Ideas for Leave Tree Marking?

[wbedient]

I work for a federal agency so we have to get accountability of our leave trees.  This means we either put paint on them or describe leave trees in the contract (called designation by description or D by D).  Lately we've been trying to figure out ways to make D by D work so we can save some time and get more volume.  Because of regulations, no tree over 21" DBH can be cut.   Also, we're doing selective harvesting  in second growth uneven terrain with high variable species mix and size classes.

We have a mix of species and a lot of disease.  We had the idea of using D x D to describe leave trees but are having trouble finding appropriate descriptions.

Example:  We would like to eliminate the painting of any trees over 21" by putting in the contract that the logger cannot cut any tree with a diameter over 24" at 4" above ground (approximate stump height).  The problem is we have a lot of larch that have butt swell and are 26" at the stump and only 17" at DBH.


Ideas?  Any other ways to mark more efficiently?

[beenthere]

What federal agency?

[Texas Ranger]

The old time reliable is to mark the take trees, or mark the leave trees, depending on type of cut.  But, that is in the commercial world, I realize feds do it differently.

[wbedient]

We currently mark every leave tree.  This costs a lot of money because of time and paint.  We also have a crew half the size it should be due to budget issues so we won't be able to complete our sale on time without getting innovative.

I work for the US Forest Service.

[Texas Ranger]

Paint levels the playing field, contracts are good in setting conditions, as long as both parties are straight up honest.

[beenthere]

I guess the USFS has forgotten about sampling techniques.
I'm aware that the enviro's have made the management of our timber very difficult and a good indication of that is having to mark every "leave" tree. Just no way that we, the taxpayer, can afford to do that. IMO

Will get all those trees marked, and someone will send in a postcard to a judge and bring the entire sale/operation to a halt. No cutting, at least as long as the paint lasts. Then do it all over again.

[wbedient]

Beenthere: I don't know what the sampling techniques comment is about.  I'm just talking about marking.

We are trying to use D by D because if we don't, that means timber sales won't make it out the door.  Trying to help loggers stay in business, mills stay in business and improve forest health.

We don't have the budget to paint every tree.  Sale administrators (who ensure contract compliance with the purchaser/logger) will have more work to do when we use D by D but what other options do we have?

[wbedient]

Texas Ranger:

Just to be clear, we have harvest inspectors which ensure the terms of the contract are being met (i.e. no timber trespass, no timber theft, all improvements are protected etc. etc.).

[Ron Scott]

Are all the unmarked or undesignated trees then to be cut? We usually selectively mark the trees to be cut.

[wbedient]

We currently mark a unit with one of two colors: "cut trees" with blue paint OR "leave trees" with orange.

Usually we mark the leave trees because more trees are being cut than are being left standing, so marking the leave trees saves us time and money.  So yes, in a leave tree marked unit any trees without orange will be cut.

If we've got a unit in which <50% of the trees will be cut then we'll use the blue paint.

[Rocky_Ranger]

Why use a stump height diameter limit instead of DBH?  If it is NEPA driven then run you a regression to compensate for the diameters due to butt swell (I know a young lady or two that have that), and use DBH.  D X D is difficult to pull off unless you have experienced operators.  Great for prep, but hell on the administration.  I wish we could do more D X D, but if that is what you really need to do then work with the loggers.  If it is more critical for meeting your desired future condition, I don't know any way around paint.  Leave tree always results in a better stand condition - always.........

[lumberjack48]

I've cut hardwood sales where everything 10" DBH had to be left. It was up to me to make sure they didn't get cut. I carried a cloth sewing tape in my pocket. If i wasn't sure by site, i'd grab the tape an measure it, if 29" cut it, and if 31" cut it. These were State sales out of Blackduck, MN. I'd worked with this office many yrs they trusted me, but they randomly checked. You all so could not skin up the stumps of these trees or look at a fine or triple stumpage.

The Federal sales in the Chippewa National Forest painted the take trees yellow DBH and the stumps to. When cutting you had to cut above the paint on the stump.
I got a Federal sale out of Cass Lake, MN. where the guy that marked it didn't take enough for a skidder to get around. I knew the head Ranger very good, he came out and told me it would take a week to remark it and cost x dollars
to do it. In stead of remarking he had me keep track of the trees i had to cut to get the skidder though. This was Norway Pine row cut, the rows were marked to narrow.

I went on a nice Norway pine sale, marked yellow the same as always. I'm cutting away and i thought boy this marked nice. This was before cell phones, so i ran in to town an called the Ranger Station. They sent a Ranger out to take a look at it, he's looking an starts shaking his head. Here who ever marked it marked the leave trees, i guise they have Green Horns to. They were sure glad i stopped cutting.

[Ron Scott]

What did the sale prospectus and contract say on what trees were to be cut? Didn't they make any mention of the leave tree marking?

