FUSHFELLING BY ELECTRICITY.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 41, 1 April 1895, Page 3

FUSHFELLING BY ELECTRICITY.

of the latest proposals for the utilisation of electric power is in tree fallin". Electricity will soon make itself felt iiT the forests of Washington State, for it is said that a large timber company in that district is about to make the paperiment which has b©ou successf’uly tried elsewhere. Attempts have been made heretofore to cut down the big giants of 'America’s wonderful forests with saws operated by steam, hut portable engines were hard to move about easily, and a number of other difficulties were also met that made the scheme impracticable. With electricity, however, things will be different. A central plant for the generation of the fluid will be set up, and of course its power can be sent anywhere by a wire, and there are few places where a wire cannot be rim. The saws will be provided with light gearing and attachments, and will be so arranged that they will not only be able to cut down a tree, but to divide it into logs after it lias fallen. Most of the timber in Washington is now felled by axemen, and their work is little short of marvellous. Some of them are so expert that they can cut down a tree and make it fall wherever they wish. They will put a peg in the ground, for instance, somewhere in the radius of the circle in which the tree they are about to attack will be bound to fall, and wager anything! they possess that they can make the tree, when it falls, drive in the peg.