150 acres of hardwoods?

[treeman82]

I am going this morning to speak with a guy who owns 150 acres of hardwood inhabited woods. From the small amount of property that I have already seen it is primarily ash, with a good deal of maple and hickory mixed in. There's a few elms and also I noticed 1 monster tulip. There was no cherry to be found, and black birch was scarce as well. The guy does not want to develop the land, but does want to make some $ off of it in order to help cover what I'd assume is a roughly $30K/ yr tax bill. The one thing I did notice was that there is a LOT of old stone walls... well over 100 years old.

I'm thinking that maybe he'd be best off hauling out the old walls and selling it off to masons and homeowners. I've already spoken with a few people and they told me that fieldstone brings in a pretty penny.

My question is this however, is it worth it to log ash? From what I have seen so far they look like good timber, good sized, etc. But I realize that ash is pretty much middle of the road as far as value goes. Except for the odd few here and there, most of the maples are less than 20" DBH so they are better off being left to grow. The hickories are also middle of the road price wise, I know that... but they are in the 20 - 30" DBH range for the most part.

 

[woodfarmer]

ash

try to get in touch with some local furniture makers or the amish. they are using ash instead of birch and other softer woods for the drawers and frames of furniture and then using oak for all outside visible finishes

 

[olyman]

and some are even using ash in place of oak---the grain is almost the same as oak--and stains out well to look almost exactly like oak--and i just priced a patio door--no oak frame--but ash---instead of steel clad pine--225 dollars more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! think the loggers pay that much for ash-----------------N O T !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[manual]

NO the Loggers don't pay that much for Ash, But they do pay more for Ash then pine.
It's not the loggers that set the price.
There is a big food chain that a log has to go through before it hits a store.
How ever the Logger plays the most important roll on how the log will be marketed.

 

[Booshcat]

Up here in New England, stone walls in New Hampshire and Vermont are being stolen from properties, so there is definitely a value there!!

 

[bwalker]

If you harvesting ash look into regulations put in place to halt the advance of the Emerald Ash Borer.

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

If you harvesting ash look into regulations put in place to halt the advance of the Emerald Ash Borer.

Some places you have to debark onsite.

There is a big food chain that a log has to go through before it hits a store.

I pharse it that lumber is a value added product where timber is a resourse. Many buisness people will understand it that way.

"but I thought walnut was valuable?" Cut it, grade it, transport and mill it, grade it again, finnish mill it and then as S4S dimensional lumber it is worth $8/bf. The vener log is the exception, hence the high value.

I'm thinking that maybe he'd be best off hauling out the old walls and selling it off to masons and homeowners.

I'm sure you know some larger landscape companies you can sell them to by the dump load. In your area field stone must be a comodity.

...150 acres of hardwood...

I think the terms you are looking for are "sustainable use" and "stand improvement thining".

Often times the bulk of improvement work will go to firewood, but then there is probably a good market for that in your area too.

You can get some merchantable timber from "overmature" trees, but if they have goood genetics, you do not want to remove the valuable seed sourse. Just like the have to through back the very big lobsters.

Lastly you need to look into local reg's as to how much you can cut. I'm in discussions with a muni on sustainable use because their ordinaces are writen just for developmental reasons. If you cut 30% of a stand the rest must go int conservancy...inperpetuity

 

[Forest Steward]

If you harvesting ash look into regulations put in place to halt the advance of the Emerald Ash Borer.

Luckily that hasn't moved quite our way yet. I've been given plenty of indicator cards by our Department of Env. Cons., so we're supposed to be on the lookout. But around here that's more of a preventative method rather than worrying about spreading it. So as far as I know, we haven't had a reason for any regs. yet.