Harvesting Trees, The Black Moon Way

[ernest dubois]

This seems a good cubical for forestry topics. I'm convinced we should follow this schedule for felling. Has anyone got their hands on a calendar?

[Roger Nair]

Ernest can you provide a reference?

I have always suspected that the winter harvesting of timber reflects the agricultural cycle, so workers don't traipse off to the woods when crops need attention, everything in it's time. Wisdom and virtue combine into best practice.

[ernest dubois]

Mainly practiced on continental Europe and still quite broadly, I could add although, a drastic fall-off is in the making there even unless something gets done to revive the knowledge. As it is practiced now it is for its own worth as a way of getting the best quality wood, so not as a consequence of something unrelated.
My only reference was a copy of an old calendar but it was so complicated, (and so French) that every time I would look, it was an exercise in frustration and futility so finally I had to get it away from me and threw it out. I did manage to look up an image of it that I have still.
pb090046.jpg
https://translate.google.nl/translat...z/&prev=search
https://translate.google.nl/translat...57&prev=search
https://translate.google.nl/translat...ml&prev=search

[Roger Nair]

Here is a link to 2018 moon phase calendar that is clear to understand.

https://www.yogamatters.com/media/ca...towel-2018.jpg

The French calendars meaning, color key and symbols are a mystery to me.
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I have read the three links to German sources, however the apparent use of idiomatic German does not translate well in the Google machine. Neither am I at all familiar with the lore of the Zodiac especially relating to forestry and the menstrual cycle as a working system. So I am lost in the deep dark forest.

[ernest dubois]

That sounds like the Black Forest then. I assumed first also the talk of women's days, (happy International Women's Day by the way), was going on about the cycle of a woman. In fact in observant Catholic Germany there are days named for certain prominent people of the church's belief system and these days refer to the days named for particular women, like Maria, Marian, etc... so religious holidays we can say. Cut no wood then.
Well, I thought the article from a local newspaper covering the test of burning wood was interesting as an example. The standard Larch and a Larch cut down on Black Moon - called Mandholz - both set alight only the moon Larch did not burn.
http://www.en.charpentiers.culture.f...lackmoon?media

[Bill Dufour]

In eastern America wood was cut so it could be hauled off in horse drawn sleds over the snow. Much harder to haul after the snow melted and it was time to plow, plant, and harvest. In the west they had steam engines and it may be that they waited for winter rains to flume the logs down to the mills.

[ernest dubois]

In the sense I mean it, the logistics of harvesting have nothing to do with harvesting by moon, it is a matter of how this method effects the characteristics of the wood in use. The famous example being the old Bayern houses with chimneys made from Larch cut before midnight on the day of the Black Moon which will not burn. In Germany there is a niche market for construction wood and the Swiss instrument makers are also keen to have Moon Wood.