The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, September 17, 1997 - AS

selective alternative

Local logger looks to change the face of forestry in B.C.

By DAVE TAYLOR

SURVEYING HIS skyline operation
with the pride of a new father, Ken
Barnard doesn’t really look like a
businessman driven with the entrepre-
neurfal. spirit.

‘Nar, with a scruffy beard and gap-
toothed smile, does he: look like some-.
one who’s close to earning his regis-
tered professional engineer’s certificate
—‘forestry’s equivalent to a Phd.

In fact, he’ s both, And he’s looking to
change the way forestry is done in this
pfevince,

‘I'm kind of a visionary, I guess,’’ he
says. ‘I think forestry is changing. I really
hope to see a large part of the cut going to
selective logging.’’

Barnard, a Rosswood resident, has been
running his own logging business here for
three ycars, In that ‘time he has not done a’
single clearcut,

Instead, he'and his crew practice selective
logging. Their methods are precise, less in-
vasive and more Jabour-intensive than con-
ventional commercial clearcut logging.
“Getting into selective logging comes
from a personal belief on how the forests
should be managed,” Barnard says. ‘‘It's
expensive, labour intensive and the returns
aren’( there in a quick way. But iv s also the
best way ‘3 manage many areas.”

-. Barnard says he thinks the day will soon come
when 20 per cent or more of the annual allow-
able cut will-be allotted to site-sensilive log-
‘ging. .

And he argues that’s a good thing, pointing
out that selective logging can {ced about three
families per cubic metre of wood cut, as op-
posed to just 0.8 families fed using the conven-
tional grapple-yarder approach.

Barnard also points out that selective logging

“7 think forestry is changing. I really
hope to see a large part of the cut
going to selective logging.”

—Ken Barnard—

doesn't leave the ugly scars of clearcuts..

‘It’s nice for people,’ he says. ‘They ap-
preciate it, They can go into a forest and enjoy
the scenery but know that other people still

managed to feed their families using some of

the wood.”

Barnard’s skyline was “custom built in B.C.,
using.a modified old skidder. Activity centres
around a 13 metre (40 ft) tower atop a 170 hp
yarder. A°540 metre (1,700 ft) line runs from
the top of the lower and along that line runs a
little 18 bp radio-controlled carriage.

The carriage transports a yarder-line, which
workers hook oite logs. The yarder then reels
the logs back to the tower landing.

It’s basically .a miniature version of a large
skyline operation.

But for. large skylines to be profitable, they
necd’ to haul-in huge amounts of . wood,
Barnard’s machine, however, with a properly-
trained crew and a well-engincered logging
-plan, can leave the forest largely intact and still

“be profitable.

Ken Barnard

College program could train workers

Start-up funding needed to get classes going

KEN BARNARD’S skyline hauls a + load of trees a across a piece of private property near Kit.
selas while his choker-setters look on. Normally, the crew leaves more trees on the site,
but this area is being developed into 10 acre lots,

‘Selective work is much more of a Gnesse
thing,”” Bamard says, ‘“You don’t just hook on
arid put your balls to the wall. You really have
to know whal you're doing.’’

If the topography is right, Barnard’s crew can
even selectively log an area and never have the
trees touch the ground. Instead, the logs are ful-
ly suspended from the skyline.

“Its preat for environmentally sensitive
mushroom areas,’’ Bamard points out.

A great deal of science is involved in the
engineering ofan area dcstined to be selectively
logged. That means lots of work must be done
up front, before any trees are removed.

But Barnard says lols of time and money are
saved afler the cul because post-harvest require-
ments are much less.

“You don’t have to worry about tree planting
or spur-road deactivation,’’ he says.

“And you always bave a crop of trees grow-
ing. You don’t have to wait 80 years for sec-
dlings to grow. The forest regenerates itself.’’

“People appreciate it. They can go

into a forest and enjoy the scenery but

know that other people still managed
to feed their families using some of the
wood.”’

—Ken Barnard—

Another benefit of Bamard’s skyline is that it
can use an intermediate support.

Basically, thal’s a jack which acts like a sec-
ond lower, allowing crews lo access areas
where more roads would normally need to be
built — saving more money on both road build-

4A CHOKER-setter readies the sky-lina car-
riage for lift-off. Barnard's operation is much
like a scaled-down conventional forestry
sky-line.

ing and deactivation.

