ATTACHMENT 2 - SOW - CPF - SITE PREP - CHIPPEWA HARROW FY2025.pdf

DESCRIPTION/SPECIFICATION/WORK STATEMENT

SCOPE OF CONTRACT

The Contractor shall furnish all equipment, labor, materials, supervision, and incidentals necessary to perform Site Preparation on the Chippewa National Forest in a skillful and professional manner.

DESCRIPTION AND LOCATION

All sites are located on the Chippewa National Forest. A vicinity map will be provided with each Task Order to show general locations. Sites will range from green timber sales to salvage sales, to non-harvested stands.

Site specific maps that locate and show sites in more detail will be provided upon award.

Within these areas there will be pine and hardwood stumps and heavy slash from harvesting activities. Some project areas contain residual standing vegetation including conifer, birch, maple, and oak; these trees will be protected. Most sites have orange boundary paint around units. The Contractor will follow the orange painted boundary unless site boundary is flagged or painted in some other color of designation as directed by the COR, or the COR provides a digital boundary on a georeferenced digital map.

QUANTITIES

Acreage shown on project maps is traversed. Payment will be made on the traversed acreage. There may be unworkable areas within the units; unworkable areas exceeding one acre in size will not be included in the paid acreage. Total acreages, per the schedule of items, are good faith estimates and may be decreased or increased, within contract limitations, based on field conditions and timber harvest schedules.

PAYMENT

Payment will be made at the contract unit price per acre and by the number of acres completed, less any adjustments or corrections. Unsatisfactory performance will result in non-payment or re-working a site at the

Contractor’s expense.

Contractor will prepare an invoice at the completion of each item (partial payments) or at the end of the contract (full payment) and payment will be processed at that time.

NON-NATIVE INVASIVE SPECIES (NNIS)

Areas, known by Forest Service prior to contract advertisement, that are infested with NNIS of concern will be shown on unit maps. A current list of NNIS of concern and a map showing the extent of known infestations is available at the Forest Supervisor’s Office.

Prior to moving Off-Road Equipment from a contract unit, with a known infestation of invasive species, to any other unit, the Contractor shall take reasonable measures to ensure each such piece of equipment is free of soil, seeds, vegetative matter, or other debris that could contain or hold seeds.

The Contractor shall identify the location of the equipment’s most recent operations. If the prior location of the Off-Road Equipment cannot be identified, Forest Service will assume that it is infested with seeds of

NNIS.

The Contractor must advise the Contracting Officer’s Representative of measures taken to clean Off-Road Equipment and arrange for Contracting

Officer’s Representative inspection prior to such equipment being placed in service or moved from contract units infested with NNIS to units that are free of such species. Contracting Officer’s Representative shall have 2 days, excluding weekends and federal holidays, to inspect equipment after it has been made available for inspection.

THE SCHEDULE

SUPPLIES OR SERVICES AND PRICE/COSTS

“Chippewa Harrow” Work

Chippewa National Forest

DESCRIPTION/SPECIFICATION/WORK STATEMENT

SCOPE OF WORK

The services covered in this contract are for the furnishing of all labor, equipment, supervision, transportation, operating supplies and incidentals, except as provided in the government-furnished property section (below), and performs all work necessary to accomplish a variety of mechanical disking with Forest

Service-provided disk (the Chippewa Harrow) including but not limited to: site preparation, scarification, road obliteration, and fire line construction and rehabilitation, in compliance with the terms, specifications, conditions, and provisions of this contract. Contractor is responsible for all mobilization costs associated with movement of the disk. The Chippewa Harrow disk will be picked up at the Supervisor’s Office in Cass

Lake, MN, and shall be returned to the Supervisor’s Office no later than 2 days after completion of the Task

Order.

CONTRACTOR-FURNISHED PROPERTY

The Contractor shall furnish all equipment and incidentals to accomplish each individual task as defined on the schedule of items, which must be approved by the COR prior to use. An articulating tractor must be used of equal to or greater than tractor specifications provided in the Request for Quotes/Proposals. Equipment shall have a Forest Service spark arrestor, fire extinguisher, and a safety canopy. The Contractor shall assume all costs of operation and maintenance. Any failure of the Contractor-owned equipment which renders it inoperable will be promptly reported to the COR. The Contractor shall have equipment repaired or replaced within 72 hours.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

A. Chippewa Harrow disk is 5 feet wide and has a weight of approximately 7000 lbs. Disk is fabricated to mount to a Pettibone PM 800. For use other than with a Pettibone tractor, an adapter plate would need to be fabricated at the Contractor’s expense. Tractor must be capable of operating implement.

