Table of Contents

Equipment & Supplier News

Texas Timberjack, Lufkin, Tex., is opening two new operations, one in Conroe, Tex. and another in Leesville, La.

The Conroe business will open as a distributor of the industrial equipment line now handled by Texas Timberjack, along with other new product lines. Brands include ASV skid steers, Doppstat grinders and shredders and small construction and utility machines made by Terex.

Texas Timberjack will open a new branch in Leesville, La. for its forestry equipment lines.

Equipment Poll: PhD Required

I can see a clear advantage to the current technology in logging equipment but the systems needed to analyze it are not cheap or may not even be available. I can get a $100 unit from AutoZone to analyze my pickup but try to get something for a 2008 feller-buncher.

I believe manufacturers and dealers want to keep loggers indentured to them. Everyone knows that parts and service are where they make the lion’s share of their profits.

Family Efforts by David Abbott

The family that logs together stays together, perhaps. Janko Logging is a true family operation. Patriarch Jim Janko runs his Ponsse Caribou forwarder in conjunction with his son, Kent, who mans his own Ponsse Cobra harvester with 860 processor head. When Timber Harvesting visited, Mary, the matriarch of the clan, drove the truck, and was always accompanied by her faithful dog BJ. She recently retired from truck driving, and the family now contracts with an independent trucker and close friend, Rhonda Hartwig. There are no employees.

When they aren’t in the woods, the Jankos spend the rest of their time running the family dairy farm. They run 70 head of cattle, half of which are milk cows and the rest young stock, on 150 acres. In the summer, when the weather cooperates, they make hay, and if they can’t make hay, they log. In the winter, the cows stay in the barn and the Jankos stay in the woods. They milk the cows in the morning, and get to the woods by 9 a.m. Jim figures b

Growing Better by Rich Donnell | Photos by Bryan Carter

Parnell Inc., led by James Parnell and his three sons—Jimmy, Jeff and Joseph—is Timber Harvesting’s 2008 Logging Business of the Year. The family principals have continued to grow and diversify their business during this decade by never taking their collective eye off the ball, despite the dramatic economic downturn of the past two years. They pay excruciating attention to production and operations data and costs. They keep their finger on the pulse of market trends and opportunities, and react quickly to them. They are sincerely devoted to the health of the logging profession as exemplified by their participation and leadership in organizations that address the crucial issues of the day.

And the Parnell family proceeds forth with a Christian humbleness through the good times and the bad.

North Carolina Powerhouse by Jim Mooney

Buddy Broadway takes great pride in the efficiency and innovation that distinguish his 30-year-old business, Broadway Logging & Grinding. In 1978, after a stint in the heating and air business, Broadway, now 56, took to the woods and has seldom looked back. Today his company is a powerhouse in the central North Carolina coastal area where his machines are usually found on flat and often poorly drained Weyerhaeuser holdings.

Thinning is the company’s specialty (25 loads a day) but it can also surge on clear-cuts (65 loads a day close to the mill) when needed.

Broadway’s credits his company’s success to a combination of excellent working conditions, efficiency and good management.

Step Back, Step Up by Frank Samuel

When one door closed on Larry Beeler’s landfill operation, created in the early ’90s to accept inert construction and demolition debris, another opened and helped enabled him to expand into new markets.

The first blow to Beeler’s business, Busy Bee Landfill and Wood Recycling, Inc., was a local ordinance that all but prohibiting burning. It was rooted in concerns about air quality and the outbreak of wildfires. The second regulation prohibited landfills from burying any wood fiber they receive. At the same time, these regulations created a potentially costly problem for developers, loggers and landowners needing to dispose of woody debris.

Two-Way Trio by Jennifer McCary

Roughly a two and half hour drive and a world away from the Big Apple, Sam Creech Jr., 64, and sons Jeff, 39, and John, 34, maintain a nimble and versatile logging operation in the picturesque Catskill Mountains and Hudson Valley region of eastern New York State. Catskill Forest Products (CFP) is a third generation family enterprise that mechanized in the late 1990s and downsized from two or three manual crews to one mechanized team comprised of the three.

