How much to make it worth logging

[windthrown]

Not so clear... the cut

So clear-cutting is the only correct way to harvest a woodlot?
Finnbear

No, I am not saying that clear cutting is the only method, or even the best way to harvest trees. What I am saying is that high-grade select cutting is probably the ~worst~ method I know of for logging. I do not know of any in silviculture who support high-grading, other than commercial merchants and wanna-be profiteers. Take the best, leave the crap, and be gone. Bad for the land-owner, bad for the environment, bad for the tree stand.

 

[Doctor Dave]

No, I am not saying that clear cutting is the only method, or even the best way to harvest trees. What I am saying is that high-grade select cutting is probably the ~worst~ method I know of for logging. I do not know of any in silviculture who support high-grading, other than commercial merchants and wanna-be profiteers. Take the best, leave the crap, and be gone. Bad for the land-owner, bad for the environment, bad for the tree stand.

But selective cutting does not neccessarily equate to high grading. See above.

 

[windthrown]

West Africa explaination

BTW, How is it you are talking about old-growth Douglas-fir in West Africa?!
High-grading in tropical forest is rampant, whether there or in SE Asia or SA, it's true. In a lot of cases, the owner's (if they ARE "owners") don't know or care about how to re-grow the large, valuable species of tropical hardwoods, and they just abandon the cut-over land to settlers and ranchers when they are done. Not too different from how many US forests were "managed" early on.

Well, in fact I live in central west Oregon, where Doug fir is the dominant species and clear-cutting is the only method used to harvest timber. I live in a remote area where hundreds of square miles of commercial timber is all around us, in variable states of 'gardening' as we call it. Clear-cut, planted baby trees, medium stands being thinned, older stands being cut, and some old growth preserves, BLM land, and nature 'island' stands.

I was getting some weird emails which seem to indicate that people are spamming me through this forum, so I scrambled my personal data so that no one can access any real information on me through this site. I get email from deposed African Presidents and the like who are interested in my transferring millions of dollars from Africa to the US... funny, all they need is direct access to a bank account that I set up and put money into... for them, to.... deposit the money into, of course. Yes, they will deposit millions of dollars... all I need to do is deposit a small sum of say, one thousand dollars to open the account.

:monkey:

 

[windthrown]

Select cut vs high grading

But selective cutting does not neccessarily equate to high grading. See above.

I agree 100%. However, in the case of this particular wood lot that the person was originally posting about, I believe that select cut means high-graded. They took the best trees and left the rest.

 

[JUDGE1162]

No, I am not saying that clear cutting is the only method, or even the best way to harvest trees. What I am saying is that high-grade select cutting is probably the ~worst~ method I know of for logging. I do not know of any in silviculture who support high-grading, other than commercial merchants and wanna-be profiteers. Take the best, leave the crap, and be gone. Bad for the land-owner, bad for the environment, bad for the tree stand.

I think your asumption that high grading or selective cuts only leave "the crap" is very wronge. In many mixed hardwood stands especially unmanaged stands you have in the young understory lots of high value trees that are shaded out by the older larger trees, when you remove the older larger trees you open up the canopy to these younger, smaller high value trees to increased light, water annd neutrients which increase their growth rate, also anyone who manages their land should already be removing "crap" species already so that the stand does not include these species (I use the crap species for firewood) The remaining highvalue trees in my case under 20 inch DBH reseed the cleared areas (large tree may shade out hundreds of square feet of forest floor)

SO if done right a high value cut increases the productively of the stand of timber by increasing the growth rate of younger more productive trees and by letting medium trees 16" to 20" DBH tree with some value become much more valuable down the road a 16" DBH tree could be worth 3X more as a 22" DHB tree

 

[JUDGE1162]

I agree 100%. However, in the case of this particular wood lot that the person was originally posting about, I believe that select cut means high-graded. They took the best trees and left the rest.

I was proposing to remove high value timber over 30" DBH, I spoke with a logger today and he said if we can back it off to 26" DBH he was more than willing to log it my way.

So high-graded selective cut of trees over 26" DBH plus some trees to make a logging road and trees in the way of felling the target trees, the logger will mark all trees for my approval.