[lumberjack48]

This was Co. bought timber, i counted what i had to take. The Ranger stoped out twice a week to get the count from me. The Co. payed stumpage by an estament on how many trees per cord, by the 10 cord loads, 120 trees a load, 12 trees per cord. They payed the stumpage rate for Norway pulpwood at the time.
The Ranger trusted me on the count, if he would have found a reason not to, they could have gone back an counted all the stumps with out paint on them.

NO, at the time i had about 20 yrs of cutting marked pine, this is why i knew something wasn't right, it was marked to get to be true. This kind of marking had nerver been used in the CNF at that time.

[BaldBob]

Many years ago, the timber company that I worked for was so unhappy with the quality of the marking - both silviculturally and operability wise - on one particular NF, that we convinced the Region 6 timber staff to come out and see for themselves. We were all in a bus that we had provided, and toured a number of units while they listened to our complaints. The region timber staff stayed pretty tight lippped throughout. On the way out we went by a small unit that had just been felled that day.  The head of timber for the region said "Stop". "Now look at that. There's an example of a perfectly marked shelterwood cut. They picked excellent trees to leave, well spaced, and I can't see anything wrong with that marking job."
Both the FS Timber Sale Administrator and our logging supervisor turned red and held their mouths tightly shut. It seems that the contract called for that unit to be cut tree marked, while it had been felled as if it was leave tree marked unit.

[Pullinchips]

I work for a federal agency so we have to get accountability of our leave trees.  This means we either put paint on them or describe leave trees in the contract (called designation by description or D by D).  Lately we've been trying to figure out ways to make D by D work so we can save some time and get more volume.  Because of regulations, no tree over 21" DBH can be cut.   Also, we're doing selective harvesting  in second growth uneven terrain with high variable species mix and size classes.

We have a mix of species and a lot of disease.  We had the idea of using D x D to describe leave trees but are having trouble finding appropriate descriptions.

Example:  We would like to eliminate the painting of any trees over 21" by putting in the contract that the logger cannot cut any tree with a diameter over 24" at 4" above ground (approximate stump height).  The problem is we have a lot of larch that have butt swell and are 26" at the stump and only 17" at DBH.


Ideas?  Any other ways to mark more efficiently?

Only read your post no replies yet.  But sounds like you work for the forest service!  Im a Fed forester my self, i work in timber harvest and supervise harvest contracts.

I worked while in grad school for a forester who bought diameter by distribution or spacing sales. There were a nightmare. I was the guy that marked them for his loggger so that he could avoid penalties by the logger messing up. They had no trees over 18" to be cut 3" from base or something like that. The spacing i think was like 12 feet or so?? That is the most screwed up marking system there is. Since i was privite industry side then, we highgraded that stand when ever possible, since all i was told to go by was the stum diameter. If a junked up tree with a big stump was by a smaller healthy tree we HAD to leave the cankered bigger tree. 2 trees side by side, one CNS the other Crooked pulp tree, same diameter, we left the pulp and took the CNS.

In my opinion it was the stupidist way to mark timber but on the hole the stand looked decent in the end. Then in typical forest service fashon they burned the [I have typed a profane word that is automatically changed by the forum censored words program I should know better] out of the stand and killed everything on the ridges in a stand with barely any burn history.

I like op select or marking it.

[BaldBob]

This thread brought to mind another tree marking/cutting incident that I experienced many years ago. It's humorous in retrospect, but at the time I didn't find it so funny.
We were logging a timber sale that, before it was sold but after it had been laid out and marked, had suffered an outbreak of Douglas-fir Tussock Moth. So prior to selling it, they re-marked the trees to account for the dead and damaged trees. And then after the sale sold, but before it was awarded they had to re-mark it again to address some issues raised in an appeal by an environmental group. The result was four different colors of paint used on some units (including Black to "erase" some marks).
Shortly after we started cutting I got a call from the FS Timber Sale Administrator telling me that we had cut 6 trees in trespass on one of the units. I rushed out to meet him on that job to see what was up. Sure enough there were 6 trees on the ground that were marked with the wrong color paint. I collared our logging contractor and had him bring over the cutter assigned to that strip.  Long story short, that cutter was color blind.
We quietly paid the fines and damages and that cutter found another line of work.

[Ron Scott]

I've had that problem with a color blind operater on a processor. The cut trees were marked with blue paint and he couldn't see blue. The trees had to be remarked with another color ahead of him. ;D 

[wbedient]

Thanks for the responses and interesting stories.  Just to clarify: we usually mark leave trees.  All marked trees will have a butt mark and a band at DBH.  This prevents timber theft because if a tree was stolen the stump would have paint left on it and our harvest inspectors would catch it.

The only reason we're looking to use "designation by description" is to save marking time, but at this point it doesn't look like a tool that is very well suited to our stands, prescriptions and operational restrictions. 

[Pullinchips]

I totally understand the reason behind it, and if you probably have fairly equal distribution and similar diameters and quality of trees will end up ok.  I mean we operator select quality pine thats 80 years old. its the stupidist method i know of, but we end up with a decent stand in the end, most trees are quality, and we dont have the money to mark it either way. 