The company’s $1 million equipment investment allows the team to operate as a conventional full tree or modified cut-to-length system, depending on the timber and terrain of the tract.

“Something Got Lost”

Editor’s Note: Readers may recognize the name Jay Browning from the Ax Men TV series. Browning wrote the following in an attempt to put reality and Hollywood in perspective and to rebut criticism.

I did not make up the saying “green gold” or “load count” or dollar per load amounts. All jobs are different and we as a company could have done without the Ax Men series slogans.

A Look At Continuing Ed by Jim Mooney

Training and continuing education can be a good thing. They make us better at what we do, extend our horizons and foster professionalism. Our industry has advanced exponentially from some of its harvesting and safety practices of the past. This is no different from other industries—construction, for instance—that require personal protective equipment, fall protection, engineering analysis and the like. Even those in the medical, real estate, insurance and cosmetology fields must participate in ongoing training.

New Products & Technologies

John Deere’s new D-Series swing machines includes three purpose-built models—2154D, 2454D and 2954D—that feature “next-size-up” swing systems, a new boom base design and a smart cooling package.

Each model features a swing system sized with larger components for extended life and a cooling package which includes a hydraulically-driven, on-demand fan with reversing option for debris management that keeps the machines productive. The fronts have been re-designed, upper frames strengthened and boom pin tolerances improved.

Developments, Meetings

New drug and alcohol testing requirements for drivers of commercial vehicles are now in effect. U. S. Dept. of Transportation (DOT) amended certain provisions of its drug and alcohol testing procedures to ensure “the complete reliability and accuracy of controlled substances tests.”

DOT data shows that each year (from 1994 to 2005), 1.3% to 2.8% of truck drivers tested positive.

Federal law requires drivers to be tested as part of the pre-employment screening process, on a random basis while employed and following an accident involving a fatality. Commercial drivers who fail a test, refuse a test or otherwise violate the drug testing requirements are required to complete a return-to-duty process before returning to work as a driver.

Logging Capacity: Make It Sustainable by DK Knight

Over the last 15 years or so, many words have been written and spoken about forest sustainability. Created to address growing environmental sensitivity in the public mindset and in the “greening” marketplace, sustainable forestry promotion programs emerged. Among other things, they mandated that all members of the wood supply community become more professional and accountable. One of them was the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), a plan created by the American Forest & Paper Assn.

Training and continuing education for suppliers and loggers became an integral part of the SFI program and today are considered routine. Not everyone applauds the way SFI came forth, or the fact that some consuming mills do not yet apply its directives uniformly to all suppliers. Still, it has raised on-the-ground performance standards to a higher level. SFI helps inform the public that forests are renewable, that the forest industry is committed to sound and responsible practices, and that it

Industry News

Decker Energy International, a privately-held energy company based in Winter Park, Fla., is moving forward with plans to build a 50 megawatt wood-burning power plant in Fitzgerald, Ga. Construction is expected to begin next summer; operation is anticipated for the fourth quarter of 2011. Vice President Tim Berrigan reports Decker is in the middle of permitting the facility, which will be erected on a 60-acre site in the city’s industrial park. The plant will supply a consortium of electric membership cooperatives.

Meanwhile, Georgia Power Co. has filed documents with state authorities in connection with a proposal to convert its coal-fired power plant at Albany to a 100% woody biomass feedstock. Should the proposal go forward, the plant would consume about a million tons of wood refuse per year.

Conflicts, Regulations Complicate Logging by Jennifer McCary

Loggers operate within a web of employment laws and regulations promulgated by various local, state and federal agencies that have jurisdiction over one or more aspects of employer/employee relations. Quite often these statutes overlap and, in some cases, even conflict with each other, leaving employers in a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ predicament.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990, which protects applicants from discrimination on the basis of a disability, is a good example of how well-intentioned laws can conflict. If an applicant can show that he is capable of performing the essential duties of the job with modifications, under ADA an employer must make reasonable accommodations for a qualified applicant.