A Day in the Shelterwood

Logger Lee Russell delimbing a large white pine in a shelterwood harvest on the Golden Road in Millinocket, Maine. He leaves tree limbs behind to support habitat for wildlife and add nutrients to the soil as they deteriorate. Photos by Ashley Conte. Select this image or scroll down to view the photo gallery.

Logger and independent contractor Lee Russell has been working in the woods for nearly 30 years, and has been self-employed since 1997. Here, photographer Ashley Conte follows along with Russell as he harvests wood for Katahdin Forest Management along the Golden Road in Millinocket, Maine. This 50-acre site is being managed for shelterwood, and Russell selects the trees to be cut to allow more light on the floor to promote regeneration of spruce and pine. He typically harvests sites anywhere from 20 to 350 acres in size, and often works in timber stands that are under special zoning along waterbodies and call for limited tree removal or prescriptions that include wildlife habitat enhancement. Russell sees opportunity for young people to enter the field as conventional loggers, particularly with smaller tracts of land, and would love to be an instructor some day.

This Web Extra accompanies “An Interview with Lee Russell: A Logger’s View from a Shelterwood Harvest” in the Winter 2021 issue of Northern Woodlands.

With a forester’s prescription for a shelterwood harvest in hand, Russell determines the best way to cut this stand to allow more light on the forest floor to promote regeneration of spruce and pine.

Russell hooking up the delimbed pine to his cable skidder to drag it out to the landing for further processing.

After delimbing, Russell pulls the logs to the landing with his cable skidder.

Russell leaving delimbed white pine logs on the landing.

After pulling the delimbed pines to the landing, Russell bucks up the logs to different lengths and cuts them to grade for the mill.

Russell continues processing a log for the mill.

Russell heads back into the shelterwood with his cable skidder to harvest more white pine. This 50-acre site is adjacent to a pond and has a good concentration of deer. The prescription he worked with here promotes regeneration of spruce and pine; bigger trees that have gone by are left behind to support wildlife habitat.

Russell works six to seven days a week, often up at 1 am to start the work day. He loves working outdoors and the freedom that being an independent contractor allows him. “Loggers are a different breed,” he says. “You have to have a good attitude, because that’s what it takes.”