B. Any failure of the Contractor-owned equipment which renders it inoperable will be promptly reported to the COR. The Contractor shall have equipment repaired or replaced within 72 hours.

PERFORMANCE SPECIFICATIONS

A. Use of the Chippewa Harrow will be on a variety of sites, however most acres will be in post-harvest logging sites. The specific use can and will vary greatly and those uses will be on each schedule of items with specifications listed. Sites will be rough with many stumps, residual trees, and slash. Primary use will be for soil scarification (site preparation) for artificial and natural seeding and for planting. Some units to be ‘harrowed’ may need slash or vegetation manipulation prior to disking to achieve acceptable scarification and vegetation control. These units will be identified in each individual schedule of items.

Slash and vegetation manipulation includes but is not limited to: raking/orientation of slash to facilitate harrowing or mowing of advanced regeneration to enable more effective harrowing. All scarifying will follow the natural contours whenever possible to minimize erosion. At least 60% of all areas within unit boundaries will receive treatment. Some units may receive double-disking at approximately a 90° angle unless mutually agreed in writing to orient the double-disking in some other configuration.

B. Operation in stands shall not unnecessarily, negligently, or willfully damage residual merchantable trees, nor damage desirable young regeneration. If unacceptable damage occurs, work may be stopped until the Contractor has displayed how the work can continue within acceptable standards.

C. Deciduous trees less than or equal to 4.9 inches diameter at breast height (DBH) may be pushed over while conducting site preparation. Coniferous trees less than 5 feet tall may be pushed over while conducting site preparation. Coniferous trees greater than 5 feet tall will be left standing. All live deciduous trees greater than 5 inches DBH and all dead trees greater than 8 inches will be left standing.

Any tree with a painted orange slash or band will be left standing. Other size classes or species of trees may be left standing as directed by the COR or as directed by specific stand descriptions in the task order. Operation in stands shall not unnecessarily, negligently, or willfully damage residual trees. If unacceptable damage occurs, work may be stopped until the Contractor has displayed how the work can continue within acceptable standards.

D. Unworkable areas may include but are not limited to: rock outcrops, stream channels, piling areas, occasional clumps of trees, areas with adequate conifer regeneration, areas with too steep a slope for safe operation, and naturally wet areas which do not lend themselves to equipment work. Unworkable areas may be left after agreement by the COR.

E. Contractor will work with the COR to mitigate rutting and if necessary, rehabilitate unacceptable rutting.

Rutting should be prevented and confined to less than 5% of an activity area. Unacceptable rutting will be defined as: “Relatively continuous tracks dominantly in excess of 6 inches deep and 10 feet long.”

F. Contractor shall protect all known survey monuments, witness corners, reference monuments, and bearing trees against avoidable destruction, obliteration, or damage during the Contractor's operation.

G. No roads or trails will be blocked by slash or debris resulting from Contractor’s operations. Upon completion of each site and prior to moving to the next site, all trash, rubbish, and debris generated by

Contractor’s operation shall be removed from National Forest Lands. Damage done by the Contractor to roads, access routes, and trails in the area of the work shall be repaired by the Contractor and road restored to equal or better condition than those existing prior to project activities, at no cost to the

Government.

GOVERNMENT-FURNISHED PROPERTY

The Government shall provide the Contractor with a front-mount Rome 36-inch “Scarifying disk” that is known as the “Chippewa Harrow”. Disk is 5 feet wide and has a weight of approximately 7000 lbs. Disk is fabricated to mount to a Pettibone PM 800. For use other than with a Pettibone tractor, an adapter plate would need to be fabricated at the Contractor’s expense.

DAMAGE TO GOVERNMENT-FURNISHED PROPERTY

Normal use means operating the disk within contracted areas in a professional manner with proper maintenance. Damage to Government-furnished property (Chippewa Harrow) that is outside the normal use will be the responsibility of the Contractor, including but not limited to:

1. Any damage incurred while hauling to or from contracted sites or during storage.

2. Any damage incurred by unqualified operators.

3. Any damage incurred by negligent use during operation.

4. Any damage determined to be the Contractor’s responsibility will be repaired to original condition within 2 weeks of damage at the expense of the Contractor.

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE

Work on Items will begin on or about Mid-August 2025 and must be completed by April 30, 2026. These dates are ESTIMATED and workable days within the Period of Performance are weather/moisture-dependent and work will occur only during acceptable dry, non-frozen soil conditions.