SO yes I will remove all the high value trees but leave many valuable trees under 26" DBH. I manage my land and have removed/thinned many of the "crap trees" already.

With this approach I should be able to relog the land again in 20 to 30 years and still get a very nice return (all those 25" and small trees should put on 2 inches BHD per 10 years so in 20 years I could have an increase of 4" DBH and 30 years 6" DBH so anything that is 20" to 26" DBH now will be ready to relog again at a 26"

Bigger the tree more valuable it is

The probability of tree grade increases could theoretically approach 100% if thinnings were to begin early in a stand's life. Research into tree grade improvement in stands that had been thinned every 10 years for 40 years (Strong et al 1995) indicates that this was indeed the case in stands that had been moderately thinned (77 sq ft residual basal area). Average FS tree grades improved 110% on trees that grew 3.4" in 20 years (3" FS tree grades). Tree grade increases were 80% for light (88 sq ft residual basal area) and heavy (62 sq ft residual basal area) thinnings with 3.2" and 3.6" diameter increases, respectively.

 

[windthrown]

High grading...

I think your asumption that high grading or selective cuts only leave "the crap" is very wronge. In many mixed hardwood stands especially unmanaged stands you have in the young understory lots of high value trees that are shaded out by the older larger trees, when you remove the older larger trees you open up the canopy to these younger, smaller high value trees to increased light, water annd neutrients which increase their growth rate, also anyone who manages their land should already be removing "crap" species already so that the stand does not include these species (I use the crap species for firewood) The remaining highvalue trees in my case under 20 inch DBH reseed the cleared areas (large tree may shade out hundreds of square feet of forest floor)

SO if done right a high value cut increases the productively of the stand of timber by increasing the growth rate of younger more productive trees and by letting medium trees 16" to 20" DBH tree with some value become much more valuable down the road a 16" DBH tree could be worth 3X more as a 22" DHB tree

You can certainly do what you want with your stand, as long as it is within the law. However, high grading around here means pulling out all the good stuff and leaving the rest. A 'cut everything this size and up' is pretty much a high-grade cut. What you seem to be saying is that you are doing a prescribed select cut ('done right'), which is different. One question I would ask is what would the value of the larger stuff be if you left the biggies and cut the slightly smaller stuff? All tree species have a maximum growth rate with gains in thinning and optimum times to cut. Larger diameter trees may or may not grow faster at any specific size, but in the end you may get more wood and money from a larger size tree stand. You may be better off leaving some areas of larger trees to harvest next time. I would certainly leave some of the largest trees as 'leave trees' to reproduce at least. Otherwise you are culling your stand for shorter growth over time.

You may be better off to thin and cull some of the crappy money trees when you harvest the large stuff as well. Thinning has a huge impact in overall board feet that you can harvest. But culling and thinning all of the so called 'crap' species trees may have a good or bad impact on your stand. Most trees have different levels of roots and in many cases different species can be more beneficial to each other if they are left in the stand than taking them all out. It also depends on what type of forest you want to have growing. Monoculture is not a good method of stand management in my view either. Yes, I am controvercial when it comes to silviculture, but I have seen some amazing things growing around here that defy standard and common practices. opcorn:

 

[Doctor Dave]

Well, in fact I live in central west Oregon, where Doug fir is the dominant species and clear-cutting is the only method used to harvest timber. I live in a remote area where hundreds of square miles of commercial timber is all around us, in variable states of 'gardening' as we call it. Clear-cut, planted baby trees, medium stands being thinned, older stands being cut, and some old growth preserves, BLM land, and nature 'island' stands.

I was getting some weird emails which seem to indicate that people are spamming me through this forum, so I scrambled my personal data so that no one can access any real information on me through this site. I get email from deposed African Presidents and the like who are interested in my transferring millions of dollars from Africa to the US... funny, all they need is direct access to a bank account that I set up and put money into... for them, to.... deposit the money into, of course. Yes, they will deposit millions of dollars... all I need to do is deposit a small sum of say, one thousand dollars to open the account.

