The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1896-04-27
LOGGING CYPRESS.
A PECULIAR LUMBER INDUSTRY IN
SOUTHERN sWAMPS
Negroes who Girdle and Fell Trees While
Standing Waist Deep I'm wster-Log
Troiieys Operated by Powerful Engines
Set Up In Pullboats.

progress in the markets Of this city, but
it is difficult 10 convince a southerner
that il is not the coming wood for both
interior and exterior construction, and
| its constantly increasing popularity In
| the southern states has Jed TO enormous
investments in cypress swamp lana, log
cling machinery and mills for working
up the logs into planks, holdings, shin
giles and other building material
Cypress logging is an amphibious sort
of business. The best of the trees grow
in SO called swamps. which are often
merely forests through which the living
water courses toward the sea in thou
sand channels. 1t is seldom found on
stagnant swamp land, and the best tim
Der grows where clear running water
circulates round the roots of the giant
trees. There are hundreds Of such places
in Florida and Louisiana.
Live cypress timber is so heavy that
it sinks il felled when green, and con-
sequently the lumbermen have to work
from eight months to year in advance
of the cutting TO prepare the timber by
girdling the trees and thus preventing
the circulation Of tlse sap. Thousands Of
trees are killed thus far in advance Of
the Telling Girdling is both arduous
and dangerous work. Ii is done by ne
gro choppers who stand often waist deep
in water in the haunts of the dreaded
moccasin snake, the alligator and the
wildcat, 20 say nothing of the swarms
of mosquitoes and other equally pestif-
erous insects. The negroes endure all
the hardships for 81 day.
On the picturesque Ocklawaha river
in Florida. one phase of the cypress lum
Der industry is seen TO the best advan-
tage. This wonderful river is fed by
clear, cold springs Of tremendous vol
ume, and it winds for many miles
through endless acres of moss draped cy-
press trees. 1t has hundreds of loops, or
branches, which leave it at one point
only TO return to it at another, between
its source and its junction with the st.
Johns.
Between the main river and the
branches, which are all more or less
navigable, is flooded forest land through
which the water slowly circulates to the
depth of 2 or aud sometimes or 8
feet. 1t is in these flooded tracts that
the cypress trees grow TO perfection.
One company with headquarters at Pa
latka and an Office at Boston, controls
the numbering on this river. The COM
pany bought 300,000 acres of cypress
land for 80 cents to 80 an acre, and sew
eral years ago engaged a number of
sturdy loggers from Saginaw, Mich, to
take charge of the work 1t was all new
to the Michiganders, but they took hold
with aptness and quickly broke in the
negroes TO the work Soon the dark re-
cesses of the Ocklawaha swamp resound-
ed with the blows of the ak, the shouts |
of men, and the crashing of the old
giants as they broke through the
branches of their neighbors and fell
with prodigious splash into the waters
of the swamp. Then above all could be |
heard the rafting, jarring and clank-
ing Of the novel logging machinery as it |
snaked the huge logs from the recesses |
OF the swamp to the swift stream upon /
which they were RATED to the big river.
A logging camp in this swamp con-
sists Of bunkboat with kitchen at
tached and a pullboat The pullboat
powerful hosting engine, and |
is secured with its square bow to the |
bank against tall and sturdy cypress
tree, denuded of branches and decorated
with band of red cloth near the top.
away from an elevated point
upon this tree to another similar giant
a quarter of "a mile back in the swamp
Is taut steel cable, from which depends
, trolley or carrier attached to an end.
less steel cable, which winds and un-
winds upon the spool of the engine.
Attached TO the trolley is huge pair
of sharp pronged tongs capable of span
ning log feet in diameter. Leading
away from the boat is we'll marked
ane traversed by the trolley. Trees are
cleared away on each side of the cable
20 the full extent Of its grasp, and the
ane terminates only where the end tree
If the trolley line stands. This point
'eached. the cable is taken down and
mother lane soon radiates from the pull
boat. When five or six lanes have been
made, the tract has been pretty well
cleared of serviceable trees, and the boat
md clamp are moved to new point.
When cypress is felled in one of |
hese lanes, it is cross cut in lengths of
3 to 10 feet. and the jaws of the crap.
lei or blight of chain grip the end "
ng toward the boat. A whoop from the
brennan OF the gang notifies the engi.
leer, who blows his whistle and starts
he engine. As the conveyor cable
ightens, the forward end of the log rises
lear of the water and stumps and the G
ther end trails through the water, send.
ng up fountains Of spray as it rears
'ver knees and stumps and splashes in
he open pools. Sometimes q venture
ONE negro straddles the log, and, cling {
ny to the chain or grapnel, rides out to .
he houseboat to get his dinner or grind !,
ak. 1t Is a wild ride, and appears far
lore thrilling than the spectacle of a q
upon bucking broncho.
This, however, is only one of the nu.
1erous cypress industries in Florida,
nd there are many more Of the same
lnd III Louisiana and Alabama, where &
wing watercourses penetrate the cypress %
wamps. Where there is not good water
'ay In Louisiana an even more costly
liant is used frequently. A sawmill is 81
laced at the edge Of cypress swamp I,
nd from the slabs and sawdust of the ;,
earby trees railroad bed is built out !"
ito the swamp, and the place of the
ullboa' is taken by heavy fiat car, n
'cured 70 nearby trees with guy ropes,
nd having ON board powerful pulling ~
lgine New York Sun. u