Gunnison is a cattle town and a college town at 7,700 feet, with Blue Mesa, the biggest lake in Colorado, at its door and some of the coldest recorded winters in the lower 48 on its record. Cattlemen’s Days has run every July since 1900. People here heat with wood, fence by the mile, and build for snow load. We’re the rental yard in Grand Junction, a half-day round trip over Highway 50, with the machines the valley calls for. (970) 241-4368.
Beetle-kill spruce and lodgepole come off the forest by the cord, and a hydraulic log splitter by the week turns a season of rounds into a stacked wall before the first snow. The chipper and stump grinders clear the lot; the Husqvarna 20-inch saw rents by the day, and the 440 and 150BT backpack blower are on the sales floor if it’s time to own. We are the authorized Husqvarna service center. Bring the saw down with the trailer.
Fence lines in the Gunnison valley are measured in miles, and the ground under them is river cobble. The two-man post-hole auger and the powered post driver set posts all day; the walk-behind trencher and mini excavators run stock-tank lines and clean ditches; a Bobcat skid steer with forks moves hay and panels. When the spring runoff comes up through the barn floor, the trash pumps are ready.
Up Taylor Canyon, out toward Ohio City and Pitkin, a lot of places have no line power and a short building season. Generators run the tools, plate compactors and jumping jacks set the pad, and the Genie material lift puts the ridge beam up with two people. Rates run by the day, the week and the 4-week month so a machine can stay up the canyon until the roof is on.