There was a great amount of work provided by the UC Hopland Research & Extension Center staff in order to meet the magical November 16th "ribbon-cutting" ceremony for the Rod Shippey Hall.   Without the dedication and hard work of the staff involved, the eventful day would not have happened on time.... so a huge round of applause goes out to them.

The oak round that you saw in the prior HREC BLOG post, as mentioned, took several months to prepare.   The stored oak round from a Valley Oak of about 300 years, is so enormous that it took forklifts and our machine shop chain-lift to maneuver it safely as it weighs probably a half-ton.

Troy McWilliams and Zane Kagley worked many hours on planing the oak round, sanding it, filling cracks, sanding some more, and banding it (we feared that it would split in half from cracks).  Here you see Mr. Kagley fabricating the steel-framed support cart which he designed to support the weight, hold it perpendicular, and yet be safe from any possible tip-over.