couple pics... post what your currently cutting

[mike_belben]

Whats the street value on the highly valuable walnut pile we are actually looking at?

[doc henderson]

walnut can be addictive.

[nativewolf]

Whats the street value on the highly valuable walnut pile we are actually looking at?

Good question, this pile doesn't have the best trees just good ones.  So let me guess and say $20-22k.  That is limbs and all.  Limbs really are only $0.50-1/bdft so worth it but they drag down averages.  Wish I could sell the limbs by weight .

[mike_belben]

Right because $1bd ft isnt good enough you spoiled walnut shuffler!   :D

[Im just teasin you out of jealousy wyatt]

[chep]

 Some nice red oaks and white pines. I have been following the processors and cutting the oversize. One of those pines scaled over 2000 bd ft. Big wood for the northeast.

 
  
  
  

[ehp]

no pictures but I cut a small walnut job yesterday , 26 walnut trees and 5 white ash trees , walnut mostly in the 20 to 32 inch DBH and same with ash, Gave me 10 days to have it down, 2 1/2 hours later it was done ;D, Got a bigger walnut job to do here in a week or so , depends on weather and its a lot more trees and bigger stuff , had another guy talk to me this morning on doing his 14 acres of walnut so its out there

[nativewolf]

Speaking of Walnut, they need to start loading, hardly see the knuckle boom anymore.

 

[nativewolf]

no pictures but I cut a small walnut job yesterday , 26 walnut trees and 5 white ash trees , walnut mostly in the 20 to 32 inch DBH and same with ash, Gave me 10 days to have it down, 2 1/2 hours later it was done ;D, Got a bigger walnut job to do here in a week or so , depends on weather and its a lot more trees and bigger stuff , had another guy talk to me this morning on doing his 14 acres of walnut so its out there

Just how tall are your walnut?  Our woods are terrible here and the trees pretty big, all over 22" but avg is 28".  Still..it takes all day to cut, top, and skid 12-15 with 1 cutter and a skidder driver.  They are averaging about 85' high and a couple are 100'.  For the next 50 is going to be a lot of topping.

[ehp]

my walnut in my area can be quite big , 50 inches DBH is here and I have cut quite abit bigger . Any logs that are over 2000 ft scale at 8 ft long I feel is large for me . 1000 ft are quite common, The next 2 walnut jobs the walnut is not that big with the largest trees being in the 42 to 48 inch DBH and most trees are 80 ft or so tall average . We do not get the prices you guys do cause of being in Canada so trucking cost a lot more and they got to deal with crossing the border . We also get smaller walnut that people want cut but try to stay away from cutting smaller stuff . Any logs smaller than say 20 inch on top end we get hit pretty hard on the value , even veneer grade we get hit compared to what you guys get . my best single log ever I got just over $7,000 for a 9 ft log and it went to Germany

[ehp]

I honestly do not go out looking for walnut jobs , they seem to find me . I cut a lot of red, white,bur, and some black oak, also soft red maple and all the white color of that I can find . Hard maple is here but your not going to find it on any good ground cause if it was easy to get it would of been cut . In winter time good white pine I can sell just about all I can cut , I cut a lot of 26 to 32 ft long logs in pine but need to be 24 inches on top end so in good pine I get 2 of those logs plus a couple short logs per tree

[ehp]

firewood here is a bad thing , I have did 5 acre clear cuts for big houses and piled firewood logs up nice and neat and I could not give them away FREE, I see farmers selling hardwood that's a year or 2 old for $25 a face cord .

