill. The Amish pay either cash upon delivery or barter with me which is what both of us prefer. As we speak, my favorite Amish sawmiller is grazing an Angus steer that he will butcher this autumn. The meat will come to me as partial payment for a load of white pine logs I delivered to him this past winter. I really encourage you to engage a consulting forester to guide you in management of your woodlot. He/she will know all the intricacies of your local market and the players in the game including truckers, log buyers, etc. Moreover, it can be a bit complicated managing northern hardwood stands for both sugar and lumber, and a licensed forester is the professional who will help you avoid some costly mistakes that can take more than a full human lifetime to overcome. Some countries, states, or provinces provide such forestry advice free of charge. Here in Maine, we have District Foresters who will, without charge, take a look and provide a landowner with general comments and direct him/her to appropriate private consulting foresters and also to sources of funding. I suggest that you start there. Check with your local state or provincial forestry department or agency. They commonly go by different names. In Maine it is the Maine Forest Service. In Nova Scotia it is the Department of Natural Resources. In Vermont it is the Department of Forests, Parks, and Recreation. My best wishes! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Thanks for the reply! I will talk with my forester. Sorry to hear about George; hopefully he wins the battle.

Thank you. I hope it will make your work safer and more efficient. Be safe in the woods! Vince

Thank you!

Bill, you are very, very welcome! Vince

Glad to hear you found the series helpful. My one critical comment regarding what you said is that your sons and grandson need to share the same interest that you have in quality management of your woodlot. The stories are endless of devoted individuals hoping to pass the legacy of their efforts to the next generation that has little interest in the forest. Get them involved! That's the only way! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Yes sir that’s right. Thankfully my sons share the goal. My grandson is only 3 but he’s learned to identify some trees by leaf already.

