Chainsaw Safety, Maintenance, and Operation in Forest Management

Catalog description

This course covers the detailed use of the modern chainsaw. The course begins with safety and personal protective equipment (PPE), Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA) regulations, saw selection, and an introduction into safe saw handling skills and techniques. The course then transitions to saw maintenance and proper care of the chainsaw, and then to a hazard recognition, mitigation, and avoidance component that addresses both the work site and the resource being harvested and processed. Once these objectives have been understood, the remaining two-thirds of the course focuses on the practice of chainsaw handling skills and techniques that are necessary for safe operation. This course has an extensive hands-on, experiential learning component in actual tree-felling and processing in the forest, including on-site discussion of harvesting as a forest management tool. The course concludes with training in proper log manufacturing, including scaling and grading of the harvested resource. Efficient recovery of the timber resource that minimize damage on the residual stand is emphasized. (In the B.S. program in Forest Ecosystem Management, this course counts only as an Elective.)