Developing Burnt Forest Areas Affected by Ground Fires with a ‘Harvester + Forwarder’ Machine System
Introduction. Unlike crown fires, ground fires tend to leave significant chance for the preservation of within-crown cones containing viable seeds. Conventional ways of developing burnt forest areas include clearing felling sites by burning debris, which causes death of the seeds retaining vitality. To avoid the loss in timber quality and merchantability, harvesting works in drying out stands should be carried out within a short time frame. Therefore, the task of ensuring natural regeneration of local pine populations becomes relevant for developing commercially usable burnt areas. The purpose of the study is to substantiate the method of cut-to-length logging with a ‘harvester + forwarder’ machine system leaving as many pine cones as possible on top of the soil in the areas affected by the ground fire. The object of the study is the technological process of cut-to-length logging using the mechanical harvesting system. Method. The time-keeping method was used for measuring the operation of the ‘harvester + forwarder’ system. Results. Mathematical expectations of the duration of the elements of the tree processing cycle with additional lifting of the stem base were established. Conclusions. The use of a ‘harvester + forwarder’ machine system makes it possible to organize the technological process of the logging operations while preserving the seed material for the natural regeneration of pine. The analysis of the timekeeping results suggests that an increase in the average cycle time of processing a tree with a harvester according to the proposed method is not significant and will not lead to a decrease in the productivity of the feller-delimber-slasher machines (FDSM).