NEWT co-owner John Adler is among the most recognized logging instructors in the United States. He has been a logging safety instructor and Game of Logging instructor since 1983, and has trained hundreds of professional loggers, forest owners, and students throughout New England, New York, and beyond. During the winter months, John owns and operates Eagle Forest Improvement, a logging business based in Chester, VT.
John has worked with a variety of logging systems, ranging from cable skidders to dozers to his current forwarder-based operation. John has a degree in forestry from Paul Smith’s College.
NEWT co-owner David Birdsall is a woods-educator. He has worked extensively with students at Sterling College, the Vermont Leadership Center, and the Merck Farm and Forest Program. David manages the Vermont LEAP program (Logger Education to Advance Professionalism), organizing and teaching loggers safety and continuing education.
David’s experiences in teaching are grounded in his work as a consulting forester, logger, and portable sawmill owner/ operator. In addition, David had a long career leading backcountry trips during the summers for his family-owned business, North Country Camps.
Arborist/Logger from Westport, NY in the Adirondacks. Mark is a former public school music teacher with education degrees from the Crane School of Music (Trumpet) and a Masters in Education from SUNY Plattsburgh. He is an ISA Certified Arborist, Rock and Ice Climbing Guide, and seven-time GOL Regional Competition winner.
Mark is the owner of SilvaSauls Inc, a logging and tree care company that prides itself in safe, clean, quality, and efficiently done work. SilvaSauls Inc maintains the right equipment and properly trained crew to remain a very much in demand service business in the eastern Adirondacks. Avid hunter, fisherman and backcountry telemark skier.
Kyle entered the logging industry in 2008 and has since spent the majority of his time felling trees with a chainsaw. Prior to logging, he worked as a tree service groundman and a trailworker. Kyle has a interest in doing physical work safely, efficiently, and well. Teaching with NEWT allows him to share and explore that interest with others.
When he is not teaching, Kyle works as a timber faller for Long View Forest Inc., a full service forest management company based in Westminster, Vermont.
Ian Irwin has been in the woods as long as he can remember. First picking up a chainsaw when he was thirteen he understands its value as an essential tool in the forest. Now able to concentrate most of his logging to family land located near his home in Granby Vermont, he is able to work in the woods most of the year. With rising costs of equipment and instabilities in wood markets he feels strongly that now as much as ever the safe and efficient use of the chainsaw is an important way to manage our timber resources economically. Most importantly he simply loves falling trees. When Ian is not logging or instructing, you’ll likely find him somewhere in the world shearing sheep.