[nativewolf]

I honestly do not go out looking for walnut jobs , they seem to find me . I cut a lot of red, white,bur, and some black oak, also soft red maple and all the white color of that I can find . Hard maple is here but your not going to find it on any good ground cause if it was easy to get it would of been cut . In winter time good white pine I can sell just about all I can cut , I cut a lot of 26 to 32 ft long logs in pine but need to be 24 inches on top end so in good pine I get 2 of those logs plus a couple short logs per tree

One crazy hot summer I need to take a week off and drive with the family up to your neck of the woods.  I'll just tell them we're going to see canada,but I'll be looking at trees  :D

[ehp]

, Barge is coming to, I live quite a ways south if you look on a map, if you look at a map of Lake Erie and you see that little arm that goes out into the lake Im just on the main land at that point, No one is allowed out on the arm pretty much , I normally cut pretty close to the water say with in 3 miles of the shore . We got a lot of stuff that will put a hurting on you pretty bad if you get any on you and we got deer ticks by the millions so lyme is bad here , north of me say a hour or so there is a lot more hard maple that the veneer guys love and it has not been picked out as bad as here  , tree by-law here is very strict , Im mean its like nothing most of you guys have ever seen but its the reason we got timber , I watch videos of other loggers cutting and that and I can tell you that if you did that here you would be banned from logging and have a huge fine , no big skidders , they raised the width now to 108 inches wide but want skidders to be 102 inches wide or less, no tree cutters period . Everything is hand fallen . Mill bought 2 grapple skidders , brought the first one to a bush, by-law told then to take it back to the mill and I see the one is for sale now , next county to the west is a lot easier thou to log in than mine.

[nativewolf]

that's why you have big timber, leave it to poorly educated or desperate or uncaring owners and you'll end up looking like much of KY or TN or PA or VA, all cut over and high graded and soils torn to crap.  I only want a harvester to deal with tops.  How, might I ask, do you deal with cleaning up all the tops on your big trees.  I mean cleaning up tops on a 30" oak is a chore.  I have tops dropped to within 2' of ground and blades are pinching etc even with good cutters.  It's a chore and it goes faster with 2 so if a guy gets pinched he gets help instead of getting another saw.  

[Bruno of NH]

Chep
That's some nice oak and pine. 

[Autocar]

Chip great job on the stumps your a timber cutter for sure  8)

[ehp]

here the max height off the ground is 4 feet for tops or any thing logging related and you are checked . I can ship pretty much any log with a top end inside bark diameter of 9 inch as long as its straight and sound so lots of times I get a couple 8 foot logs out of the top in the limbs so that helps lower the top as well. Some jobs you skid the tops but lots of jobs they stay right where you cut the tree. , The ground I mainly log on is real sand and it eats the tops up real fast 4 or 5 years there pretty much gone and same with the stumps , if I log a place this winter you have to cut the tops up no more than a year later or the wood is just punk and going rotten, another thing is once were done logging we still have a lot of the higher grade timber left standing so trying to get a top out would not be a easy thing and you may touch a standing tree, big problem here if you do . On a average acre there is about 10,000 to 12,000 feet of grade timber and we cut 1500 to 3000 feet of grade out of that acre and no small trees are counted in that footage number as we donot cut hardly any small timber , if I mark the bush I cannot mark a single tree under 22 inch diameter to be cut . Its a strict system but it does really work well I feel as you mainly cut the lower grade timber each time you cut and now were cutting pretty nice timber. Trees here grow real fast on this sand as well

[chevytaHOE5674]

if I mark the bush I cannot mark a single tree under 22 inch diameter to be cut . Its a strict system..

That seems very odd to me. If you have a crooked ugly 12" tree what sense is there leaving it grow to 22" only to be even more crooked and ugly? I would rather cut that tree at 12" (better yet catch it at 6") and release another potentially superior tree to takes its place.
Glad I live in an area where I own the trees and don't need anyone's permission to harvest them and if I want to leave big tops or cut small trees I can. Nobody telling me what I can do with the land i supposedly "own". No laws controlling the equipment I have to use to try and squeak out a living. 

[nativewolf]

if I mark the bush I cannot mark a single tree under 22 inch diameter to be cut . Its a strict system..

That seems very odd to me. If you have a crooked ugly 12" tree what sense is there leaving it grow to 22" only to be even more crooked and ugly? I would rather cut that tree at 12" (better yet catch it at 6") and release another potentially superior tree to takes its place.
Glad I live in an area where I own the trees and don't need anyone's permission to harvest them and if I want to leave big tops or cut small trees I can. Nobody telling me what I can do with the land i supposedly "own". No laws controlling the equipment I have to use to try and squeak out a living.

