May 14 marked the date of this year’s annual Chainsaw Safety Course offered by the US Forest Service to volunteers who wish to participate in maintaining Idaho’s multiple-use trails. Due to difficult economic times these days, volunteers help the Forest Service in a major way by taking on projects that the agency’s tight budget simply cannot afford. With so many popular recreation trails in this state, it serves to reason that volunteers would be a necessary element to uphold optimum trail conditions. And since our chapter makes good use of these beloved trails, we are instinctively driven to be stewards of the land.

Held just outside the picturesque town of Garden Valley, Idaho, this course offered essential safety information to people of all skill levels, as well instruction for using proper techniques for operating and maintaining a chainsaw, bucking and limbing downfall, and felling dead and dying trees that may pose a hazard to trail users. The course attendees consisted mainly of gentlemen over fifty, with one young lad and two tenacious ladies tossed in for good measure. Probably a fairly accurate representation of the types of people most interested in sawing logs in the back country, but that is just my personal biased opinion. Several members of the USFS Hot Shot Crew of Garden Valley quickly, yet thoroughly walked us through a PowerPoint presentation that covered all the basics. These down-to-earth guys even managed to their own flair to the otherwise bland talk by speaking candidly about personal stories and sharing back country humor with the group.

Due to the relatively low number of participants in the course, and the ominous forecast for the following Sunday, the instructors (volunteering their time to teach us) decided to attempt to finish the normally two-day event in just one intense Saturday. The plan worked beautifully. We spend the entire morning in the classroom, but around noon, we all grabbed our sack lunches and headed out to the location of the field portion of this course. A few miles up Old Crouch Road, just past Tie Creek Campground, we corralled the trucks and prepared ourselves for an afternoon of fun with potentially dangerous equipment.

Rob, Janine and I slipped into some Kevlar chaps meant for use during chainsaw operation, and lugged our equipment up a steep incline to the cutting site. The attendees were then split up into groups according to skill level, which facilitated the hands-on education, and gave everyone an experience more attuned to their current level of sawyer certification. Because of this fieldwork, I have decided that it I enjoy the powerful feeling if running a chainsaw, and I am very much looking forward to putting my newfound skill to good use!

Janine and I acquired a level A Sawyer Certification, and Rob refreshed his B Sawyer status, and got in more time with the saw. All in all, it was a fantastic and worthwhile experience, and a great excuse to get a group together and play with powerful tools. I highly recommend this course to anyone interested in learning how to operate a chainsaw, as well as those who simply want to better understand the safety information and practices for trail maintenance in Idaho back country.