Running any business is difficult, but Barnard

is also pioneering new techniques and merging
science and high-tech equipment with old meth-
ods,
So far, the business has managed to survive
three turbulent years, although Barnard stil)
refers to the company as somewhat “‘financially
challenged’’.

But he sees a big future for selective logging
and encourages other people to get involved.

*'There’s still a place for clearcuts and big
machines in forestry,’’ he says. ‘‘But there is a
growing need for smaller operations and selec-
live practices,’”

ONE OF THE difficulties of

selective logging is finding -

trained employees. But that
problem might soon” be
solved if a new program at
the college gels funding.

‘Those looking -to ‘get in-
volved in selective logging
face a classic Catch-22
sitiation, -

They need trained workers
~ to do build their businesses,
but loggers can’t. get train-
ing because there aren’t any
training programs. And
there aren't any. programs
because ‘there aren’t’ many.

businesses to hire the
workess. .
“Selective logger Ken

Barnard ‘s crew consists of a
faller, two choker-setters, a

loading bucker, a loader op-

- erator, @ ‘yarding engineer
arid a contracted trucker, °

Although these guys are

experienced conventional

loggers, they’re new to se-
lective logging, It’s required
time and training to get up
to speed, but Barnard says
they have been up to the
challenge.

Unfortunately, they’re
also laid-off workers from
the SCI shutdown, And
since there’s no pool of
trained selective loggers to
pick from, Barnard © will
have to train a whole new
crew if these guys ga back
tg their regular jobs.

But Fred Adair from the
Northwest Community Col-
lege hopes that will all
change soon.

“fm a firm believer in
Ken’s system,’ he says.
“There’s no doubt: in my
mind that’s the way to go.’

So Adair and Barnard
have’ been working since

January to develop a train-

ing program. It’s scheduled

‘everyouc else- is

to be 1,000 hours long,
spanning two semesters al
the college.

That is, if they get fund-
ing,

“We should have a
proposal.in to FRBC by the
end of the month,” Adair
says. ‘‘Money’s tight with
them ‘right ‘now, But you
never know what will hap-
pen.”

‘Adair says ithe selective
logging program would
train: loggers for. multiple
tasks —- skills that would be
valuable in any job market. .

“This system requires that
everyone does everything,”
he says. ‘You have to
climb, set blocks, sel rig-
ging, mun the machines, set
beads and ‘do layout. ‘That
way everyone knows what
dolng.
These people would be yery
valuable in any logging

situalion.’

Adair also says the pro-
gram would be open to both
men and women.

‘'We would love to get
women involved,”’ he says.
“You have to be fit for the
job, but you don’t have to
be huge.”’

Bamard’s also getting
support from some local
politicians like city coun-
cilor Val George and MLA
Helmut Giesbrecht.

“You could log an entire
hillside and probably not
even notice,’ Glesbrecht
says. “If that isn’t the way
of the future I don’t know
what js.””

Giesbrecht says he’s tak-
ing the idea to forest minis-
ter David Zimbhelt, to see
what kind of support and in-
centives he government can
provide.

“There’s less capital out-

Ken Adair

lay required, it’s more
labour intensive and there’s
less visual impact,’’ he says.
“People ought to seriously
look at this.’’

Ln cen tame aoiemmumdienin
CORRESPONDENCE FOR THE TERRACE STANDARD

The Mail Bag

We're being manipulated

Dear Sir:

Task Jeff Bolingbroke, Sarah Glen and Earl Ratclifle:
are you really against intolerance, prejudice and
bigotry? If so, then consider how people, ever you, use
injurious and derogatory labels. It goes without saying
that terms like ‘faggot’, ‘queer’, ‘fal boy’, ‘squaw’,
‘four eyes’, ‘Jesus freak’, etc., are damaging, and totally
unacceptable,

Most would also agree stereotyping and: atlaching
derogatory labels to groups of people is just as damag-
ing and wrong. Ideas like ‘lazy Indians’, ‘Jew them
down’ are unjustified and hurtful characterizations.

Would you describe the actions of people who da
such things as ‘judgmental, prejudiced, or bigoted’?

But how is attaching to groups of people damaging
terms like ‘bigoted’, ‘narrow-minded’, ‘homophobes’,

‘intolerant’, and now ‘outlandish’ and ‘fundamentalist’,
any different?

The fact is everyone in our socicly makes judgements
based on their moral convictions about the rightness or
wrongness of different kinds of sexual conduct.

