This Week in the Woods

It has become abundantly clear that winters just aren’t what they used to be. While many Mainers may welcome the warmer winter temps, it is really impacting the way we can operate. We have always saved our more fragile ground for winters, but that trend is changing. We now tend to plan for those in the dead of summer when the ground is nice and dry. There is not a thing we can control about old mother nature, but we can change our machinery and our methods. Enter and bogie skidder which we are adding to our line up. For those who don’t know, a bogie skidder is used in our whole tree operation. It is a 6 wheeled skidder with tracks on the back two sets of wheels. The benefit of this machine is decreased ground pressure on soft and fragile ground. We will be using the bogie when necessary as a back up method or as a landowner preference. This type if machine is significantly more expensive to operate and maintain, so we will continue to use the CAT four wheeled skidder when we can.

Boys and their toys… they just get bigger and more expensive.

It was a big week for Kimball & Sons Logging because we also finally found the right employee to operate our loader. This is a very big deal because that is Randy’s machine and the one he has operated his entire life. Giving it up and letting someone else take the seat is a major step for him. We are busy taking chances and working slowly and steadily to grow our business. In order to focus on other parts of running a business, Randy had to get out of being in a machine 24/7. With our current model, if someone is out sick it really impacts our ability to produce, so with the addition of another employee, we will be able to cover and keep things moving. This will also give him the time necessary to source woodlots in our area.

Powers Welding to the rescue….. again

Of course, no week would be complete without something breaking. This week it was the bunk of the forwarder. It split right in half. Thankfully, we’ve got a guy. A great guy, who can fix anything with a welder. The whole tree crew is still up in Anson trying to get the ground to freeze up. Grandpa is getting a little grumbly up there, but he’ll be alright :) The cut to length crew is moved up to Farmington. On this job, we are testing out using a feller buncher to fell ahead of the processor. We are trying to determine if doing it this way will increase our efficiency and production enough to warrant having one ourselves. Numbers don’t lie, so we shall see!

The week ended with Randy getting his mulching head back together. Back in the fall, he hit a culvert with it and really did her in. Nothing a few grand can’t fix. Ugh. Guess he better take the time he had in the loader and get to mulching!

Hope you lovely people have a great week with the colder weather and winter wonderland!

As much as we love the sun…. we need COLD!