I suspect what you'll find is that in his forest someone has done the TSI already and that there is a real forester doing the dirty work of monitoring and "growing" the forest.  At least that would be the case in Europe where the difference between the forest is night and day compared to the US.  Our forest management practices are sort of stone age and in the long run neither the forest nor landowners have benefited.   Especially the case in slower growing hardwood forest that require some careful tending.  I'm not joking about getting up to see these woodlands.  Duke forest in Durham is a beut, there are some other high quality managed woodlands that make one realize that great forest and active use are possible.  Sort of a shame that so little takes place.  @mike_belben has posted quite a bit of his experience in TN dealing with high graded forest, in VA it is mostly the same, WV, KY too if the forest were at all close to towns or rails.  The forest was the bank but no landowner ever made a deposit...just runs on the bank.  

[chevytaHOE5674]

I've seen plenty of well manage forests and plenty of mismanaged forests, both here and abroad.  I guess my take away is if I own the land I want to have the ability to manage it how I see fit, if that's a clear cut then so be it. I'd rather live on acres of overgrown alder brush and garbage that I can use as I see fit than acres of pristine government managed forest that I "own" but can't do anything with without somebody else's permission.

[mike_belben]

Whats worse is all i see are early withdrawals with the associated penalties.  Toothpick timber.  


There was a state owned swamp across the street from my old house up in mass.  It was the neighborhood tire dump wasteland.  Full of mattresses, shopping carts and contractor loads of pine rounds.   But timber wise itnwas a goldmine.  Red and white oak veneers 50' to a limb you couldnt bearhug.  I have never seen a forest to match in tennessee.  I have seen 2 pretty close parcels, out of a few hundred.  


The bigtimers atleast plant pine i guess. Kind of a sterile barbie forest but it is actively managed.  I have met one person who was interested in improving his stand and that was only after i met him about cleaning up a hit and run logging job.  

Big tracts of standing timber only seem to change hands by inheritance and it would be very rare for the 2nd generation to give a hoot about anything but cashing it out.  A farmer seems to typically be a more conscious land owner but naturally theyre under pressure for pasture and hay production so as they can clear, theyll tend to.  Hard to blame them.   Every case i personally know of with say 1000 timbered acres, is an inheritor.  People who didnt need the cash. 

[ehp]

Yes I agree but remember Im on sand and if you do not cut your forest it dies and if I cut your bush this year I should be back in your bush in 8 years cutting it again ,  lots of the timber I cut is 45 years old or so, sometimes its less . It took me a while to get use to how they do things here as Im from up north where the rules were a lot easier , you cut lots of processor style hardwood up there , here I would not cut a load a year of that type of wood . Up north I see a lot of rotten butts and a lot of low grade, here I see very little rotten butt and if I do most times I can go up trunk about 2 or 3 feet and cut block off and tree is good and sound . By- law wants the bush to be pretty much a high grade stand at all times which you still cut ever 8 years or so with that depending on tree growth

[BargeMonkey]

The race is on to get done, sat in the buncher 10hrs last night throwing down what was left in the back. Hard to tell but that's 30"+ on the stump, wish it had turned out good. 


 
 

[jimbarry]

Clearing a spot for a new work yard.



 


 


 



 


 

[dustintheblood]

Yes I agree but remember Im on sand and if you do not cut your forest it dies and if I cut your bush this year I should be back in your bush in 8 years cutting it again ,  lots of the timber I cut is 45 years old or so, sometimes its less . It took me a while to get use to how they do things here as Im from up north where the rules were a lot easier , you cut lots of processor style hardwood up there , here I would not cut a load a year of that type of wood . Up north I see a lot of rotten butts and a lot of low grade, here I see very little rotten butt and if I do most times I can go up trunk about 2 or 3 feet and cut block off and tree is good and sound . By- law wants the bush to be pretty much a high grade stand at all times which you still cut ever 8 years or so with that depending on tree growth

Hey EHP,
Just a quick note to thank you for weighing in on your experiences with the tree cutting bylaws and forestry practices here in Ontario.  You really seem to have a balanced and decent way of looking at things and I like how you take the forest health into consideration.
We need a ton more guys like you!!!