FAYETTE TOWNSHIP - To anyone who enjoys hard work, Steve Mullins invites them to give logging a try.

Though he may not be the subject of tall tales or have a blue ox, Mullins has been a logger, or lumberjack, for the past five or six years.

Working for Steve Wilds Logging of Ironton, Mullins and two others recently were wrapping up a two and half month project atop the ridge along Willow Creek Road near South Point.

How would Mullins describe logging to all for the city folks who have never experienced anything like it?

"It is hard work," he said. "Too hard sometimes."

"We select cut about 65 acres," he said as he wiped the sweat from his face. "Now we are just cleaning up."

Taking down mostly oak to be sold to a mill in Wellston, they filled two to three tractor-trailer loads with stacks of 12- to 16-foot logs five days a week.

The former railroad man is quick to point out that the logging is not damaging to the environment, and in fact can be beneficial.

"It helps the forests because it lets the poplar and other trees grow," he said. "You can't even tell it has been cut."

While they may use the traditional tools as well, modern loggers use bulldozers and other heavy equipment to get the job done quickly and efficiently.

So Paul Bunyan may have swung a mighty ax, but Mullins and others like him will put their bulldozers up against an ax any day.

The Dart is a weekly feature in which a reporter throws a dart at a map of the county and finds a story where it hits.