:monkey:

I've gotten those too. Why do they pick on tree guys? (Actually, they don't) It's the infamous Nigerian bank account scam. You'd be surprised at how many people fall for it. It's really no different than a con man coming up to you, saying, "hey, I've got a sure thing, give me 10 dollars, and I'll double your money" And the guy runs around the corner with your ten and dissappears.

 

[NYCHA FORESTER]

SO yes I will remove all the high value trees but leave many valuable trees under 26" DBH.

Bigger the tree more valuable it is

The probability of tree grade increases could theoretically approach 100% if thinnings were to begin early in a stand's life. Research into tree grade improvement in stands that had been thinned every 10 years for 40 years (Strong et al 1995) indicates that this was indeed the case in stands that had been moderately thinned (77 sq ft residual basal area). Average FS tree grades improved 110% on trees that grew 3.4" in 20 years (3" FS tree grades). Tree grade increases were 80% for light (88 sq ft residual basal area) and heavy (62 sq ft residual basal area) thinnings with 3.2" and 3.6" diameter increases, respectively.

Looks like you did some homework. Good info, I gather (Strong et al 1995) was referring to a similar forest type to yours.

 

[JUDGE1162]

It was done in a hardwood mix forest in the midwest so not identical but not data on pine stands in oregon either. I looked at some data from the Allegheny national forest in PA, which should be pretty close to the catskills, and it was even better, more growth per year and better chance of increasing forest service (FS) grade in 10 year span of time.

 

[lsylvain]

Itried to find an article I read today but I can't seem to find it again. Here is the jist. I can't remember the exact numbers so all numbers are just rough.

about 380 acres that had been clear cut in the 20's in Virginia.

In the early 80's it was clear cut again resulting in over 500 million board feet of wood.

It was replanted and then thined about 8 years later. From that thining they got 32 cords per acre.

It was thined again in the 90's and I can't for the life of me remember how much came out of the second thining but it was more than the 1st.

It is scedualed to be clear cut again in the early 2010's with an estimated 1 million plus board feet from the harvest.

Moral of the story, by proper management and selectivly cutting out the undisirables they generated 2 times the timber in half the time.


So my .02 if you want to make money and don't mind the buzz cut look for a couple of years clear cut it. If you don't want the clear cut look. I would go out and find some firewood people and let them take out all the small less desirable stuff just to get all of that out of the way and make a couple bucks, while you search for a logger who will do what you want. Another option would be to clearcut only a portion such as the back 10 acres replant it and then in 10 years when you need to thin the back 10 clear cut the middle 10 at the same time and replant it. After another 10 thin the 20 previous acres and clear cut another 10. 10 years later do the same thing on the front 10. Then start all over again.

 

[ciscoguy01]

OK, I bought forty acres in the Catskills, I am looking to have it logged but only want to do a selective cut, I had a forestry plan done last year (NYCDEP grant), I have been told that a portion (1/3) of the property was logged about 5 to 7 years ago and that any trees of real value were removed from this area. But on the back portion of the property there are some valuable trees (Cherry, Maple and Oak) with 30"+ DBH. The forestry plan estimated over $15K worth of cherry alone. I called a couple logging companies and they said they are not interested in a selective cut, they want to cut every hardwood tree (the property is 90% hardwood if not more) over 20" DBH. (That is a selective cut for them)

I am I missing something here? How much wood does a logger need to remove to make it worth it for them? We had agreed to a 50/50 split of the sale of the trees (for the cherry alone that should be $7,500 a piece) and I keep the tops for firewood.

The only limits I had was nothing within 200 feet of the house and only trees of real value (Oaks, Cherry, Maple, etc.) I have a lot of poplar and birch some elm which I would like to keep. The property is 800 feet wide by 2500 feet long; I think a 200 X 200 no cut area is fair, I already checked no Cherry in the 200 X 200 and much of that 200 X 200 area this is the area that was logged 5 to 7 years ago.

Let me know if I am being unreasonable

I'm not sure how you feel about your land, but when you let a logger on, make sure they don't leave it like they did my picture below. That's how they left a piece of land that wasn't very strictly monitored through the whole process. It's definitely not every logger that does this, but there are a few of them out there...

