Odd Socks was here before I was.
You could also saw down the tree for lumber, but you can't wait too long.
You could also saw down the tree for lumber, but you can't wait too long.
How did the pioneers clear the land?
- Thread starter Yoga Face
- Start date
They cleared the land with basic tools, ox teams, etc, and likely had so much wood they would burn it to keep warm. The first couple of years were brutal, and they would live in whatever shack they could put up.
The usual method involved having a lot of children, and putting them to work in a self-sustaining growth process to clear the land. With lots of hard work by all. Live as much off your own land as possible.
The usual method involved having a lot of children, and putting them to work in a self-sustaining growth process to clear the land. With lots of hard work by all. Live as much off your own land as possible.
Oh boy, felling dead trees is a very dangerous business. Not a good strategy.Cut a section of bark around the base of the tree (or drill a series of holes). This interferes with sap flow between the roots and the leaves and the tree eventually dies. Then you cut it down and use it for firewood...
the easiest method with no danger may be to notch the tree in the direction it is bent then girdle it
this way the tree will fell itself
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Dead trees are more likely to shed branches while being chopped down with potentially lethal consequences.
Only if they make someone a widow. A dead tree is less likely to barber chair and kick you in the chops.
No-one has mentioned the classic 'Roughing it in the Bush' by Susanna Moodie. It had some descriptions of how they cleared the land, written as a first hand observer. I haven't read it in many years. It described the 1830's homesteading experience near Peterborough. Susanna and her husband eventually gave up I think. 
I also have some historical society books that describe how lands were granted up by the Bruce Peninsula, to give you some idea of what it was like. (The Bruce area was one last areas of virgin land opened up in Ontario for settlement.)
- government was responsible for surveying and clearing the roads. Ie Highway 6 from Fergus to Owen Sound was opened in 1841
- As they opened the roads, they would give 'free grant lands' in 50 acre sizes beside the road - free, with conditions, to settlers
- settlers had to clear 12 acres in four years, and build a house 18'x24', and live there continuously to keep the land
- Note 12 acres is about 58000 sq yards - about 8 or 9 football fields to be cleared in 4 years
- later (1850), settlers could purchase land in 100 acre lots for 10 shillings per acre - I think there were similar conditions on clearing the land
- It was typical for people to have to walk from the Guelph area to get to the surveyed lands
- Approaches differed - some men would go alone in the first year to clear a bit of land and build a shack then return to bring their family the next year, while others would go all-in and bring the family along at the beginning
To give you an idea of the labour intensity of these times, a typical road survey crew for roads was like this:
- qualified surveyor as the leader
- two men to handle chains (the survey distances were measured in calibrated chains)
- two or three men to cut stakes and markers for the chains
- At least eight axemen to cut the trail - cut brush, blaze the trail on the trees
- a further team of men as teamsters - move supplies etc
The team would be out surveying roads for months at a time.
Our ancestors were tough bastards. Men and women alike.
I also have some historical society books that describe how lands were granted up by the Bruce Peninsula, to give you some idea of what it was like. (The Bruce area was one last areas of virgin land opened up in Ontario for settlement.)
- government was responsible for surveying and clearing the roads. Ie Highway 6 from Fergus to Owen Sound was opened in 1841
- As they opened the roads, they would give 'free grant lands' in 50 acre sizes beside the road - free, with conditions, to settlers
- settlers had to clear 12 acres in four years, and build a house 18'x24', and live there continuously to keep the land
- Note 12 acres is about 58000 sq yards - about 8 or 9 football fields to be cleared in 4 years
- later (1850), settlers could purchase land in 100 acre lots for 10 shillings per acre - I think there were similar conditions on clearing the land
- It was typical for people to have to walk from the Guelph area to get to the surveyed lands
- Approaches differed - some men would go alone in the first year to clear a bit of land and build a shack then return to bring their family the next year, while others would go all-in and bring the family along at the beginning
To give you an idea of the labour intensity of these times, a typical road survey crew for roads was like this:
- qualified surveyor as the leader
- two men to handle chains (the survey distances were measured in calibrated chains)
- two or three men to cut stakes and markers for the chains
- At least eight axemen to cut the trail - cut brush, blaze the trail on the trees
- a further team of men as teamsters - move supplies etc
The team would be out surveying roads for months at a time.
Our ancestors were tough bastards. Men and women alike.
No-one has mentioned the classic 'Roughing it in the Bush' by Susanna Moodie. It had some descriptions of how they cleared the land, written as a first hand observer. I haven't read it in many years. It described the 1830's homesteading experience near Peterborough. Susanna and her husband eventually gave up I think.
I also have some historical society books that describe how lands were granted up by the Bruce Peninsula, to give you some idea of what it was like. (The Bruce area was one last areas of virgin land opened up in Ontario for settlement.)
- government was responsible for surveying and clearing the roads. Ie Highway 6 from Fergus to Owen Sound was opened in 1841
- As they opened the roads, they would give 'free grant lands' in 50 acre sizes beside the road - free, with conditions, to settlers
- settlers had to clear 12 acres in four years, and build a house 18'x24', and live there continuously to keep the land
- Note 12 acres is about 58000 sq yards - about 8 or 9 football fields to be cleared in 4 years
- later (1850), settlers could purchase land in 100 acre lots for 10 shillings per acre - I think there were similar conditions on clearing the land
- It was typical for people to have to walk from the Guelph area to get to the surveyed lands
- Approaches differed - some men would go alone in the first year to clear a bit of land and build a shack then return to bring their family the next year, while others would go all-in and bring the family along at the beginning
To give you an idea of the labour intensity of these times, a typical road survey crew for roads was like this:
- qualified surveyor as the leader
- two men to handle chains (the survey distances were measured in calibrated chains)
- two or three men to cut stakes and markers for the chains
- At least eight axemen to cut the trail - cut brush, blaze the trail on the trees
- a further team of men as teamsters - move supplies etc
The team would be out surveying roads for months at a time.