@@danieljohnson8087 That is terrific! You are a very lucky man. Be safe! Vince

Please forgive me for my delay replying. It appears that you run an interesting and creative operation that provides numerous benefits, and I commend you! And please do not apologize for the length of your comment or questions. This is all about sharing information and experience and helping each other. Regarding my Metavic forwarding trailer, I am not familiar with the Woody brand and therefore cannot make a comparison. However, after almost 8 years (I bought my forwarder in November 2012) I have had zero problems and zero complaints about the design. Prior to my purchase, I did have the Payeur salesman discuss with Metavic a minor custom alteration that they easily accommodated. My model forwarder comes with a standard 12-foot log-bed. The local mill that accepts my aspen takes 100-inch wood and the local mill that accepts my spruce and fir logs prefers as many 16 footers as possible. That being said, a 12-foot log-bed would have allowed me only one rack of aspen. To double the capacity of each trip, I wanted to be able to load two racks of 100-inch aspen one behind the other as seen in my video. Allowing for a 2 to 3-foot overhang, that meant I needed a 14-foot log-bed. The Metavic engineers worked out a two-foot frame extension design that included lengthening the loader boom and repositioning the bogey wheels for proper balance, and the factory built it for some ridiculously low additional price. Various features that make the Metavic more expensive than several other brands have proven to be worth every penny. The Metavic's box frame is impossible to bend or twist. More than one other manufacturer uses a single central tubular steel frame that can hardly be called a "frame" because such a design provides only a central pole from which the log bunks hang inviting twisting or bending if loaded with anything except small logs or comparatively light loads. More than once I have clumsily dropped some heavy logs on my Metavic's frame without it flinching. The high flotation tires are also great, and the deflector wings on the frame just forward of the tires have saved me countless times from the aggravation of trail-side trees lodging against the tires and stopping forward movement or, worse yet, getting jammed between the tires and the frame where cutting one free would be very dangerous. Several other brands lack such deflector wings. I consider them a must. I have checked payload capacity and found that I typically carry around 6,000 pounds (2,700 to 2,800 kg) of logs per load, a bit over one cord. Available space limits the capacity. There is just no more room. Unfortunately, I can't help you much regarding operating on hills. Most of my terrain is flat to gently sloping where my steepest sections of trails rarely extend more than 100-meters at a 6 to 10% grade. On such slopes, I gear down ahead of time and stay in that gear until back on flat ground. Taking only this precaution on either bare ground or snow packed trails, I have never had any sense of the loaded trailer trying to gain on me. In his book, Milton Nilson offers some advice regarding operating on slopes. If you haven't yet downloaded a free copy in pdf. format, I encourage you to do so. Someplace I offered a public comment with the direct download link, or you can just Google, "The Farm Tractor in the Forest" for the link. I'm also confident that the people at Payeur could put you in touch with customers operating in hilly country. Before I bought my Metavic trailer, the salesman at Payeur personally contacted a customer that he felt could answer a few of my questions better than he could. The customer very happily agreed to offer me his phone number and we had a couple very informative discussions about his experiences with his unit. By the way, if you are in the USA or Canada, I suggest you contact Payeur in Ascot Corner, Quebec, Metavic's exclusive distributor. They sell directly to the public and will deliver just about anywhere in North America. Under NAFTA and I hope under the new USMCA trade agreement, going through Payeur will save you huge amounts including secondary dealer markup and avoidance of import duty and state sales tax if you are in the USA. Payeur's website is payeur.com/en/. In case you are not aware, Metavic forwarders are available with or without an integral winch. If you already have your Wallenstein winch and plan to bunch you wood trailside as I do, make certain that you don't buy a trailer with the integral winch. That adds a thousand or two dollars to the purchase price and won't benefit you. In other applications, the integral winch has value. I also have Trygg chains. There are none better. I do caution you, however, against running chains on your front tires. I never have because doing so reportedly can invite problems, some serious. Your Branson is quite a bit bigger than my 34 hp Kubota, yet I run chains only on my rear tires, only in the winter, and have no traction problems on snow-packed trails. I suggest that you start out with chains only on the rear. If you don't get all the bite that you want, you can later decide if you want to spend money on front tire chains. I predict that you won't need to even consider it. Something that I discussed in my video but didn't emphasize is that the distance from harvest site to log landing determines the benefit, if any, that a forwarding trailer can offer. If operating on bare ground, carrying the load on wheels as opposed to dragging logs and tree sections also reduces damage to trail surfaces and the residual stand, issues that don't apply when operating on snowpack. So, the primary benefit of a forwarding trailer is the ability to move larger volumes of wood per trip. At shorter distances, a forwarding trailer actually slows the operation down. So, where is the break point? I have never performed a formal timed analysis, but my gut impression is that the trailer provides no efficiency benefit when skidding time from harvest site to log landing is less than 5 minutes on snowpack (10 minutes round trip excluding bucking and piling time at the landing) and 3 minutes on bare ground. The difference relates to the fact that I can skid more wood directly behind the tractor on snow-packed trails than I can on bare ground. Last winter I was a full 1/4 mile (about 0.4 kilometers) from my log landing. Each complete round-trip with the forwarder took me between one hour and one hour fifteen minutes. That included loading trailside bunches in the harvest area and unloading at the landing in addition to round trip travel time. If instead of bunching logs trailside I had just continued out to the landing skidding tree sections behind my tractor, I would have cut down on bucking and handling time trailside but increased the number of trips by a factor of about 3 and increased time at the landing due to bucking and piling there, something that likely cancels out similar time bunching trailside in the woods. Without a formal time-task analysis, all that I can do is give a gut impression, and that gut impression is that the trailer saved me about one day out of every four or five in this scenario. I hope that I have answered your questions and that you find my answers at least somewhat useful. By the way, where are you located? It sounds like New England or Acadia. Please keep me posted on your progress, and above all, be safe! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Thank you so much Vince! We are in Eastern CT. Windham County, the quiet corner. We have a variety of hills, dark forests, slippery swamps, glaciel erratics, tons of stone wall size stone, and mostly hardwoods. My trails are close enough to skid to but I drive my tractor through the woods, off trail, often. I always joke that I will take it everywhere a skidder can go, I have a winch for the front for when I get stuck, as well as the skid winch of course. I do plan to tow the log trailer off trail in some situations, which is why i was considering front chains, also for off camber sections of trail in the snow. Im very familiar with using the cutting brakes to steer when the front won't though, so i will try rear chains first as you suggest. I will be calling Metavic this coming week, I'm looking forward to their input. One thing I would like to do is to tow the trailer behind my winch. I may rig up a bar to connect the winch to the tractors draw bar for added support when i tow the trailer, but ideally I will disconnect at my landing, which is almost a mile from my firewood operation, either through trails or down my road, depending on the day I will utilize either. The other lot is 1/2 mile or more through the woods, and yet another is my own property, 1/4mile or less. Another must for me is that it can fit on my 20' equipment trailer so I can transport it to future potential woodlots. As long as the tow bar disconnects with bolts I will be happy. I'm pretty sure they can work with me. Thank you so much, im sure I missed some questions, I have downloaded and read most of the logging book you have mentioned. I'm trying to learn as much as I possibly can about species and proper woodlot management, including which pests to worry about, which trees thrive amongst others, and whatever else i can learn. And finally, when I do get it, I will make a few videos to add to my channel, hopefully as informative as yours! BTW, I have watched them all multiple times over the last couple years, there are very few like it in English, i find myself guessing through Scandinavian logging videos! Ben

