Image provided by: The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs; Warm Springs, OR
About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 22, 1978)
SEPTEMBER 22, 1978 PAGE 7 Climbing for Cones - by Cynthia Stowell “ It takes a certain kind of person to climb up a 75-80 foot tree,” said Bill Donaghu who is heading up the BIA’s first cone gathering program. Two days of training with the professional Barnes Tree Im provement crew separated the climbers from the ground-hug- gers. Not only physical agility and stamina are required but also a strong stomach since trees can sway dizzyingly ip the wind and under a climber’s weight. After two weeks of climbing, forester Paul Brna still had sore muscles but raved about the peaceful experience of being poised in the top of a tree with a great view and no sound but the wind. Brna was also enthusiastic about the overtime and hazard pay he was collecting along with the cones. He and several other Bureau foresters gave up two weekends, including Labor Day, to dangle from trees, and every time they climbed over 50 feet they received hazard pay for the whole day. Pine and fir cones have traditionally been collected by enterprising but am ateur gather ers, but increasingly forest man agers are looking to professibnal Not for everyone contractors to do the work, said Donaghu. Thè methods have naturally become more profes sional. The local BIA spent $1000 on specialized equipment, including spurs, ropes, harnesses and lad ders; found suitable climbers among its own ranks add is now in the cone picking business. Seven Warm Springs fores ters “know the ropes,” so to speak, but still leave the fancier footwork to the pro’s. A tree is relieved of its cones from top to bottom by a forester- turned lineman^ who either leans a ladder against the trunk or straps on spurs and “walks” up as far as the first branches. Brna noted that the ladder often the shakiest part of a climb. Protected from the sap and dense growth by coveralls,and heavy gloves, the climber re verts to boyhood and scrambles up to the top. Once there he slings a rope around the tree and attaches it to an elaborate 8-10 lb. harness worn on his torso. He leans back gingerly and the picking begins. One suprise for Brna was that the sorest parts of his body were his wrists, which yrere continuously twisting cones off branches. Another surprise was; that even on crisp fall days, sweat poured freely, attesting to the amount of physical effort involved. The climbers descends slow ly, filling his burlap bag with cones all the way. Maneuvering around and through branches becomes more difficult as the bag fills up. Often more than one bag can be filled in one tree, but rather than wrestle with two bags the first is dropped careful ly to the ground. Real “pro’s ” incorporate a mountain climbing technique into their tree climbing. Equip ped with ropes, they can “repel” down a long fir trunk, making, fast work of the last part of the descent. A good picker can collect about six bushels of cones a day. With 700 cones in a bushel sack, that means a daily harvest of 4200 cones per picker. Climbers are not forced to tackle trees they don’t feel they can handle, one reason for the infrequency of accidents, said Brna. There were no unfortunate incidents during the two weeks of B.I.A picking, except for a few queazy stomachs and shaky knees as some foresters dis covered they are better suited for horizontal trav e l.' HAPPY HARVESTER— Forester Paul Brna enjoyed the solitude and silence of cone-picking but only tolerated the sap, sweat and sore muscles. CDS Photo Cone Harvest, cont’d been identified and trained, (see separate story above). The journey of the cone takes time to master. The pain involved is not so much in the feet and calves but in the arms, which had to do a bit of hoisting. The rope dangling in the upper right is slung around the tree and attached to the forester’s harness while he is picking cones. CDS Photo Once collected, the cones are stored in a potato cellar in Culver where the atmosphere is held constant at a humid 60 degrees. Processing is done in Cot tage Grove. Dipped in a chem ical solution, the cones are then air dried, reducing the moisture content from about 80 percent to 6 percent. At about 12 percent moisture, the cones begin to open and a thrashing machine separ ates the seeds from the cones. Air blown through the seeds separates 10 percent of the lightest seed, leaving those more likely to contain embryos. Chem ical and X-ray germination tests are administered and each seed lot is assigned a predicted suc cess rate. Seeds are then packaged and frozen, to be sent to the nursery for germination when needed. Seeds collected this year will be sown next spring and planted as seedlings in the spring of 1981. The advance planning needed in reforestation pro grams can be thrown off by unexpected events such as fires or blowdowns. For instance, this past winter’s excessive blow down has produced an unanti cipated 1300 acres of clearcut, creating a push for Douglas fir seed, noted Donaghu. With a large inventory of native seed, B.I.A. Forestry should be ready for anything. A burn in Seekseequa will receive pine seed suited for an arid environment while a high country blowdown will be planted with high country fir seed. In familiar soil and weather conditions, native seedlings are expected to have a better chance of surviving. Donaghu added that the replacement of poorer species with more ideal types should produce a healthier, more valuable foiest. D isa b led To Get H elp From HUD-HEW A study and demonstration project jointly financed by HUD and HEW will explore ways to house and care for Indians with limited disabilities in their home surroundings, Secretary Patricia Roberts Harris of Housing and Urban Development reported. Noting that Indian persons with limited disabilities fre quently are sent to institutions which often are far removed from their cultural and family base, Secretary Harris said the study and demonstration are an effort to halt that practice. She called it “offensive to tribal traditions and values” to break up the family life of those Indian persons. The practice applies to those who are disabled or retarded, elderly persons with infirmities, and abandoned or neglected children needing spe cial care. Preliminary to the demon stration project, HUD and HEW are funding up to $63,945 of a study conducted by five south western tribes . . . the White Mountain Apache, the Hopi, Navajo, San Carlos, and Zuni. . . in collaboration with the Native American Research Institute, Inc., a non-profit firm in Law rence, Kansas. The study will focus on these key needs: — de-institutionalization of Indian people, including child ren, with limited disabilities — examination of policies which constrain construction for groups with such disabilities — the need to maintain and reinforce the natural family and extended family concept. Through the study, the tribes will assess their needs them selves and will determine where to put their limited resources. This study is preparatory to the planning and construction of 50 specially designed housing units to be allocated among the five tribes in a demonstration pro ject. The familities developed by the demonstration will be owned and operated by tribal govern mental or non-profit organiza tions. Federal assistance for de veloping and constructing these facilities will be shared by HUD and the Indian Health Service of HEW. The federal assistance for operating and maintaining the facilities, and for the provision of special care, also will be shared by HUD and HEW, with potential participation by other appropri ate agencies. The concept for the demon stration project was developed by Dr. Karl A. Menninger of the Menninger Foundation, who will continue to serve the project in an advisory capacity. This is p art of the ongoing effort by the Secretaries of HUD and HEW to promote nationally the objective of de-institution alization of persons, including children, into alternate facilities with appropriate care. HEW’s Intra-Departmental Council on Indian Affairs is cooperating with HUD in over sight and administration of the project.
