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bucked pants: pants cut off at mid-calf
so as not to catch in brush and trip the working logger.
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bucker: sometimes the faller, who limbs
and bucks the trees just felled.
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cat: any tractor used for logging
that is on tracks instead of wheels. As Finley Hays said, the
term "was stolen from the Caterpillar people."
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chaser: a logger who works on the landing,
unhooking logs from the yarder cables. The landing is a relatively
small area of ground immediately adjacent to a logging road, cleared
and leveled to allow logging trucks to be loaded and turned around.
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choker setter: fastens chokers--devices
constructed from five-to eight-foot lengths of 3/8ths diameter steel
cable with a sliding bell attached--around logs so they can be moved
by the yarder, cat, or skidder. Usually the initial job that
a logger will obtain on a logging crew. Requires lots of running
and balance.
-
cork boots (also known as caulk boots):
leather boots soled with nail points for maximized traction in the
woods. Standard equipment for the logger. Diane Heersink
had a pair made for her husband Brian relatively recently that cost
$400.
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cruiser: goes into the woods and estimates
how much timber is on a given piece of land.
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crummie: the vehicles--usually
trucks-- that transport logging workers from their homes to the logging
site.
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"draw": between pay days when a logger
must take some money from the next paycheck.
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fallers: also known as "cutters."
The elites of logging, they cut down the trees that would then be
processed by others. The faller's work is very dangerous.
He often worked shorter hours, essentially worked alone, and often
received more pay independent of an hourly wage.
-
gyppo: independent logger. Often consider
themselves always willing to do more work faster.
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hickory shirts: typical logger shirts;
denim shirts with narrow white and navy stripes.
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high climber or high rigger: the logger
that limbs and tops the spar trees.
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hoot owlin': in the summer, loggers go
to work very early in the morning, often between 2AM and 3AM, in order
to get in and out of the woods early before the heat becomes too high,
humidity too low, and fire danger too great.
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nosebag: lunch bucket.
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rigging slinger:
directs the yarder to go ahead and haul the cabled logs to the log
landing. Uses a "talkie tooter" to instruct the yarder
operator to proceed or stop. Bosses the choker setter and picks
the turn of logs to be hauled to the landing.
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"rocking chair": going on unemployment
compensation.
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side: complete crew of workers and the
associated equipment necessary to move logs from the stump to the
truck.
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skidder: rubber tired skidding tractors.
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spotted owl "thing":
also referred to as the "spotted owl mess" and the "spotted
owl issue." One of the greatest controversies to rock the
timber industry, the issue took root in the mid-1980s. According
to wildlife researchers, the Northern Spotted Owl appears to be largely
dependent on old-growth forest habitat. Environmental interests
seized on these findings and fought to have the spotted owl listed
by the federal government as an endangered species, thus ensuring
protection of its environment. Environmental advocates argued
that once old growth forests were logged they were irreplaceable,
and such logging would therefore ensure the extinction of the spotted
owl. The timber industry was forced to curtail cutting old growth
in order to protect the spotted owl, which meant loss of timber jobs.
Timber industry advocates argued that stopping the long-planned harvest
of old-growth timber would inflict serious damage on timber jobs and
destroy timber communities. (See Carroll, Community and the
Northwestern Logger, 14-15, for more detail regarding this issue.
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"talkie tooter": a small radio
transmitter used by the rigging' slinger to notify the yarder operator
through various coded horn blasts to either proceed to move the cabled
logs to the landing or to stop.
-
widow maker: a branch
that falls from a tree being worked on by a logger, and hits either
the logger or someone working with him. Most often deadly.
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yarder: piece of equipment that uses steel
cables attached to a powerful engine to yank and pull cut logs--six
to eight at a time--from the cutting site to the landing.
