Is it wood, is it bricks or is it lego?

Time to practice your French with this post. One of the big new things coming over from continental Europe is "massive wood construction". This is an extension of the idea of a traditional log cabin - in which the walls are solid wood - but updated with modern hi-tech manufacturing methods. So instead of irregular round logs you have nice regular building blocks.

This provides very good insulation keeping the heat in and the noise from outside out. It's also greener than conventional fired clay bricks - which require more energy to make and produce more carbon dioxide in the process.

Obviously it requires an awful lot of wood, but the good thing is that cheaper, low quality, wood can be used. As there is so much of it, the force is shared over a bigger area, meaning it doesn't have to be nearly as strong or as stiff as the wood used in a timber frame building.

You might see this type of construction more often in the next few years for buildings like schools and hotels.

The first video is an explanation (in French) of one particular system of massive wood construction (there are others). Notice the computer controlled robotic cutting and drilling machines. Wood manufacturing really is like this in the 21st century.

The second video, which has no sound, shows the same system being used to actually construct a building. Notice how accurately the pieces fit together thanks to the precision manufacturing.

Virtual forest tour

UPM's Forest Life is a really beautiful combination of Flash, still photography, video and audio. It takes you on a tour of a Finnish forest looking at trees, plants, animals and people. Find out about how forests are managed sustainably for different purposes and how there is much more to a forest than just the trees.

Careers in the timber industry

The UK's multipurpose forests provide environmentally friendly materials for all sorts of things and there are a vast array of different types of job out there.

For more information on jobs visit The Doorway and A Job In.

How trees are harvested

Think you know what a lumberjack is? A big guy with a beard, a checked shirt and an axe? Possibly saving girls in red hoods from wolves dressed as grandmothers? Well think again...

For starters the people (men and women) who take down the trees are called loggers or harvesters...and its all part of forest management, which also includes tree planting, silviculture, landscaping and a range of other 'forest operations'.

Technology has changed the job considerably from the days of yore. Chainsaws started to replace axes back in the 1920s, but these days most of the trees grown for timber in countries like the UK are felled by machines a bit like the ones you see on construction sites. These machines can cut a tree, strip the branches and cut the logs to length in a matter of seconds...plus they have a lot of other fancy gadgets too...like GPS to locate the trees marked for felling. Other types of specialised machines are used to get the logs to the road and on to the sawmills.

All this is done while causing minimum damage to the forest floor and to young trees. The forest owners don't want their future timber crops to be put at risk...or any income they get from other uses of the forests such as recreation and tourism.

In some areas the land is so inaccessible that other methods have to be used, such as horses and helicopters ...or even submarines and machines that walk on legs!

Helicopter logging

There a several ways to get timber out of the forest, but perhaps the most spectacular method is by helicopter. This video shows a helicopter in action in Canada where the large distances and remoteness of the forests make this a viable option. It has been tried in the UK...the first time was in 1956 at Glenduror, near Fort William by the Forestry Commission.

The walking harvester

A Finnish company owned by John Deere has developed a tree harvesting machine that walks through the forest like something out of a science fiction film. Even the wheeled and tracked harvesting machines are like a cross between a space ship and a sports 4x4.

The machine is useful in areas with difficult terrain ...where land has been turned to forestry because it can't be used for much else. Notice how lightly it treads...allowing forests to be managed for timber with the minimum of environmental impact.

The video shows the harvester in slow motion - it would be interesting to see how quickly it can really move!