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Muscle power, hand tools, and the rising tide provided the means for hand loggers a century ago to fell and transport trees to the lumber mills supplying a rapidly growing province. Loggers worked in pairs to cut down huge Douglas firs that were often 100 metres tall. Using axes, they cut notches on either side of the tree and wedged pieces of lumber called “spring-boards” into them. Standing on the boards, the loggers first chopped an undercut in the trunk and then sawed the side opposite the undercut and just above it until the tree fell. They had to be careful not to miss-judge the undercut or the tree could “pitch back” on them with fatal results. The loggers then “bucked” the fallen tree, removing the branches to make it easier to slide the trunk down the slope into the water. When rapids such as the Yuculta were navigable at high tide, the loggers used rowboats - often with a small sail - to gather the logs into a boom for transport to the mill. |
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