Our ancestors were tough bastards. Men and women alike.
Stop for a minute
1830 WAS BEFORE CIVIL WAR so freed slaves would be available as they escaped through the underground as well as Irish immigrants
Very good labor for little more than food and board ??????
The way they cleared the land was decisive in how hard they worked
I suspect the trees they actually moved were the ones that had value so they used them or sold them
The others they burned by this simple method
“Take a long shanked auger, bore two holes, one above the other, at an angle so they will meet some distance inside; after which some pitch fagots are lit and introduced into the upper hole, the flame causing a suction of air from the lower hole, acting something like a blow pipe. The portion of the tree inside of the sap being more or less of a pitchy nature, burns with great rapidity and in a short time appears and roars like a huge furnace.“
It’s quite ingenious – creating a self-sustaining bellows out of just two holes and a source of ignition.
Also, what does clearing the land mean???? Just removing the trees or also removing the stumps?????
Also, we are assuming all the land was woods. Perhaps it included meadows so part of those 12 acres were already clear
Clearing two football fields per year by burning when some of it is already clear seems like the easy part if you are not required to remove the stumps which can be done by setting them into a slow burn with charcoal but i say let them rot into fertilizer over the years
Building the house while feeding a few pigs and cows seems harder unless he could sell some trees to the British who were desperate for lumber as they have cut down most of their forest over the centuries
Getting our lumber and fish was why they came over and fought for this country
It was hard no doubt but maybe not as hard as we assume it was
my idea is to notch the trees and girdle them at the same time
within a year they will fell themselves then you salvage the valuable wood and burn the rest
Burning when felled or using the bellows method in post 34 will decrease the chance of an uncontrolled burn esp. if you burn after a rain as only the outside of the tree is wet so the felled tree will still burn but embers will not start a fire on a wet tree still upright and alive or burn them in the winter after a snow fall by pouring pitch on them as this will burn through the wet bark into the dry inside of the tree and no worries about an uncontrolled fire. I suspect they even had laws about the proper way to burn a tree
Sound good ?
they paid 7.50 an hr. to young people would be scheduled part time hours based on seniority after school. and their paychecks from payroll would be included with union fees.
it was called the Great Canadian Loblaws
it was called the Great Canadian Loblaws
Actually, the trades were unionized into guilds but laborers were fucked .... no union, no labor laws, no health care ....
So how many trees do you girdle? It takes a long time for a single tree to die and decay to the point of falling over. What do you do if the tree doesn't fall over free of other trees (a very dangerous situation) a very common in the largest forest in the world.
OK
legitimate problems
1 a big enough notch and the tree is gonna fall on its own esp after it dies. The bigger the notch the quicker it will fall and with experience you will learn the proper notch to make
2 You have to be aware of falling into other trees but what if you intentionally get it to fall into another notched tree which falls into another notched tree??
They will fall like dominoes ??????????
But i suppose this is one of many methods you will use to fell a tree
A very, very clever way follows
During the summer take a long shanked auger, bore two holes, one above the other, at an angle so they will meet inside;
Wait for winter to come then after some snow falls put some pitch fagots into the upper hole then lite them , the flame will cause air and smoke to rise from the upper hole causing a suction of air from the lower hole, acting like a blow furnace. The portion of the tree inside of the sap being of a pitchy nature will burn rapidly and in a short time it will roar like a huge furnace.
If you do this in the winter you will not have an uncontrolled burn as the embers will land on a snow covered tree
Also, girdling the tree in the summer and killing it may improve the burn and make auguring easier, I am unsure as the resin itself may increase the burn
I do not know for sure as I am guessing but it is interesting idea that should be extremely effective once the details are worked out
The best part is the minimal labor as you never touch an axe and are left with a burned stump that you can let rot or slow burn with charcoal
Also , the residue will quickly become fertilizer
As bennett said earlier while I was pontificating elsewhere: You'll find the actual first-hand accounts in Roughing it in the Bush by Susannah Moodie and the books and journals of her sister Catherine Parr Trail. They make good reading, especially by a winter fire, and since they were settling in the empty wilderness between Port Hope and Peterborough, there's a local angle.
First they felled the trees and cultivated between the deadfalls as they slowly cut them up for firewood or building materials, hired someone with a team to drag them to the water's edge—with few roads everyone and everything had to go by water—or onto the ice to await breakup and perhaps profit downriver. Somewhere in the process money/bartered goods or services and ownership changed hands. Brush was piled and burned, along with whole trees that were excess to needs, or too troublesome to cut with handsaws, just as settlers do today in forested parts like the Amazon. That took years, and the stumps took much, much, much longer. The ladies describe it all, and much more in a very readable style.
The really commercial timber trade with Britain pillaged the boreal forests further north and ran down the Ottawa River to be loaded in Montreal. Toronto was upstream of the Lachine rapids (Getting past them is also in Moodie and Trail) and inaccessible from the sea until after canals were built. By then the Lake Ontario country was well settled and under the plough. The attempts to link clear-cutting with farming in northwest country up the Opeongo Road from Bytown/Ottawa were mostly sad failures because the Shield grew nothing well but pine. And some sad folk-songs.
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