@@smoothlandin You know, there is a lot for us to discuss specific to your operation that may not interest other viewers. Therefore, I invite you to email me at vrsmd@yahoo.com and we can continue on from there. Be safe! Vince

Hi Kent. The place to start is with the spec sheets from the mills or log buyers that buy hardwood veneer logs in your area. Those spec sheets will clearly state species, log lengths, minimum diameters, allowable sweep, and allowable defects. Quality veneer logs are at such high demand that once you believe you might have any in your woodlot, ask the buyers to come take a look before you ever cut them. I have done this several times over the years and have found the foresters working in procurement eager to take a look.

Bombadil Tree Farms thank you for the reply. I will contact some local mills and go from there. Thanks

You are very welcome! Be safe in the woods! Vince

Thanks, Rick. After all these years, I still can't seem to decide which looks the best, the standing tree or its cut to length logs. Managing the forest sustainably makes that a moot point, anyway, because we always have plenty of both. Thanks again. Vince

My trailer has a 14-foot log bed, and I have traveled it up to 10 miles on paved roads pulled behind my tractor. Its axles and tires are not high speed rated, and it carries very large amounts of weight on the tongue which means that pulling it with anything but a tractor would not be a good idea. The same company does make similar units designed for highway travel equipped with their own engine to power the hydraulics. However, you would not want to use the highway units off-road in your woodlot. Check out their website at payeur.com/en/. Be safe! Vince

Jon, it runs off my tractor's hydraulics but the same manufacturer, and others, offer units with their own hydraulic pumps driven either by a PTO shaft from the tractor or by a separate small gasoline engine. Yes, it is a nice piece of equipment but pricey. From the purely financial standpoint, the money would have been better spent on extending my haul roads to decrease the distance from stump to log landing thereby making skidding directly behind my tractor and winch efficient. Be safe! Vince

You are very welcome and good luck with your project. Vince

I truly appreciate your comment because it reflects my purpose in producing the videos in the first place. Over six years ago I searched the internet for quality educational videos on tractor logging and found little. Yes, there were some that were entertaining primarily from the standpoint of near-miss disasters and others that focused on self-learned little tricks of the trade but none that collected the thoughtfully researched and developed knowledge of others like Milton Nilsson and Nils Forshed's team from the National Board of Forestry, Sweden and Professors Benjamin Hoffman and Robert Seymour from the University of Maine here in the USA. They invented the wheel, so to speak, and it was an excellent wheel that still rolls very well. I had no intention of reinventing it, but wanted to spread the word to save others the pain, expense, and risk of injury that you refer to. Thanks again! Vince

John, you are very welcome! Be safe in the woods and I wish you great success! Vince

Please forgive my delay replying. My snowblower is made in Canada by the Canadian firm, MK Martin Enterprises, Inc., and available through many retailers in Canada and northern states in the USA. It is rated to run at 540 rpm but I rarely operate my tractor at a high enough engine rpm to turn the pto at 540. For most applications including operating the snowblower, an engine rpm between 2000 and 2200 just feels right to me. That equates to a pto rpm of somewhere around 450 to 480. Over the weekend we had a 12-inch (about 30 cm) snowfall, and I had 3/4 mile (a little over one kilometer) of road to clear back to my log landing. The blower laid down a "drop zone" ridge of snow a good 20 feet (about 6 or 7 meters) from the road's edge. The snow was light. Wet or heavy snow doesn't get tossed that far. I hope that gives you the info you desire. As always, I appreciate you questions and comments. Vince

And you are so very welcome! God's blessing be with you! Vince

Hi Don, Yes, both my radio controlled winch and the forwarding trailer came from Les Distributions Payeur in Ascot Corner just outside Sherbrooke, Quebec. Payeur is the exclusive distributor for the made in Quebec, Canada line of Metavic products. New ones are pricey but occasionally they show up on the used market. Check with Payeur's salesman. I think it is till Norman, and he is fluent in French and English. Payeur exports a lot to the USA and will deliver right to your woodlot or garage. If you are located in the USA, both NAFTA and the favorable currency exchange rate will work in your favor. Be safe in the woods! Vince

