High Grade or Not

[Tarm]

I think we all can agree at this forum that high-grading is cutting the best and leaving the rest. So my question is at what diameter does a hardwood tree become mature and should be cut? As soon as it will make a 10 ft grade sawlog, say 14"? Or as the Menominee Indians do in their tribal forest, wait until trees reach full biological maturity at about 28"? In my forest I've settled on the following guidelines for harvesting.
Black Ash, White Birch, 16 inches
Yellow Birch, Bitternut Hickory, Soft Maple, 18 inches
Basswood, Hard Maple, 20 inches
White Ash, Red Oak, White Oak, 22 inches.
I assume that the four diameter groups would have grade sawlog lengths of 1log, 1 1/2 logs, 2 logs, and 2 1/2 logs, respectively. For each 1/2 log change of length I would increace or decrease the diameter goal by 2 inches. I think these guidelines are reasonable and fair. Replies anyone?

[Bud Man]

Tarm,  High grading is a continuous harvesting of  trees from a purely economical standpoint (Taking the most $'s) with little or no consideration as to what is to become of a tract of land in the future.  A tract of land depending on its "Silvics" is best suited for growing a certain combination of species of trees, and with proper management will maximize forest yield and economical return on an ongoing basis and insure maximum results in the future as well.  Because of economic desires of man to harvest every generation of trees and always take the best, what is left is generally a hodgepodge of trees that are  not ideally best suited.  Harvesting Guidelines need to be established on facts and known entities (not guessing),  I recommend you seek local professional advise that can explain options available to compliment the conditions that best fit your goals and objectives and will insure the end of high grading on your forest or woodlot.  Good Luck !!

[Tillaway]

I pretty much echo what Bud Man has to say.  The type of cut you are referring to is called a diameter limit cut.  I have used these in the past to achieve a specific silvicultural goal for that entry (seed tree removal or shelterwood removal step in even aged management).  Generally to maximize economic return over the long haul you need to cut throughout the diameter classes.  This allows you to take the all the trees that really should go.  After a couple of entries you will be cutting mostly high quality logs... sustainably.
Diameter limit cuts have a tendancy to target your best crop trees.

[Ron Wenrich]

Personally, I don't think much of diameter limit cuttings.  If you are looking to optimize your % return, then you have an upper diameter limit where you take the tree out.  I think it is poor management and poor economics.

A quality sawlog doesn't come onto hardwood trees until they have reached a dbh of 16".  Below that, they won't fall into the veneer category and they won't fall into the #1 sawlog category.  

To get an idea of how a tree's value changes, go over to the toolbox and play around with some numbers. http://www.timberbuyer.net/treevalue.htm is the one you want.   Look at how much value is gained on a tree by allowing it to grow from one diameter class to the other.  This doesn't include veneer values, just lumber values.  Be aware that they aren't exact.

I can never understand why someone wants to eliminate an asset just because it has reached an arbitrary number.  Just when they are being productive, they're cut.  Good farmers never cull their most productive livestock.  They harvest when mature.

I've seen diameter limit cuts.  Some have been successful, only where there is a distinct 2 age forest.  Most have been silvicultural suicide.  It leads to a genetic depletion of the stand.  Quite often the smaller trees are just as old as the larger trees.  They do not respond as well to release as older trees..

[Ron Scott]

Amen! to what has been previously said. Do not base your timber harvest on diameter limits. Work in all the diameter classes taking the worst first.  

[L. Wakefield]

   Is there an 'old age' or senescence for a tree? When it is 'past its prime. I suspect that just as you said with the younger ones; that not all of the same age will be in the same condition. I am picturing snagginess, heartrot, lightning damage or like that, diseases, whatever. lw

[woodman]

   I think the answer to this is like asking witch came first, and we all have to learn there is know wright answer.

                                          ps. I don't cut them
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                                                  o
                                                    w
                                                       n
                                           just  c
                                                  u
                                                  t        
                                                      them up
                                           them         u

                                                        

[Bud Man]

Woodman, I hope you're the best sawyer there ever was or is, the point I was trying to make is that there is a proper way to oversee the harvest of timber to eliminate High-Grading and It's not guessing or taking the high dollar harvest by each new generation of land owners.   Hindsight mixed with a plan for the future (EDUCATION), whether it involves growing or harvesting, shows one the best path to follow.  Maximizing yield and sustaining a tract of land's ability to sustain future fertility to the best of it's ability are vastly different . Maximizing yield on a short term basis leads to High Grading and planning leads to stewardship and future benefits for generations to come. Logging and harvesting have changed dramatically too,  we used to whack a tree, buck the tree till it got down to 10"s on the bole, and leave everything else in the woods to rot and move on to the next tract and whack some more without any thought of tomorrow ......I'm rambling  ???......Have A Nice Day

[swampwhiteoak]

I agree 100% with the Ron's & Budman.  Setting a diameter limit, no matter what your limit is, doesn't make for good silviculture.  

