Cable crane firewood yarding in a Mediterranean area

In Calabria, a Southern Italy region characterized by a forest cover equal to 31.8% and by steep terrain, firewood represents an important economic sector of forest exploitation. Firewood yarding is mainly performed by means of animals (mules and horses) or by agricultural tractor, while cable yarding is rarely used and only for sawlogs. Nevertheless a wider use of cable crane is desirable because 66% of forests grow in mountainous area where yarding with terrestrial means lead to low or negative stumpage. A part from the economic reasons, the use of cable crane should contribute to modify the forest work style, improving the working conditions and the skill of the operators. These effects are particularly important in Southern Italy forest area that at moment could be considered marginal from the technological innovation point of view. Concerning the firewood cable yarding few experiences are available in Italy and hence the opportunity to carry out a study in order to define the productivity and the operative costs of a light mobile tower yarder (Koller K300) used for cable yarding of Quercus cerris L. firewood assortments. The study was carried out in a coppice stand, located at an altitude of 820 m a.s.l., and in a high forest, located at an altitude of 1 280 m a.s.l, both of them growing on terrain with a gradient ranging from 60 to 100% An established data collection protocol was chosen and all the data concerning cable line features, working times and costs were collected. The processed data were compared with the ones available from literature and with the ones coming from the conventional yarding systems. The results demonstrate the effectiveness of the cable crane applied to firewood yarding, when compared to the terrestrial yarding systems, and show the possible solutions to be adopted in order to enhance the productivity.