Steve, that leaves it up to you and me to grow them! I'd love to have you swing down from Eagle Lake and I will show you thousands of them on Bombadil Tree Farm here in Ashland. Check my reply to your other recent comment for contact information. It will be great fun. Vince

Mike, my forwarding trailer runs off my tractor's hydraulics. Being an older model tractor, it lacks any factory installed auxiliary hydraulic hook-ups. There is one access point that, after removal of factory installed plugs, accepts a hydraulic adapter block that supplies a single auxiliary hydraulic outlet and another single inlet or return. This provides hydraulics to both my front-end loader and to the forwarding trailer. My radio controlled winch does not run off a PTO shaft the way my former Farmi winch did. Instead, it is powered by a hydraulic motor that also runs off the tractor's hydraulics. I have short hydraulic hoses (less than 2-feet or one-half meter) attached to the adapter block by threaded fittings. On their opposite ends I have quick change hydraulic couplings, one male and one female, that allow for easy hook-ups and disconnects. When nothing is attached, these must be connected to each other. My tractor's auxiliary hydraulic system requires "open-center" valves (common with farm tractors) on all attachments and the flow loop must always allow through flow and never be interrupted by a disconnected hose. This allows flow to pass through the front-end loader's control valve before reaching the control valves on either the trailer or the winch before returning to the tractor's internal reservoir. In hydraulic lingo this is called a "power beyond" or "high-pressure carryover" system of valves. When no attachment is being operated, the high-pressure outflow from the tractor flows unimpeded through the open centers of all valves in the system and back into its internal reservoir. Hope this answers your question. Vince

Thank you for take the time to respond to my question. Yes that answered it.

Hi Dylan, Gee, that doesn't make much sense to me, and all that I can offer are hardly thoughts but more what amount to a guess or two. My tractor's maximum hydraulic flow rate of 6.4 gpm is lower than what your Honda driven pump puts out but flow is related to how quickly the cylinders fill not to lifting capacity. Maximum hydraulic pressure determines that. Unfortunately, I can't find what my tractor's maximum pump pressure is rated at, but I believe it is in the 2250 to 2500 psi range. A reasonable guess is that your lifting capacity issue relates to your hydraulic pump having a lower maximum pressure output or, more likely, that the pump is able to generate high enough pressure put the pressure bypass or pressure relief valve is set too low. Have you contacted Payeur for their thoughts? Vince

I got it figured out with the dealer, turns out it was the relief valve like you mentioned, a quarter turn, psi went up to 2600 and she is lifting anything i would like now, which is a great relief. it is a great machine. i have plans for an auger and hedge trimmer on the boom to maximise uses as its a road legal trailer too, thanks and good luck :-)

Hi Alan. I'm sure that you will be happy to hear that after almost 8 years (not three; I bought my forwarder in November 2012) I have had zero problems and zero complaints about the design. Prior to my purchase, I did have Payeur discuss with Metavic a minor custom alteration that they easily accommodated. My model forwarder comes with a standard 12-foot log-bed. The local mill that accepts my aspen takes 100-inch wood and the local mill that accepts my spruce and fir logs prefers as many 16 footers as possible. That being said, a 12-foot log-bed would have allowed me only one rack of aspen. To double the capacity of each trip, I wanted to be able to load two racks of 100-inch aspen one behind the other. That meant I needed a 14-foot log-bed. The Metavic engineers worked out a two-foot extension design including lengthening the loader boom and repositioning the bogey wheels, and the factory built it for some ridiculously low additional price. Various features that make the Metavic more expensive than several other brands have proven to be worth every penny. The Metavic's box frame is impossible to bend or twist. More than one other manufacturer uses a single central tubular steel frame that can hardly be called a "frame" because such a design provides only a central pole from which the log bunks hang inviting twisting or bending if loaded with anything except small logs or comparatively light loads. More than once I have clumsily dropped some heavy logs on my Metavic's frame without it flinching. The high flotation tires are also great, and the deflector wings on the frame just forward of the tires have saved me countless times from the aggravation of trail-side trees lodging against the tires and stopping forward movement or, worse yet, getting jammed between the tires and the frame. Please let me know as you get some hours on your forwarder if you find any issues in quality or design that you don't like. I doubt that you will. Be safe! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 the only issue thus far is the height to step up onto the tongue. The other day I welded some small steps to allow easier access up to the controls. Ideally, there would be a grab handle and a chainsaw holder as well as a seat, but those are all luxuries I can live without. Thanks for the info, appreciate it.