[Bud Man]

"SILVIC'S with a little SILVICULTURE"   Now that's a combination that  mixed with a little common sense could go a loooooong waaaaaay with a loooooooot of folks !!  :P  Especially if they would look past the short-term of things.  ;)

[Ron Wenrich]

LW

Old age would depend on the tree species.  It seems the more tolerant the tree, the longer the life span.  

For example, cottonwood may live 200 years, but deteriorates pretty quickly after 70 years.  Size is not an indication of age.

Beech can go 300-400 years and white oak and hemlock to 500-600 years.  

Not all trees would live that long, even without any harvesting.  And declining growth rates would occur much sooner.

Quite often you can tell how well a tree is doing just by looking at the form, and the bark.  Bark, for me, is the best indicator.  When it starts to look a little abnormal, there are defects forming or the tree is starting get stressed.  Swollen knots, seams, abnormal amounts of dead wood are also indicators.  

Knowing what to take and what to leave is the art of forestry, and not the science of forestry.  

[Jeff]

Knowing what to take and what to leave is the art of forestry, and not the science of forestry.

This one is going in the knowledge base under quotes

[Tarm]

Well I've certainly received different replies than I thought I would.
High grading to me means the cutting of the highest value trees from a stand without regard to what is left. Usually the biggest, best formed, and/or most valuable species are removed. Diameter limit cutting is similar to but not the same. If as usually happens the limit is set low enough to remove all the sawtimber than it's a liquidadation cut and just another form of high grading. If the diameter limit is set high, say 22" for a northern hardwood stand then it borders on a high thinning. If a little TSI work is done in the lower size classes while this harvest is occuring than we are backing into reasonable forestry.
This brings me back to my original point. At what point is a hardwood tree "ripe". In the Lake States white birch is a short lived tree. Getting it to 80 years is lucky. If I find a 16" diameter white birch in my woods I mark it for harvest. I feel the chances of it lasting another cutting cycle of 12-15 years is remote. So is this high grading or is it prudent forest management? An economic goal of forestry is to produce the greatest value per acre or a reasonable rate of return on ones' forest investment. Unless you hold that we should let trees grow until they die and then harvest them there must be some guidelines as to when they are "ripe".  
In reading the literature and talking to timber buyers, loggers, sawmills, and the Menominee tribal foresters there appears to be a wide set of beliefs as to just how big a tree needs to be to be big enough.
I started this thread to simulate discussion on that topic but somehow it drifted into the evils of diameter limit cuts.

[Bud Man]

Tarm -- The most important thing is that your seeking other opinions and information with questions and concerns ! Forestry to most Foresters goes beyond Economics,  It's an effort for Perfection and Perpetuation of our greatest renewable resource.  A Forester seeks to treat a tract of land as an old-fashioned general practioner treated his patients, From Birth to Death, with wishful thoughts for it's progeny and the next generation to come !  Most patients outlive the doctor but in Forestry the trees generally outlive the Forester ! A tree is Ripe when it begins to decline and takes more away from the space it occupies than it returns, or when it becomes a detriment to it's surroundings.  Harvestable size of the tree varies from species to species and goals sought. It's growth and yield can be measured and it's rate of return can be precisely predicted.  I certainly hope my response didn't imply a level of evil exist in how a tree is harvested , my desire  is that everyone would make an informed and knowledgeable effort in management of their resources and seek out professional help when their own answers are suspect, which  is what you did with your post. " Keep On Asking "  The  Forestry Forum is a great source of diversified people and a lot of good answers. I learn more and a new perspective on many things every time I enter!!  " Keep Participating - We'll All Learn Together "  ;)  :P

[Ron Wenrich]

I don't think anyone sidestepped your issue by talking about diameter limit cutting.  If you are picking a number, and saying that is the point of "ripeness", then you are making any management decsions by diameter and not tree vigor.

When you start doing that, you are doing cookbook forestry.  Start with one acre of land, add trees, wait, harvest.  For some, that is considered good and sustainable forestry.  For others, it doesn't make the grade.

There are some trees that don't do well in certain areas.  I would usually take out beech, gum, and other "junk" species when they reached sawtimber size.  They weren't mature, but they weren't crop trees.  Neither is your birch.

Rate of returns is something that a lot of people look at.  But, they never look at earnings.  A big difference.  10% of 1$ is 10 cents, but 5% of $10 is 50 cents.  Rate of return is lower, but the earnings is 5 times as much.  

