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Log prices

Started by Firewoodjoe, August 24, 2020, 07:18:21 PM

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nativewolf

Quote from: Cub on August 29, 2020, 08:10:45 AM
Yeah it's definitely tough going here. I'm not sure what a lot of guys are going to do. I have a feeling the pulp mills will keep most shut off past September. They are hauling lots of wood from Wisconsin rapids up here so I think they will process that before they open back up. Heard around 20,000 cord they have  sitting in the yard down there. Not sure what will happen going forward. I think there will be some bankruptcies and bank owned equipment for sale in the next few months.
Wow...that would mean they'd start the fall/winter really not needing the wood.  Terrible. 
I would expect it is a good time to find some redpine or something that saws into a 2x4 (conifers).  Down here even though the lumber prices are sky high the mills have not budged on pine logs,  somethings rotten.  
Liking Walnut

Cub

Almost impossible to move pine now. Has been all summer. Potlach in Gwinn hasn't been sawing much for studs. And they had a full yard before the virus stuff started. Escanaba pulp mill uses lots of pine. Yard is full. Lots of guys were getting 1 truck load a month for quota. Aspen same thing. Lp mill hasn't taken much to make osb. Running half crew up there. It's been tough to get rid of anything. Things moved all summer. Just really slow. It's like what do you even cut. Just don't know how long it will sit on the landing and dry out n get lighter. 

mike_belben

Something definitely rotten.  


Store beef prices through the roof, but cows are dirt cheep at the stockyard auction and the custom slaughterers have a 2 yr appointment lead now.

  Lumber, plywood and osb flying off the shelf at record prices, but the mills arent buying.  


These are some seriously peculiar supply chain anomolies.
Praise The Lord

Ed_K

The spf on the exchange made it to almost $900.mbf now it down to $790. and going down.
Ed K

quilbilly

Just trying to piece together what I see here, but it seems like where there is some competition for wood from exporters, the market is a bit higher and more reflective of the cost at the lumber yard. 

We have had a huge jump YoY and it's expected to hold through the elections. Went from no work in the late spring to 6 months lined up in a few weeks, at higher rate than normal too. 

People here want to leave Seattle and Portland bad and are buying anything they can get their hands on to start building houses.
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stavebuyer

Commodity pricing is always about supply and demand; but that does not mean that supply/demand is in balance through the entire  production chain. Covid19 caused supply chain chaos. Stuff in the store got wild because demand exceeded supply at the retail level. Plant closures at meat and egg processing plants made shelf ready product in high demand. No reason to buy beef on the hoof if your plant is not running so yes over-supply on the farm and under supply on the store shelf can happen and pricing at both ends of the chain reflect different realities. No conspiracy and if you don't have product to sell you aren't getting rich selling at the new high price because you have little to sell.

Lumber is the same. Shutdowns that weren't forced by the government still resulted. Some by management scaling back in an uncertain environment, some by labor shortages even with widespread unemployment. Not a single mill I deal with is able to keep adequate workers to maintain full production. Fear and government incentives to not work plays a part. Framing lumber is high because they big mills can't produce enough to meet the demand they didn't expect and don't have the workers to produce. Paying extra for logs that are not in short supply makes no sense. Log prices will not move until log demand exceeds log supply. Producers never set pricing in commodity markets; supply and demand does. Traders had to pay to get rid of crude oil for a couple days but the mini-mart is never going to pay you to put gas in your tank. Not a conspiracy just supply and demand doing its thing. Big prices will either curb demand or increase production.

mike_belben

I was driving a truck into the same plants i always did through mid May and everything was pumping while toilet paper and hand sanitizer were gone.  

I never saw a "shutdown" anywhere.  Not a sawmill, brickplant, block, mulch, coils, hardie board, pressure treater.  Heck my last backhaul was that hardie board out of plant city FL and there was 7 staging lanes of trucks completely full, trucks all over the entrance road and a flagger waving us away.  Thats atleast 4x more loads booked than normal and they averaged 120 truck loads a day normal.   I got a load of drainage tile out of south georgia to bounce home. Plant looked normal there too.

I read about closures that would disrupt supply chains.  But i saw none. And i probably drove into more industrial locations than your average bear.  The pulp trucks never stopped running on 68 or 127 either.  atlanta journal said the everglades were plowing fruit under but i was there next morning.. No fresh tillage to be seen.  This is the only tractor i ever saw working in 7 trips to south florida and hes mucking irrigation.