Consider your own moral conviclions regarding the
following: sado-masochism, sex wilh anintals,: incest,
pedophilia, pre-marital sex, pornography, adultery,
promiscuity, rape, rude or degrading dirty jokes,
homosexuality, prostitution, etc.

Some of these activilies we as a socicty believe lo be
wrong to the point that we judge and prosecute under
the Jaw those who do them.

Does believing that any one of these sexual activilics
are wrong make a person a ‘bigot’ or ‘narrow-minded’,

a ‘hale-monger’ or ‘whatever-phobic’?

If so, everyone must be bigots. ] trust you can see thal
it is absurd to think that a person is a bigol just because
they believe that a certain kind of activity is wrong, But
this is what people are being conditioned to believe.

Why it is that only those who disagree with one par-
ticular sexual activity and lifestyle, aamely
homosexuality, are being demonized and labeled as
bigots and intolerant? Why aren’1 those who oppose in-
cest, or pornography, or prostitution, or pedophilia, or
seeing women as sex objects, or promiscuily, or dirty
jokes etc,, being givea the label of ‘bigots’, or
‘intolerant’, or “hatemongers’?

The answer is obvious, if you willing to hear it; The
activists promoting the homosexual lifestyle and the
homosexual political agenda have been working very
hard to change the altitudes of our sociely toward
homosexuality, in particular. Hence, the attack on those
who disagree with homosexuality, in particular.

They know that to achieve their goals they must sway
public opinion, gamer public support and silence or
marginalize any opposition.

The methods they are using, very effectively | might
add, to change the attitudes and values of our socicty
are highly manipulative psychological behavior madifi-
cation techniques.

Three in particular have been catalogued by. Robert
Jay Lifton in his book, Thougit Reform andthe
Psychology of Totalism: Desensitization, jamming and

conversion. A pro-homosexual book by Marshall Kirk
and Hunter Madison, After the Ball: Haw: ‘América will
Conquer its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 1990s, ex-
plains how these techniques are now being used to
change societies attitudes toward homosexuality.

‘Desensitization’ is the process of. normalizing
whatever il is that you want people to accept. Subjects
are inundated with information in all media forms that
presents homosexuality as normal,

The goal in desensitization is to lower resistance lo
whatever it is that you want people to accept and to gel
them to have an attitude of indifference toward it,

‘Jamming’ is the process of shaming people into a
sense of guilt over their own altitudes and values.
People are jammed into feeling guilty or that there is
something wrong with them if they. do not accept
homosexuality or have a positive altitude toward it.

This is accomplished by presenting those who hold to
a negative opinion of homosexuality or who, ‘for
whatever reason, disagree with the homosexual agenda,
as Villains.

You must be made to think that you might be a bigor,
prejudiced, prudish, or antiquated if you harbour some
hint of rejection of the homosexual lifestyle, You must
be made to fear opposing homoscxualily or even
saying that you do not believe that it Is right or good.

The end of these methods is a process behavioral
psychologists call ‘conversion’. In conversion people
are brought to a change in their emotions, mind and
will about certain activities or ideas, People: must be
made to feel both sympathy and warm regard for those
who practice homosexuality.

To do this two kinds of media images niust be crafled
and presented regularly to society: the homosexual
community must be seen as victims, and. the
homosexuals who are presented in all media forms
must be lovable or admirable.

If the pro-homosexual activists who are promoting
homosexual curriculum and agenda do nol besitale to
use manipulative psychological techniques such as
these, how can we trust that any so-called ‘tolerance’
or ‘antil-homophobia’ curriculum (hat is created under
their influence will not use the: same manipulative
psychological conditioning techniques?

Citizens, how do you feel about the fact that. these
techniques are being used to manipulate you, our chil-

dren, and our society?
(Fina

Adis AB

Mike Rosenau
Active Citizens of B.C,
Terrace, B.C,

Beard policy harsh .

Dear Sir:

A friend, following many other jobless people, came
from Prince Rupert in search of employment, Standing
in line his turn finally came to submit his application
for employment at the Real Canadian Wholesale Club,
Before any consideration of his qualifications, he was
told ‘Sorry, we don’! hire people with beards’.

This company policy seems a lite harsh.

There are many Sikhs in the three communities thal
this new store will serve. Perhaps they should be aware
thal this new store wiil nol Lire mate Sikhs.

[ have a beard and not that long ago I-was.on the job
market. This store wouldn't bave hired ine either, |
guess I’ll restrict my shopping to its. competition,

- Jack Cook
Terrace, HC,