Operate forestry equipment
Little of this can be handed to software today.
This happens in the physical world, so software agents do not touch it. Automation here means robotics and machinery, which is a different market from the one mapped on this site, on a much slower clock.
| How automatable | Barely automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Physical, manual and inspection work |
| Jobs that do it | 3 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | None |
| O*NET activity | Controlling Machines and Processes (4.A.3.a.3) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 3 occupations that perform it.
- Thin or space trees, using power thinning saws.
- Stop saw engines, pull cutting bars from cuts, and run to safety as tree falls.
- Drive straight or articulated tractors equipped with accessories such as bulldozer blades, grapples, logging arches, cable winches, and crane booms to skid, load, unload, or stack logs, pull stumps, or clear brush.
- Prune or shear tree tops or limbs to control growth, increase density, or improve shape.
- Clear brush from work areas and escape routes, and cut saplings and other trees from direction of falls, using axes, chainsaws, or bulldozers.
- Drive crawler or wheeled tractors to drag or transport logs from felling sites to log landing areas for processing and loading.
- Operate skidders, bulldozers, or other prime movers to pull a variety of scarification or site preparation equipment over areas to be regenerated.
- Insert jacks or drive wedges behind saws to prevent binding of saws and to start trees falling.
- Drive tractors for building or repairing logging and skid roads.
- Work as a member of a team, rotating between chain saw operation and skidder operation.
- Control hydraulic tractors equipped with tree clamps and booms to lift, swing, and bunch sheared trees.
- Drive and maneuver tractors and tree harvesters to shear the tops off of trees, cut and limb the trees, and cut the logs into desired lengths.
What we would actually use
Nothing in our landscape addresses this work. That is the honest answer rather than a padded list: this activity needs a person present, or a machine rather than a software agent.
Nothing on this site applies. Automation here is robotics and machinery, a different market on a much slower clock, and no software subscription moves it.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
3 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Operate agricultural or forestry equipment”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
| Activity | Jobs |
|---|---|
| Operate farming equipment | 5 |
| Operate grounds maintenance equipment | 4 |
| Operate irrigation systems | 2 |
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.