Ana, I have check-scaled the weights of several loads and average right around 6,000 pounds. That roughly converts to a bit larger than one cord or 500 board feet. No, it has no brakes, and somewhere I gave a lengthy reply to another viewer on the same subject. See if you can find that discussion in the comment stack. If you can't, check back with me and I'll see what I can do to find it. Vince

I am very confident that on prepared trails that are smooth and free of obstructions or major surface irregularities as a result of packed snow (my preference) or naturally smooth ground (something that I lack except on a few acres that had once been cleared for farming) that a 50 to 60 hp tractor would handle a forwarding trailer like mine very well. The main advantage that I find to having a powered front axle is in climbing over obstructions and ground irregularities. These become moot points on snow packed trails or on bare ground blessed by nature or past human activity with being smooth. I do want to make a cautionary comment about horsepower. You don't need a lot of horsepower for this system of logging but you do need a rugged and heavily framed tractor with tires of adequate size and profile to provide traction, stability, and easily roll over surface irregularities. I have seen many tractors manufactured in more recent years that boast high horsepower on comparatively small and frail frames and tires. A neighbor of mine in Georgia recently bought a new 4wd Mahindra in the 50 hp range whose general bulk and tires appear comparable to the 2001 model year 21 hp Kubota that we have in Georgia. I would not recommend trying either one with my forwarding trailer that typically carries a 6,000 to 7,000 pound (about 3,000 kg) payload of logs. My 1982 model year 34 hp Kubota L345DT scene in these videos has a conventional heavy and rugged integral frame composed of engine, transmission, and rear axle assembly. It does not have a light weight engine and transmission attached to a secondary frame that has become more common in recent years on some makes and models. My L345DT has 13.6 x 28 tires on the rear and 9.5 x 16 tires on the front. If your 2wd tractor matches or exceeds mine in these regards, I am very confident that yours, with the additional horsepower, will outperform mine. On a separate note, I see that you have a team of work horses. Payeur, the Canadian company that markets the forwarding trailer that I have, also makes a forwarder to be pulled by a team of draft animals. It sports its own hydraulic pump driven by a small Honda engine. Please let me know how things develop with you and, above all, be safe in the woods! Vince

Just saw at the end of the video Ashland ME.

Just outside Ashland, a little less than 20 miles west of Presque Isle. The closure of Loring AFB in the early 90s hit northeast Aroostook County hard, and it still hasn't recovered. You were there, as you know well, in its final days. Thanks for your comment, and my best wishes to you in your current pursuits. Vince

Hi Ernie, the manufacturer is Metavic located in the Province of Quebec, Canada. At the time I purchased mine, the exclusive distributor for Metavic products was Les Distributiones Payeur in Ascot Corner, Quebec. They do a lot of business in the USA and their websites are easy to find with a Google search. Hope that this helps. Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 ty

Hi Stewart. I'm pretty sure that I can guide you to where you want to go. I would check with your state forestry commission or forest service, whichever it is called in Pennsylvania. They always have lists of local logging contractors in different regions of their respective states. Such contractors either own their own trucks or hire them. Either way, you will find a trucker. Key thing is that the log truck, and that's what they are called everywhere I have ever been, must be what's called a self-loader. Many log trucks are unable to load themselves, requiring a stand alone log loader to load and unload them. The truck that hauls for me has a rigid single frame typically called a "straight truck" or a "wheeler" that is short for a 10-wheeler because of the ten tires always on the ground. The third rear axle is called an "air tag axle" that can be lowered by the trucks air system to allow for heavier loads being carried on public roads in effect making it a 14-wheeler. George's truck has a 25-foot long log bed that is common in northern Maine and could accept the limited overhang you would encounter on your longer sections. In contrast to a straight truck are tractor-trailers comparable to most of the long haul trucks on the highway. In their case, however, the detachable trailer is configured with log bunks instead of a flatbed or closed box. However, I have only encountered self-loading tractor trailer log trucks here in Maine. Another option is to simply contact a local general construction company. They typically have trucks and tag behind large trailers used for multiple purposes that may or may not be self-loaders. In that case, they will commonly load and unload with a forklift or articulated frame front end loader. Some even carry their forklift with them snugged into the tail of the truck frame. There are also contractors that specialize in moving houses either intact or dismantled. Personally, that is where I would first search. I just Googled "house moving contractors Pennsylvania" and got a long list of companies for you to choose from. I suggest that you Google the same. Vince

Jay, it is sad to say that after growing the timber for 60 to 80 years during which time it needs to survive storms, insects, disease, and the risk of fire, then harvesting it, a truckload brings me only $700 to $800 USD. Vince

