Logger Calls Himself A "Forest Gardener"

In September 2010's issue of Family Handyman , there's a great story about Tim Carroll, an old-fashioned horse-logging operator in Minnesota. Working with clients to reduce the amount of construction impact on building sites, Carroll uses horses to haul away logs instead of modern tractors.

"Conventional logging calls for skid loaders. they not only tear up the woods but also require a lot of trees to be cut down for manuevering room. The horses, on the other hand, just leave a nice, long trail of road apples, and luckily, the remaining trees appreciate those." ~ Trace Larsen

Tim Carroll, a woodworker who also builds custom cabinets says about his work, "We're not loggers - we're forest gardeners."



Logging with Hoof and Heart

Cedar River Horse Logging

Free Guide To Identifying Southern Invasive Plants

The USDA Forest Service Southern Research Station has created a free pdf download of invasive plant species, “A Field Guide for the Identification of Invasive Plants in Southern Forests.”

The book is a more comprehensive identification guide to nonnative trees, shrubs, vines, grasses, ferns and forbs invading the region’s forests and other natural areas. The revised guide includes 23 more plant species with updated information on the original 33 species; 241 new photos and images and a new “Resembles” section so users can identify plant “look-alikes.”

The book’s appendix contains the most complete list of nonnative invasive plants in the 13 Southern states, providing common and scientific names for 310 other invading species including, for the first time, aquatic plant invaders.

Complete with color high density photographs, it takes a few minutes to download or you can email:

To: pubrequest@fs.fed.us
Subject: Publication Request
In email, type: Please send me: A field guide for the identification of invasive plants in southern forests (GTR-SRS-119) by Miller, James H.; Chambliss, Erwin B.; Loewenstein, Nancy J.

This publication should be in every Master Gardener Clinic, County Extension office, Master Naturalist, eco-tourism guide, and environmentalist's library. The pdf is an updated version of their original publication from 2003.