Magazine Series

Owning just a single choker chain is a lot like having one Crescent wrench in your toolbox. Sure, you can get the job done, but it would be a lot more efficient (and enjoyable) if you had a…

Somewhere out there is a ship carrying, in one of its thousands of steel containers, a natural disaster. The ship could be an old rust bucket. Or a brand new, high-tech cargo vessel. It might…

You’d think, in our high-tech world, there’d be some sort of sensor or detector or app that could electronically evaluate and instantly confirm that a log is truly veneer-worthy.…

"The days of our years are threescore years and ten, and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow.” So says the psalmist, a deep…

It was the late afternoon of a long day of hauling timbers, sawing posts, and hammering hand-carved wooden pegs. Excitement ran high among the 10 workshop participants as they carried the…

Have you ever wondered why patch cuts in the North Woods become carpeted with spruce and fir seedlings within a few years of being cut, while beaver meadows in the same area stay grassy for…

There’s a barn by a river, and tree swallows in the sky. They could be a flock en route from Quebec, or maybe just tardy locals, fattening up on insects that were displaced by the…

In 2013, The New York Times ran a story exposing a Scandinavian controversy that has divided Norwegians (and New Englanders) for eons. The question centered around the proper way to stack…

Barry Genzlinger is up at 5 a.m. mixing the formula: one part goat’s milk to one part Fox Valley formula. As he feeds one of the pups tiny drops from a graduated syringe and talks about…

Good friend and fellow tracker Paul Rezendes once observed that there are times when a species’ tracks will convince you that you are looking at those of a different animal. So it is…