My Kubota L345DT tractor is rated at 34 horsepower. Not a big tractor but, as you can see, employing this system of logging allows it to do a lot of work. Be safe! Vince

Hi Dave, Shortly after I published this tutorial trilogy, the last remaining copies in the hands of various Amazon booksellers quickly sold out. I contacted the publications editor at the Swedish Forest Agency requesting that they publish more. Unfortunately, they had other projects of higher priority but did grant me permission to republish it in any format that I wished so long as I offered it for free. That I did and got the Maine Forest Service to graciously posted it on their website. You can download that PDF version from the Maine Forest Service website. Just Google "The Farm Tractor in the Forest", and high on the search result list will be a link to the PDF download. If you have any problems, let me know and I will provide you the detailed direct link. Be safe! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Thanks for the information on finding the booklet as a PDF. I am a Wisconsin Forest Landowner and love working in our woodlot and use a winch with my tractor, but can always learn. Currently spending winters in Arizona and with Covid virus keeping things low key this Book will give me some hours of enjoyment. Thank you so much

@@davewittek5180 And you are very welcome! Be safe in the woods! Vince

Hi Mike. I'm not quite clear about your question. Could you expand a bit? Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 when you are runing the boom and jib..........you move one at a time........is that lack of hydraulic power or you getting use to the machine?

Hi Mike, Thanks for the clarification. Even with my small tractor, there is adequate fluid pressure and flow to operate more than one valve and set of cylinders at a time allowing for simultaneous boom lift, grapple rotation, boom rotation, and even boom extension. Yes, you are correct. It took me awhile to get used to the machine and will never come close to the skill and finesse of "Frosty" George. Be safe in the woods! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 I'm glad you didn't take it as a jerky comment because it wasn't meant as such. It takes time then you'll be runing it in your sleep!!!!!!! Keep up the good work

Hi Mike, your words were no jerky comment at all, just part of a legitimate question. In the intervening years since those scenes were filmed, I've gotten a little better with the loader but, for an old dog learning a new trick, I'll never be running it in my sleep. Thanks, nonetheless, for your encouraging words. Cheers! Vince

Hi Jeff. If by "real terrain" you mean steep or mountainous terrain, one place to look is southern Germany and Austria where I have personally witnessed timber harvests using chainsaw felling and farm tractor mounted winches. However, their system relies upon well established, elaborate networks of switchback roads that lace the mountainsides. I emphasize that these are graded roads, not forest trails, and albeit narrow are accessible to log trucks. The tractor mounted winches only winch to the edge of these roads where logs are directly loaded onto trucks. The U.S. importer of Tajfun winches, Oesco, showed me some videos he shot of similar harvests using Tajfun winches not far from the Tajfun factory in Slovenia. Once again, those operations depended upon the existence of quality, graded, mountainside switchback roads. The system developed in Sweden that is illustrated in Milton Nilsson and Nils Forshed's book and demonstrated in this tutorial trilogy of mine is, as you point out, a system for generally level forests and not appropriate for steep or mountainous terrain. Please let me know if you are able to discover a system that is suitable to your conditions, and above all, be safe in the woods. Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 Thank you for the feedback. I am planning to buy some timber land and start managing it in my retirement. It won't be large scale so I'm looking at things that might make it less labor intensive. In my youth I did quite a bit of work logging but equipment and strategy have changed a lot since then so I'm trying to catch up a bit. Hopefully at the end I leave a nice timber plot for my kids to use for recreation and cash flow.

@@jeffhanson6844 Jeff, I admire your thinking. Should you like to exchange some thoughts that might not interest general viewers, I invite you to email me at vrsmd@yahoo.com and we can discuss things more. Merry Christmas! Vince

Hi Rick. A couple other viewers had asked the same thing along with my opinion of the unit. Let me hunt back and find my replies because they were quite complete and included how to take advantage of sales and import duty exemptions under US trade agreements with Canada. When I do, I'll copy and paste my answers into another reply to you. If you haven't heard back from me within a couple days, please pop me a reminder. Vince