The contractor i was delivering to hardscapes for citrus barons.. Said he hadnt heard of this fruit crisis and his projects are in the $ million range.  But how did i get into FL?  The news said theres roadblocks all over?  Nope.  75 was wide open.  Scale and ag checkpoints were even closed.  

Call me crazy i dont care,all i said was somethings fishy.  Just tellin you the honest truth of what i witnessed first hand.  Lord strike me dead if im lying.


These kinda lines to pick up TP and water were a month long. Plants were on mandatory OT.   This demand insanity should always raise input prices under any circumstance.  Youd need a concentration yard the size of rhode island for this much TP demand not to spike pulp prices.














Praise The Lord

ehp

up here most lumber yards are pretty bare , lots of stuff is sold out and whatever you get the price is up 50% , HMMMM I wonder when my price goes up . 

ehp

OH Logger its the same here , mills are paying crazy prices for standing timber . 

thecfarm

Now that's a line of trucks!!!   :o
What do you do, wait in line for 6 hours to be loaded?
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Ed_K

 Last week I posted that the price of 1k bf of spf was up to almost $900. I checked yesterday afternoon and it's down below $670. a thousand.
Ed K

Firewoodjoe

I don't understand how things can be so different up and down all ever the place. I think it's just uncertainty in the future that is controlling the market right now. I have worked lined up for the rest of the year so I hope it stays that way. My work I mean. 

BargeMonkey

Chinese are still taking it as fast as it goes in the boxes, saw 2x debarkers and iron going the other day filling boxes when I dropped wood off. Decent ash, not the best couple sticks of maple and I averaged 700 straight thru. 

ehp

China shut down all containers up here a week ago , said they are full of red oak and ash and walnut

mike_belben

Quote from: thecfarm on September 06, 2020, 09:02:06 AM
Now that's a line of trucks!!!   :o
What do you do, wait in line for 6 hours to be loaded?
Probably more like 16. Thats why the govt had to suspend the hours of service. 
Praise The Lord

dnash

Quote from: ehp on September 06, 2020, 08:21:28 PM
China shut down all containers up here a week ago , said they are full of red oak and ash and walnut
That sucks...I spoke to one of the bigger exporters over your way a month and a half ago and he said he had just got an order for 30 containers a month of red oak. Hopefully it gets sorted soon.
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mudfarmer

There is a log buyer/concentration yard about 10 miles from me, having a hard time even getting a price sheet from them ::)

Woodfarmer

 China got several triaxle and pup loads of my ash over the last 3 years.

ehp

ya Im pretty sure the guy your talking about is sitting and if you didnot know his Dad had a heart attack couple weeks ago, they put 4 splints in him so he seems ok, the one problem was a certain mill in the prov. besides us sent some containers that had bugs in them . That is a real big no no . So now every container has to be done proper and is inspected . They got so much red oak over there they have no idea on what to do with it and the price shows . The containers guys had another loop hole to ship stuff but that also got shut down hard so we will see 

ehp

But that same guy were talking about is looking for hard maple 300,000 feet and paying very well and its not the high grade veneer , more like rotary veneer grade stuff , its alot more than what the mills here are paying

nativewolf

AMEX, canadian mill, has opened a facility in east/central PA to buy logs, looking for WO (like everyone else).  


Anyone have any quartersaw log news?  My current buyer is good but this project could cover him up, especially in the larger chestnut oaks (who knows what they'll look like once dropped, CO is notorious for staining).  
Liking Walnut

ehp

amex gets very few logs around here , I know guys that have tried them for a couple loads but go back to the normal mills here

nativewolf

Quote from: ehp on September 10, 2020, 08:40:57 PM
amex gets very few logs around here , I know guys that have tried them for a couple loads but go back to the normal mills here
Yeah the pricing is not so great, international scale on small walnut is good though.   They have a competitor I hear, don't know who they are..V something?   
Northwest Hardwoods rumors continue to abound, they closed the export facility operated at the inland port of Virginia in Front Royal (last season).  Put a lot of smaller exporters in VA in a hard spot.  
Liking Walnut

ehp

there is a couple bigger mills over in Quebec buying hardwood  , there is not alot of good hardwood left over there so thats why their looking everywhere to get more. There is a area that has good yellow birch just east of ontario border in Quebec and its a fairly big area and yellow birch is the most common tree . Lots of birch veneer in it 

nativewolf

Rift WO veneer pricing is in at $ 3-7/bdft.  We'll see how some do, not really happy on the wood quality but we've got size.
Liking Walnut

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