I only have a small pool of loggers that work on our property anyway and all are trusted. If i see one i dont like, i correct and try to show them they way it needs to be done based on contract spacing etc, if they still dont comply i kick them off and get another crew.

The problem with The DxD thing is that its an ADmin nightmare that i see, you need way to many people that would be thier job to check behind them and then talk each new contractor though how confusing that it is.  I see you also taking way less money for the timber cause in my case i was just marking it for the purchasing contractor. 

The USFS pays one way or the other, either in house through marking or in the sale of timber at a lower stumpage rate cause the buyer will have to mark it then anyway. I would get a markiing contract like they do around here and mark it the way you want it before its sold.

Also stumps marks are not fool proof, paint gets pulled off from skidding, they cut them really low, but if you have doubts you do not need that logger.  My contracters if they have to cut leave trees call me and tell me. We cut them but most of my sales are by the ton so we get paid anyway, not like a lumpsum where you have to talley them up and price them out.

[beenthere]

Thanks for the responses and interesting stories.  Just to clarify: we usually mark leave trees.  All marked trees will have a butt mark and a band at DBH.  This prevents timber theft because if a tree was stolen the stump would have paint left on it and our harvest inspectors would catch it.The only reason we're looking to use "designation by description" is to save marking time, but at this point it doesn't look like a tool that is very well suited to our stands, prescriptions and operational restrictions.

A thief can't simply remove the paint mark?
As pullinchips points out, way too much administrative cost.  I like the "trust the logger" or get someone else on the job.

[Pullinchips]

As i pointed out and others its just the cost to do business, some higher ups dont like that answer though.

As i pointed out, your not going to end up with a total junk of a stand in the DxD method but as i pointed out when on the private side of things we took every opertunity to take the "better" tree when allowed to by the contract specs. All they went by was stump diameter remember. So you could often times leave a low value pulp tree and take several smaller yet saw timber trees from around it, and all this was specified in the wording.  Also like i pointed out it was crazy like always a tree is markers choice but this case its a marker with a vested interest. Two identical trees same stump Dia  the lesser quality tree is left and i take the better one. 

Thats the part that i did not like about it.  But the stands i marked looked good after all the timber was removed!!  Untill the FS sent fire through there and burt the trees on the ridges and had it crown out killing them all.  ;D

[BaldBob]

I'm pretty sure that the stand types and species mix of the industrial timberland that I managed in the Blue Mts of NE Oregon/SE Washington for many years are very similar to your conditions. We were always looking for ways to lower our cost of doing business - including timber marking. In over 25 years the number of units that we were able to use what you call Designation by Description while achieving our desired post harvest stand conditions  and lowering overall costs (marking costs+ administration costs + logging costs) was in the low double digits - out of probably 1000 -1500 units total..  It requires a stand without excessive variability in the trees to be designated (either cut or leave) and specifications that are easy for the contractor to understand and follow. It's not easy to find those conditions, especially if you have large units with a variety of conditions. Sometimes you can carve out smaller units to meet these criteria, but if too small, the added boundary marking effort needed overcomes the marking savings. About the only place it worked well was when we wanted to strongly discriminate  or strongly favor trees of a specific species, e.g " Cut all merchantable Lpp and GF. Leave all live merchantable DF, WL, PP, & WWP. not marked with Blue paint."

[wbedient]

After looking at it and trying out some DxD combined with marking we decided DxD using diameters isn't going to work.

Basically, we are going to mark as usual but use DxD when a whole species is to be kept or removed (i.e. don't paint any pine and write in the contract to save all pine).

[Gary_C]

Ideas?  Any other ways to mark more efficiently?

I have been watching this discussion from my logger perspective and have been hoping you would come up with good answers to this question. But after just seeing a rehash of the same old issues, I think you've asked the wrong question.

I think the question should be, How can foresters stop being tree painters and how can management learn to allow decisions to be made on the ground and in the woods?

Your D x D method is flawed because trees are not made in factories and are not all uniform. For example if you put 21 inch diameter limits on the cutting, you will get poorly formed 21 inch diameter trees left behind while nearby 20 inch dia trees are cut.

And surely the foresters that mark trees to be cut have heard the complaints from loggers that the paint marks are not visable from all directions which takes a lot of paint. Plus unless the cutting follows the same path as the marking was, it is not possible to cut the stand as it was marked.

Here in MN there has been good progress in having the softwood thinnings done by operator select to a prescribed BA. So much progress that I don't believe a marked softwood sale would bring a decent bid price. And the DNR doesn't have the manpower anymore to do the marking. On most of the pine thinnings I have done, the forester has told me to take a little more that I start out cutting. But yes, I've seen some jobs where they have thinned from the top down, but that is due to faulty or total lack of supervision of the job.

I sincerely hope that someday I see no more painted timber sales. Perhaps it will take some new computer program/locater chip in trees to get that done. Or it may take more trust between loggers and foresters.