[Jeff]

At the seminar cedar eater and I attended last night I had the opportunity to ask your question. At what point is a tree mature. And of the 3 foresters there, none had, as Ron said, a cookbook answer. But they did say, that a certain diameter is certainly not. They talked on economic maturity, and sustainability.  

They likened your forest to a bank account drawing interest. You want to draw the interest, never the principal. It's not like a bond where you let it reach matuity and then cash it all in.

The first step on managing the northern hardwood forest in a previously unmanaged forest was likely to remove the junk, diseased, and undesirable trees from the woodlot. Leaving a balance of healthy trees of desirable species of different age classes.

They reccomended thinning down to a basil area of 80 to 90 with intentions of harvesting when a woodlot reached 110 to 120. About every 10 to 15 years  I would think with this method that a tree is economically mature when you are able to replace it with a tree before the end of the next cutting cycle.  Again though, because each tree is different and each tree may have an effect on its neighbor, its rate of growth, thus equated to money, its rate of return will be different.

My example would be if you have 2 red oaks, and your going to cut 1. 1 tree is 18 inches, but it is only putting on about 1/16th inch in diameter a year. The other is 24 inches, but it is healthy and adding 1/2 inch a year. Which one are you going to cut?  Go use the tree value calculator in the tool box and look at the rate of return. If your managing for sustainabilty and economics, I think more has to go into the decision of maturity then size.

I am not a forester, and don't pretend to be one. This is my take from listening and learning. Makes sense to me. I am also a painter, and I know that Grandma Moses did not begin painting till after she turned 70. Some folks are different. So are some trees.

One other point that is notable, desirable trees are determined not by what they are, but more by what you want your forest to be. If you are managing for wildlife, then your desirable species may be much different then managing strictly for monitary value.

Tarm, actually you titled this thread. It's not titled when does a tree reach maturity. The tread does more resemble the title High Grade or Not.  Lets pose the question differently to this forum. How do we define the term maturity in relation to a tree, and how do we know when a tree has reached this point. I will start a new thread and see where it goes. Look for Tree maturity?

[L. Wakefield]

   I'd actually picked up the new thread first this am, and responded with a slight redundancy to some of the stuff already posted here- but I also wanted to pick up on you analogies to bank accounts. 'Back along' one of the posters had said something along the line that timber growth tends to outstrip inflation by something in the ballpark of 3%, and referred to a forest as a 'wealth generator' (I think it was..)

   While this is a biological system, the analogy to principle and income, harvesting annual returns vs capital liquidation with the attendant long-term gain (or loss) is very apt.

   IF one only looks at the 'wealth' aspect of it, then one might as well take 15 giant steps back and look at the land itself; and inqure as to whether perhaps more wealth might be generated by turning it into stripmalls and residential houselots. I don't think anyone here wants to go that route.

   The spinoff thread approaches tree value as defined by the after-cutting market. If the mills don't want logs bigger than 22" diameter, you may have a healthy tree yielding 'growth' in terms of inches per year- but with the 'wealth analysis' a dependency relationship on the after market occurs that changes the value.

   Something has to change in that equation if you want to harvest the POTENTIAL financial yield of the ACTUAL ability of the tree to grow larger in a healthy way and give you more wood.    lw

[Ron Wenrich]

Turning land into housing or malls negates the wealth generating properties of the land.  It becomes stagnant.  Wealth generation only comes about by extracting a natural resource.  All other activities are swapping previously generated wealth that have been amassed.

You can argue that you can't generate that much wealth from a piece of property, and depending on your interest rate, you can discount it out into the future.  But, there is a point where that becomes a negative.  It all depends on how long your management perspective is.  

As for tree size, the reason mills want smaller logs is that they have smaller equipment.  The equipment matches the resource.  If you have a pool of large timber, you build the equipment to match the resource.  You don't need to grow the resource to match the current market scheme.  That changes rather quickly.

The problem with looking solely at market values in timber is that most private landowners do not have timber production as a primary goal.  Industry does.  But, industry controls much of the land management, so value and liquidation becomes a driving factor.  

[Ron Scott]

When the "mean annual incrument" or average annual growth rate of your trees starts to fall off then it may be time to harvest them based on your land and resource management objectives.

Also, do not remove "all"l the old and large tree stems (mature trees) and leave younger, poor quality tree stems that will never produce a high value timber crop.

Again, remove the "worst" first and improve your timber stand by a "true" selection of trees to be removed this harvest period.

It also depends upon whether your timber stand is even-aged or uneven-aged, where individual trees may become mature but the stand itself consists of trees of diverse ages and stages of development.