I bought my forwarding trailer came from Les Distributions Payeur in Ascot Corner just outside Sherbrooke, Quebec. Although many dealerships in Quebec and possibly a few in the U.S.A. sell the Metavic line, Payeur was and I suspect still is the exclusive distributor for the made in Quebec, Canada line of Metavic products. Payeur will sell directly to the public and will deliver just about anywhere in North America. NAFTA was in effect at the time I purchased my trailer, and buying directly from Payeur saved me a lot of money by avoiding secondary dealer markup and exemption from import duty, Canadian HST tax, and Maine state sales tax. NAFTA has since expired but was recently replaced by the U.S., Mexico, Canada trade agreement (USMCA). I hope the USMCA provides the same tax and duty exemptions. Check with Payeur's salesman. He would know. The favorable currency exchange rate will also work in your favor. Payeur's website is payeur.com/en/, and I think the salesman is still Norman who is fluent in both French and English. Payeur exports a lot to the USA and will deliver right to your location. After more than 8 years (I bought my forwarder in November 2012) I have had zero problems and zero complaints about the design. Prior to my purchase, I did have the Payeur salesman discuss with Metavic a custom alteration that they easily accommodated. My model forwarder comes with a standard 12-foot log-bed. The local mill that accepts my aspen takes 100-inch wood and the local mill that accepts my spruce and fir logs prefers as many 16 footers as possible. That being the case, a 12-foot log-bed would have allowed me only one rack of aspen. To double the capacity of each trip, I wanted to be able to load two racks of 100-inch aspen one behind the other as seen in my video. Allowing for a 2 to 3-foot overhang, that meant I needed a 14-foot log-bed. The Metavic engineers worked out a two-foot frame extension design that included lengthening the loader boom and repositioning the bogey wheels for proper balance, and the factory built it for some ridiculously low additional price. Various features that make the Metavic more expensive than several other brands have proven to be worth every penny. The Metavic's box frame is impossible to bend or twist. More than one other manufacturer uses a single central tubular steel frame that can hardly be called a "frame" because such a design provides only a central pole from which the log bunks are cantilevered inviting twisting or bending if loaded with anything except small logs or comparatively light loads. More than once I have clumsily dropped some heavy logs on my Metavic's frame without it flinching. The high flotation tires are also great, and the deflector wings located on the frame just forward of the tires have saved me countless times from the aggravation of trailside trees lodging against the tires and stopping forward movement or, worse yet, getting jammed between the tires and the frame where cutting one free would be very dangerous. Several other brands lack such deflector wings. I consider them a must. I have checked my payload capacity and found that I typically carry around 6,000 pounds (2,700 to 2,800 kg) of logs per load, a bit over one cord. Available space limits the capacity, not weight. There is just no more room. Much of Somerset county is hillier than my region of Aroostook. Most of my terrain is flat to gently sloping where my steepest sections of trails rarely extend more than 100-meters at a 6 to 10% grade. On such slopes, I gear down ahead of time and stay in that gear until back on flat ground. On both bare ground and snow packed trails, this precaution alone has spared me from any sense of the loaded trailer trying to gain on my tractor or push it forward. If you plan to work on steeper ground, I strongly advise you to find somebody who has that kind of experience and am confident that the people at Payeur can put you in touch with customers operating in hilly country. In his book, Milton Nilson offers some advice regarding operating on slopes. If you haven't yet downloaded a free copy in pdf. format, I encourage you to do so. Someplace I offered a public comment with the direct download link, or you can just Google, "The Farm Tractor in the Forest" for the link. Metavic forwarding trailers are available with or without an integral winch. If you already have a winch and plan to bunch you wood trailside as I do, make certain that you don't buy a trailer with the integral winch. That adds a thousand or two dollars to the purchase price and won't benefit you. In other applications, the integral winch has value. Something that I discussed in my video but didn't emphasize is that the distance from harvest site to log landing determines the principal benefit that a forwarding trailer offers. When operating on bare ground, carrying the load on wheels as opposed to dragging logs and tree sections also reduces damage to trail surfaces and the residual stand, issues that don't apply when operating on snowpack. So, the primary benefit of a forwarding trailer is the ability to move larger volumes of wood per "turn." At shorter distances, a forwarding trailer actually slows the operation down. So, where is the break point? I have never performed a formal timed analysis, but my gut impression is that the trailer provides no efficiency benefit when skidding time from stump to log landing is less than 5 minutes on snowpack (10 minutes roundtrip excluding bucking and piling time at the landing) or 3 minutes on bare ground. The 5 vs. 3 minute difference relates to the fact that I can skid more wood directly behind the tractor on snow-packed trails than I can on bare ground resulting in fewer turns to move the same amount of wood. Two winters ago I was between 1/4 and 1/2 mile (about 0.4 to 0.8 kilometers) from my log landing. Each complete roundtrip "turn" using the forwarder took me between one hour and one hour fifteen minutes. That included loading trailside bunches in the harvest area, unloading them at the landing, and roundtrip travel time. If instead of bunching logs trailside I had just continued out to the landing skidding tree sections behind my tractor, I would have cut down on bucking and handling time trailside but increased the number of trips by a factor of about 3. Of course, I would have spent increased time at the landing bucking and piling there, something that likely cancels out similar time bucking and bunching trailside in the woods. Without a formal time-task analysis, all that I can do is give a gut impression, and that gut impression is that, in this scenario, the trailer saved me about one day out of every four or five. This winter no point in my harvest block was more than 300 yards from a log landing so I did not use the forwarding trailer. The trailers are not cheap even if you can locate one used, so I do believe that it is worthwhile to first determine if the cost is worth it in your particular situation. I hope that you found these detailed comments useful. Please keep me posted on your progress, and above all, be safe! Vince

