60 | Eight crews mastering the forest from page 58 The Tigercat can handle the slopes. “The volumes in Northland have definitely declined, and there’s still not as much volume coming on stream as there used to be.” FORESTRY Douglas Logging Sustainable harvesting techniques have been introduced and Douglas Logging now does a lot of shovel logging, whereby the log loader grabs logs from the harvest area and swings them around to drop them close to the road, instead of driving to the log and dragging it back to the landing. “This, combined with our tethered felling systems, means we can shovel the areas away from the creeks and cause less disturbance.” Douglas Logging builds its own forest roading and puts a lot of work into sustainable practices. Hydroseeding or spray on grass is used immediately after earthworks are completed so grass starts growing within a couple of weeks, and hay mulching is also used for a fast and effective re-vegetation solution for areas of exposed ground that require immediate coverage. Cost -efficient logging in steep and tricky terrain is a speciality for Douglas Logging, which has designed and built its own 8x8 stem trucks to cart from the steepest terrain and minimise the costs involved in unnecessary roading infrastructure. Brad says the local logging market has been through a recent downturn with low export prices since October which are starting to come up again now. Domestic demand and prices are obviously still strong, but one of the biggest problems for a Northland logging firm is the lack of saw mills left in the region. “We haven’t got a lot of mills left up here now, and so we have to rely on export,” he says. “We used to have some quite big mills like Carter Holt Harvey in Whangarei which closed down in 2020, and the LVL manufacturing facility at Marsden Point has drop down from two shifts to one shift.” 09 439 7399 office@marcelmotors.co.nz 142 Victoria Street, Dargaville Service Parts Finance Authorised Parts & Service Douglas Logging’s opportunity to harvest in South Waikato for existing client CFG was a welcome one. “The volumes in Northland have definitely declined, and there’s still not as much volume coming on stream as there used to be,” Brad says. “It will be like that for the next three to five years. There is planting going on right now, but I don’t know whether it is for carbon credits or what.” Back in 1993 when Douglas Logging first started, if something was planted, it was going to come down one day.
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