Busy Days

Before the harvest season starts, we have to figure out the schedule for the helicopter. You have to book your hours in advance and then make sure everything works out. If it is foggy, they can't fly. If it is too windy, they set down. Then your are all screwed up. They have to move on to the next guy on the list and you have to try and refigure everything out. I remember one year that we had fog everytime we were scheduled to fly. We had 30,000 trees in slings in the fields and trucks scheduled to arrive to pick up loads. Luckily, the fog lifted and we got them out in time. This year so far everything is working out really well. We flew for 8 hours yesterday. That is what we had scheduled. Today was really windy and it's supposed to be again tomorrow. But on Friday when we have 8 hours again, it's supposed to be nice. I pray for no fog. I don't think it's a coincidence that things are going smoothly. I'm quite sure Jay is looking out for us.

I just wanted to show you some more pictures of whats happening here. Every time the helicopter drops a bundle of trees, one of the guys pulls both slings and rolls it up. Then hurries because the next bundle is on it's way. After all the trees are on the landing, they are bailed and sorted into piles by size. Each tree has a colored tag identifiying it's size. Some buyers have their own tags so they have to be seperated not only by size but by buyer, too.

Right now the piles are getting bigger. We should start loading some out tomorrow and making room for Friday when we will start this all over again. I like it when the piles get smaller. I love it when they are all gone. I love the guys who work so hard, too. I'll try to show you more tomorrow.