Grappling With Posts ...

This is a cool machine.

The guys at the timber yard just call it "The Bell".
They originally came from South Africa and were used for handling sugar cane, now they are made here under licence.

The grapple can rotate, and the whole machine can spin around in it's own length. The rear wheel is just a castor trailing wheel.

The driver had just grabbed a strapped bundle of posts, and cut the strapping with the grapple.
He grabbed a heap of them, rotated the bundle and counted them end on with out leaving his seat, and now is loading them onto the truck.
He then shot back and grabbed the extra few to make up the tally.

There is something really pleasurable about watching a skilled operator in a neat machine.

On the way home I remembered seeing a photo which showed a somewhat similar driving position.
I finally found it

Not a tree in sight though ...