Logging is the process of cutting trees, moving them to a location for processing and moving. This may include slipping, on-site handling, and trucks on wood or logs loading
or skeleton car.
It is the beginning of a supply chain that provides daily raw materials for many product communities worldwide for use in residential, construction, energy and consumer paper products. Logging systems are also used to manage forests, reduce the risk of forest fires, and restore ecosystem functions.
In forestry, the term logging is sometimes used to describe the logistics of moving stump wood to a place other than narrow forest, usually in a sawmill or a lumberyard. However, in general usage this term can cover a range of forestry or silviculture activities.
Illegal logging means harvesting, moving, buying or selling timber illegally. The harvesting procedure itself, including the use of corruption tools to gain access to forests, may be illegal; removal from unauthorized or protected area; cutting protected species; or removal of timber that exceeds accepted limits. It may include the so-called "lumber mafia".
Sharp cutting (or "block cutting") is considered a method of harvesting or silviculture, not necessarily a type of woodcutting. In the forestry products industry, logging companies, logging contractors, smaller, non-union crews can be referred to as "gyppo loggers".
Cutting down trees with the highest value and separating them from the lower value ones, usually diseased or damaged trees, is referred to as high grading. It is sometimes referred to as selective logging and is confused with selection cutting, the practice of managing stands by harvesting part of the trees.
Logging generally refers to the above-ground forestry diary. There are submerged forests on the land flooded by dams to create reservoirs. Such trees are cut using underwater logging or lowering the reservoirs in question. Ootsa Lake and Williston Lake in British Columbia, Canada are notable examples of the need for timber recovery to destroy flooded forests.