
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.

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