Lumber prices

[smokechase II]

On the AM radio yesterday heard that lumber prices are the lowest they've been since 1982.

The one full sized mill nearby is running every other week.

Logs are being left stacked at landings for now.


Bad. Not good.

 

[Festus Haggen]

Seems like the whole mess is just freewheeling, spinning down to low RPM's. I don't know how people do it anymore with fuel costs and such. Glad I can walk to work, and that I'm healthy enough to burn wood for heat.

 

[goatchin]

My father is on the Chenango county farm bureau directors committee here in NY and when he came home from last months meeting he said its a dang good thing we logged in the fall of '06-we were lucky and got our harvest on the tail end of that high price streak then-when the cherry was really high.

At the meeting, the man that gives the updates and new on forestry said that everything is pretty much bottomed right out except for hard maple and black cherry which has leveled off and is steady. I'd have to go through the meeting minutes to see if he said any actual price #'s and what not.

 

[Festus Haggen]

Gonna head up to our forester this afternoon and have a chat. I don't get to talk much anymore to my logger friends, imagine the same situation here, I cut a lot of wood in Broome County. Would be conceivably a "normal" turn in the cycle of things, but it's not just timber that's affected, it's everything. I'm a "doom and gloom" kind of guy, but I really feel us teetering on the edge. We could be a third-world country in short order if things don't change.

 

[Locoweed]

IMHO, lumber prices went to unreasonable highs after Katerina. The booming housing market kept them high and it is past time for prices to come down to reasonable levels.

Unfortunately, the drop in demand that caused the lower prices is going to hurt the lumber industry.

 

[olyman]

IMHO, lumber prices went to unreasonable highs after Katerina. The booming housing market kept them high and it is past time for prices to come down to reasonable levels.

Unfortunately, the drop in demand that caused the lower prices is going to hurt the lumber industry.

russ--that be extremely true--as is with a lot of products in this country--they send out shock waves--to a percieved shortage--and raise the prices artificially high--they cash in--the foresters make more--but nothing in comparison to the lumber cos--------

 

[spencerhenry]

i wish the prices were really that low, doug-fir timbers around here are the highest per bf that i have ever seen.

 

[ak4195]

IMHO, lumber prices went to unreasonable highs after Katerina. The booming housing market kept them high and it is past time for prices to come down to reasonable levels.

started before that,the so called re-construction of Iraq sucked the supply of ply and OSB off the west coast,throw the housing boom on top of that,Katrina a a big whipped cream cheery top on the tippy top.

 

[NBailey]

Our local sawmill closed down last month after 60 years of continuous operation. Needless to say, the Doug Fir markets are in the tank out here. Our town is small, with a population of 1,500 and the 250 high paying mill jobs are sorely missed. If it doesn't start back up, the logging jobs are next. Fairly sad state of affairs.