Itty bitty hickory

[Robert R]

The fellow I am harvesting some walnut for has a large area that has come up in hickory.  Used to be open meadow.  There has to be a couple thousand stems--all about baseball bat diameter at the largest and going down to a couple inches.  He'd like them taken out.  I have been thinking of possible markets.  They are the right size for making the bent wood furniture but I don't want to mess with shipping.  I was wondering if this size, cut to chunks, would be worthwhile to market to smokehouses for their meats.  I am presuming they would want it green to be smokier but before I take a chunk and talk to them, I thought I'd ask here first--easier to swallow being a fool over the internet than face to face.  Does that sound like something a restaurant would be interested in?  Or is it just to small.  The landowner in thinking of dozing it.  I'd hate to see it wasted if it is saleable.  Any guess on it's worth?

[ohsoloco]

I don't know anything as to the value of it, but that would make some nice smoking wood 

[Tom]

Your  market as cooking wood would be something of your own making.  Something like Kirk was doing with sawdust. 

Smaller stuff could be used to make walking sticks and canes.   There are markets for those is some places. 

It sounds more like just a clearing job to me.

[rebocardo]

Sell it as BBQ wood or firewood. When clearing a lot like this the trick is NOT to cut the tree down. What you do is make a waist height hinge, large open face, push the tree over so the hinge holds it off the ground without breaking.  Then walk the length of the tree, cutting off the limbs, when you get to the end walk back to the truck cutting it into 1 foot sections. Then cut the last foot off the hinge, then cut to the ground. When cutting the branches I toss them all in a pile before moving to the next tree so I can easily find the wood later with a wheel barrel.

Cutting little trees it is hard to collect a 1/4 of a cord. So what I do is make sure I get paid for the lot clearing, load up the truck and have a customer ready for the 1/4 cord to sell on my way home.

[Robert R]

Thanks, that is great advice on leaning and limbing.  My problem is I can't get the truck anywhere near them.  I'm going to have to cut and bundle them as poles and skid them to where I can reach with the truck and then cut up and load.  When I am in there later this week, I think I will cut one and just pack it out and take to a few BBQ places and see if anyone would be interested and what they would give.  If they want it and are willing to pay for it, it will make getting my walnut out easier--I have to skid through it and even with a trail cleared, the horses are a bit leary of getting into places that tight.  My plan is to take my smallest saw and limb up as high as I can reach and them lop them off that this as well.  I may see how much it would cost to rent a pole saw for a couple days to reach higher.  With all that debris cleared out, then I can just cut off at the ground and build bundles to drag out.  I am going to make my minimum price at $75 for a 1/3 cord since that is what I am planning on selling firewood at.  This will be a lot more cuts and pieces to load but at least there won't be any splitting at all.  Should be an ok trade off.  I go halves with the landowner on the walnut.  I'm going to let him know I won't split this with him.  I figure if he won't let me have them, he can cut them all himself or pay a dozer guy to clear it.  I think he'll come out ahead just giving them to me but we will see.  The hardest part about this whole business is pricing my services.  At the mill, I get told "I'll give you this" and usually like it.  But on a high labor job like this, I really don't have a clue what the labor is worth, especially since I enjoy it.  Sometimes I feel guilty charging.  Thanks again.