Glentress Forest — thinning at Cardrona

Date Added: 18 January 2018 Contributor: Norman Davidson Year of Photo: 1971 Picture No: 3805

Photograph is courtesy and copyright of Forestry Commission, Forest Research, Roslin, and provided with help from Glen Brearley. FR Photo number No B6540 taken by H J Turner.

Text reads as:
‘A View of Hielan Shiel Road showing pulpwood stacked awaiting collection’.

Not much information on this location but from the spacing of the heaps of wood it looks as though a cable crane had been used at a typical rack spacing of around 20-25 metres in a Sitka spruce crop. Most of the wood is 3m or 10 foot long pulpwood with some smaller heaps of rough tops - for what use?

Can anyone say where the pulp wood would have been delivered to at this date? Does anyone recognise the site location/name?

Groups: Forestry Areas, Timber harvesters, processors, forwarders and cable cranes

9 Comments

Ruth Robertson has commented that Highland Shiel Road is on the west side of Cardrona Forest. The name referred to a house at the start of the road which is now a ruin but was lived in during the early the 1900s.

Ruth also remembers that pulp wood was shipped down to Ellesmere Port where it would have been delivered to Bowater's pulp and paper mill. Comment left on 14 February 2018 at 15:34 by Norman Davidson

This is looking north towards Glentress a few 100 yards south of photo 3984. The rough tops would be collected for firewood at weekends usually by who was working there. Heilen Shiel road had a sign at its junction with Kirkburn road calling it Yellow Mire road in the early 70,s Comment left on 18 September 2019 at 23:30 by Callum Wilson

I worked this compartment with Dod Aitchison. The timber was extracted using Ford 3000 plough master tractor with selecto speed gearbox and double drum igland winch (fabulous machine) the driver would have been Andrew Thompson. The cut wood was in several sizes no.1 Millwoods 10 - 24ft no. 2 Bowaters 3ft 9” (now crane loaded)
no.3 TBM 6 - 7ft 6” Comment left on 17 January 2021 at 18:28 by Ian Smart

The F.C. also sent some 10 feet lengths to Corpach Mill I believe..I didn’t like cutting them for some reason.In this wood I came upon a Woodcock sitting on a nest at a base of a tree I was about to fell..even though I was about 2’ away with the saw ticking over it would NOT move..fantastic dedication.... we abandoned that part of the compartment I recall. Comment left on 19 January 2021 at 18:40 by Ian Smart

In relation to to the loose tops, Callum is spot on.However every now and then a 4 wheel Seddon lorry would turn up for a load of ‘scrap’ as we called it. A real pain as it was all hand loaded,which took ages due to the small size of the ‘ends’. They lorry then took the untidy load all the way to Queensferry in North Wales!...how it made a profit is anyone’s guess Comment left on 20 January 2021 at 08:10 by Ian smart

Aye Ian, maybe it was the weight! For the first 8 months of 1975 afore I left the FC for Newton Rigg, I spent most of my time cutting SP second thinnings at Blackstand in the Black Isle. There was a small proportion of fencing material, but the majority of the tree was cut into 3m (10') lengths for Corpach pulp and pokers for the Invergordon aluminium smelter from the tops. A 2lb snedding axe was quicker than a chainsaw for snedding out the pokers. Even using the bench method of felling and rolling the butt ends, it was heavy going and at 6p per pulp piece you had to go some to make your piecework. One cutter was making �60 per week, which caused some angst amongst the squad!

For a time we were taken off the felling and drafted into Blackstand nursery to lift, sort, count, bundle and sheugh SS 2+2 transplants. The piecework price was ??? and with glaur up to your knees we were supposed to be sheughing 20,000 trees in bundles of 50 trees, per day to make the piecework rate. Not a chance; until we sussed out the "technique". No wonder planters used to gurn!

After watching in 2020 a brand new Ponnse harvester put 1,200 tonnes of a NS/SS/hardwood P68 crop through the head in 6 days at a neighbouring wood, I can only comment that "times have changed"! The height of the stumps, snags on the produce and amount of useable timber buried in the brash mat would have cost you your job in the chainsaw era. Comment left on 20 January 2021 at 11:55 by Bill Rayner

I couldn't agree more with your last comment Bill. Never mind the brash caught up in the logs, way SRW is presented at the roadside, quality of some of the logs is questionable to say the least, etc etc.

But no good reminiscing, times have moved on, volumes have increased and systems have changed to accept this now.......its the way it is. Comment left on 20 January 2021 at 17:52 by Iain Gale

Aye Iain, I'm no getting the 'Stradivarius' out and agree "its the way it is". The world market for wood fibre says "Cheap", so that is what we do, if we can, and not to everybodies or everythings benefit. Good health, Bill Comment left on 21 January 2021 at 10:41 by Bill Rayner

I was at inverness tech in 1971 doing City and G forestry. We went to the Black Isle and also near Invergordon where they were cutting Hemlock which had selfseeded into thin poles...also for pokers at the smelter. Some years later I cut big birch which was milled into 1” strips to put under the steel products at Ravenscraig..nothing wasted in those days. Comment left on 26 January 2021 at 19:35 by Ian smart

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