 

[windthrown]

Moral of the story, by proper management and selectivly cutting out the undisirables they generated 2 times the timber in half the time.


So my .02 if you want to make money and don't mind the buzz cut look for a couple of years clear cut it. If you don't want the clear cut look. I would go out and find some firewood people and let them take out all the small less desirable stuff just to get all of that out of the way and make a couple bucks, while you search for a logger who will do what you want. Another option would be to clearcut only a portion such as the back 10 acres replant it and then in 10 years when you need to thin the back 10 clear cut the middle 10 at the same time and replant it. After another 10 thin the 20 previous acres and clear cut another 10. 10 years later do the same thing on the front 10. Then start all over again.

Yep. I have to agree 100% on this Rx... :biggrinbounce2:

 

[Ryan Willock]

One thing that you have to watchout for on this forum is free advice from people that have NO PERSONAL experience with logging or a timber sale! If you really want to manage your woods then you need to talk to someone like gypo or I would be happy to talk to you and give you some advice. I have cut millions of feet of timber with percentage based splits with the landowner, I PREFER to buy the timber outright as its alot cleaner neater deal for me and I can normally get the timber for less but I must be mistaken as so many other experts have commented in this thread. I've never had a landowner complain that they didn't get their money's worth from the split. There are crummy fly by nights in every business. But if you don't do YOUR do diligence then if you get screwed its YOUR FAULT!!!! Shame on YOU!

 

[JUDGE1162]

Ryan Willock glad to hear I thought I was going nuts, I have always been told that a % split was the best way to do a timber sale, especially fi you really don't know what the stand is worth. Yes I can see how the logger could screw over a landowner by cutting a side deal with the lumber mill, but that is the land owners respisablity to watch what trees are cut, what trees are loaded, and what trees show up at the saw mill, this way the only way a land owner can really get screwed is by low grading at the mill that is a hard one to fight since most landowners are not proffesion lumber graders. I have and reccomend a timber study for my property they ted to be less then $500 for 50 acres and it tells you the mix of trees you have, management techiques to maxiumize your timber growth and value, it shows you any truely valuable trees, what to expect from a timber sale what trees to cut and what type to replant.

I met with my logger this week, he marked each trees he wants to cut and which trees he thinks he needs to remove to get to each tree and where the logging road will be. I took the advice of one of the other people on the board reccomended which was to mark the base of the tree to to make sure that they don't take more trees that they planned and if they do that they tell me and either leave it for me for firewood or pay me for it. This is another good reason for the whole %split payment on a flat price how do you value those extra tree that had to come down during logging for what ever reason. Most time on a flat price you don't get paid for them with the % payment you get paid for every tree that is removed from the property.

 

[ciscoguy01]

References

Ryan Willock glad to hear I thought I was going nuts, I have always been told that a % split was the best way to do a timber sale, especially fi you really don't know what the stand is worth. Yes I can see how the logger could screw over a landowner by cutting a side deal with the lumber mill, but that is the land owners respisablity to watch what trees are cut, what trees are loaded, and what trees show up at the saw mill, this way the only way a land owner can really get screwed is by low grading at the mill that is a hard one to fight since most landowners are not proffesion lumber graders. I have and reccomend a timber study for my property they ted to be less then $500 for 50 acres and it tells you the mix of trees you have, management techiques to maxiumize your timber growth and value, it shows you any truely valuable trees, what to expect from a timber sale what trees to cut and what type to replant.

I met with my logger this week, he marked each trees he wants to cut and which trees he thinks he needs to remove to get to each tree and where the logging road will be. I took the advice of one of the other people on the board reccomended which was to mark the base of the tree to to make sure that they don't take more trees that they planned and if they do that they tell me and either leave it for me for firewood or pay me for it. This is another good reason for the whole %split payment on a flat price how do you value those extra tree that had to come down during logging for what ever reason. Most time on a flat price you don't get paid for them with the % payment you get paid for every tree that is removed from the property.