Thank you

Mark, the tires specifically specify they are not for highway use. The manufacturer does, however, offer other models with axles and tires designed for highway travel. Thanks for your question. Vince

Hi Tom. I do have a flatbed tandem axle trailer with a wooden deck that is designed for highway use. I use it primarily for moving machinery but also occasionally use it for taking logs to the mill. It is not suitable for off road use of any sort and certainly not for use in the forest. I hope that this answered your question. Vince

Hi Rick! I am still in northern Maine currently involved in this winter's timber harvest. We had a very busy year that included preparing for a terrific Forestry Field Day hosted on our property last September to celebrate our receipt of the 2022 Maine Outstanding Tree Farmer of the Year Award. I hope to have the next two videos in the Clearcutting as a Silvicultural Option series posted on KZfaq by the end of February. Thanks for thinking of me. Be safe in the woods! Vince

@@bombadiltreefarms314 looking forward to it, take care!!

Hi Leo. Thanks for your comment because it brings up a very key point that I failed to make in the video. The system of logging that I discuss in the video is primarily designed for folks who already own a tractor for other purposes, find themselves and their tractor sitting idle for a period of time each year, are reasonably experienced with a chainsaw, own their own woodlot, have a limited amount of timber to harvest each year, and aren't afraid of hard work. It is not applicable to production logging, although one viewer who makes his living as a professional logger down in the Smokies, pointed out that he uses a woods adapted farm tractor because many private landowners associate it with a less damaging logging operation. Competition among loggers for contracts to private woodlots is apparently very stiff in his local. We see this here in certain regions of Maine where some logging contractors opt for horses and, as a result, often have months if not years of work waiting for them. Admittedly, there are times when I do miss my skidder (in my youth as a production logger I owned a 440A then a 440C). However, owning and maintaining a skidder for what I do on my own woodlot doesn't make economic sense. A great fallacy that got me into trouble when I first began using the tractor for logging was believing that it was just a small skidder. It took me some time and endless frustration before discovering that it wasn't, and this system developed to employ a farm tractor safely in the woods will never compare to systems developed for use of a skidder, a machine with a single application. Thank you again. If I ever revise the video I will make sure that I address this issue that you brought up. Vince

Thanks Vince for your well crafted reply.

No, I cannot, but the manufacturer of my forwarding trailer offers trailers with built-in winches and they work very well for many people. Since I already had a winch and had prior experience pre-bunching logs trailside for final movement to landings by a second piece of machinery, I decided to stick with that system and save myself the additional cost of a built-in winch. Moreover, I use the forwarding trailer when harvesting at more distant areas of my forest. When I am close, I skid directly to the landing using only the winch and tractor. You are absolutely correct by pointing out that my system does involve a change-out of attachments that takes a little time and effort. I also thank you for the complement regarding my video tutorial. I had seen at least one of yours, several produced by others, and deliberately didn't want to duplicate what you and others already had out there. I also wanted to do as much justice as I could to describing the entire system, from start to finish, as presented in Milton Nilsson and Nils Forshed's landmark book. Thanks again! Vince

Yes, this part of the world has its own forestry slang that I have not encountered elsewhere. Where "twitch" came from beats me, but it has been around for generations. Another is "chance" which refers to an individual logging crew's harvest block. If it contains good timber on decent terrain with an easy twitch distance we refer to it as a "good chance." If it is full of garbage, on difficult terrain, with a long or difficult twitch distance, we call it a "hard chance." "Hard" is commonly replaced by less polite expletives. There are several other slang terms for which you probably have your own regional variants. Merry Christmas, and be safe in the woods! Vince