I say this. Here in the dacks, about 2 yrs ago, some cats from over in NH took a few folks for a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of wood. They were a legit outfit, seemed well organized, yada yada yada they said. It took them a year or so to catch up with them, and the people didn't even know what had been done to them. I forget how they found out. Anyhoot, to make a long story short, ask for a few references, call the better business bureau to check on complaints for the company you use, it won't hurt just to check, nothing lost, could be alot gained from checking around. Find out the dude's name your signing the contract with, run a background check on him, trust me, this isn't a bad thing. Make sure you know how long they've been in business for, not some new company or fly by night deal just doing a quick bit of business. Are they from NY? You think it'd be easy tracking them down in PA or MA if something did go awry? The people that got taken for a ride here in the dacks were pretty upset when they found out what was done to them, they gave all the advice above before choosing any logger. Unless your going to be there every single day to check over what is going on, I'd suggest you do at least a couple of the above.

 

[Monk]

your trees

I am a logger myself and have cut thousands of acres of ground we deal strictly off of percentage it pays the landowner much better. An average bid is 10 to 13 cents a foot straight through we average 60 to 70 cents a ft when we sell it. Which would give you 30 to 35 cents a ft. But you have to find an honest logger like was mentioned above and I hate to say it but they are few and far between. I would do a select cut like you want to mark the trees, count them and paint them chest hiegth and right at the ground.

Hardwoods don't grow very fast ecspecially where you are. we cut for a guy that cut his timber every 10 years. One time he would do the maples 15 inches and up at chest hite. 10 years later the oaks the same way. 10 years after that the cherry. If he had some other trees in there he would through them in a year that there wasn't many trees to cut. It gave him a 30 year cycle and it seams to work pretty good last summer we took cherry trees off there 4 and 5 Ft across. Just food for thought if you would like some more advice or thoughts feel free to email me.


Jeremy Hart
2-ms660, ms084, ms200t
2-jd440b

 

[380LGR]

ALWAYS check ref's every gypsy hopes you dont. Every horror story I hear they Never checked them out!!! Like anything theres good ones and bad ones.

 

[CRN Tree]

It's your property remember that we've done jobs where the land owner marks out the trees to be cut and sees the check from the mill. We get a sheet stating what every tree brought so you know what each tree was worth. You marking the trees is the only way you are sure what is cut. A 50/50 split seems a little low but it all depends.
:monkey:

 

[Wolf66]

I may be able to help

I made the mistake of trusting a logger on my 65 acre property and he promised me 45k. He came in and took all the best wood; black walnut, cherry,oak, etc, made a huge mess; never flush cut one top to slash, cut all stumps 3-4' above ground, never bulldozed the huge ruts the skidder left as they did it in mud season. It was a complete diaster. To top it off, we only recieved 6k and the sub contracter he used was paid over 40k, + the logger purchased a nice second hand forwarder. I got stiffed and found out that there are more non honest loggers in our area (NY) than honest ones. Then you have the saw mills that must be local for such a small amount of wood, and they are even worse. The best thing I can offer people being a Tree Service owner and operator for over 11 years with excelent refrences in the hundreds and 18 years in the industry, is either have a actual forester to come and pay you up front with all your agreements in writting, not just thiers. What I can offer at best is to bring my equipment to your location and you can personaly come to the mill with me to follow every step of the way and recieve a copy of all the paperwork. Driving my tri axle logging truck to your location is not to bad, but through a skidder into the equasion and it is hard for me to turn a profit. Are there any access roads to the wood? Can you skid the wood curbside with a truck or dozer, tracter,etc? I am still in the market for a skidder and even after I get one, a 20 ton tag along trailer is needed and now cost to get all this to and from your job is a lot of $. What I am offering local customers is I will take a 40% cut, but my cost comes out of your 60%. Bigger company's either dont want to be bothered or are looking to cheat you as they did me, and smaller honest folks like myself have higher cost, hence it is hard to get involved in a smaller job with little profit. I recently took 1700 board feet to a mill for a friend and I expected to get paid at least 1500-$1800. and this local mill gave us next to nothing. My friend and myself took a horrible beating. I am looking into sending my wood to canada or trying other mills. It is a toug busisness. PS who told you the value of the wood and why does he not buy it?