Cutting the little trees out from under the big trees.

[WDH]

There are some really poor customers out there. 

[OneWithWood]

It really makes it hard when good stewards have to fight county government to practice good forestry because of all the owners who only look at the money and the loggers who want to maximize every harvest without paying a market price.
Sometimes I wonder why I am doing what I am doing when it would be so easy just to say the h*** with it and cash out... :-\

[ancjr]

Reminds me of the economic theory espoused by mathematician-turned-amateur-economist John Maynard Keynes: "In the long run, we're all dead"   :

[Andy B.]

I realize this thread is a few months old, but this is EXACTLY the type of information I'm looking for.  My wife and I only have about 14 forested acres, but I would like to find out how best to manage it.  Is there anyone you guys could recommend in the Easton, PA area who does this type of forester work?  I am fascinated by the whole ecology of the forest, but I wouldn't even know how to go about trying to figure this out myself.

Andy B.

[Claybraker]

A couple of thoughts from a fellow landowner. I'd start with the service forester. Nothing wrong with private consultants, but it doesn't hurt to have someone who doesn't have a financial interest in your decisions, at least at first. Plus, it's usually free.

Also, a really good exercise to help you organize *your* objectives is to fill out an application for a Forestry Stewardship Plan.

[mesquite buckeye]

Read The Practice of Silviculture by David M Smith 1986. There may be a new addition by now. There is a lot of information packed inside and I have found it to be quite helpful, both to understand the terminology and at least an inkling of how the forest ecosystem works. If you get a feeling for how the system works, you can tweak it to produce more and better of what you want from it and help to keep it all healthy. ;D Good luck.

[petefrom bearswamp]

In my 25 plus yrs consulting, I found that when the client, after being given a good program to follow regarding timber harvesting said it isn't that I want the most money, it WAS that they wanted just that sound silviculture be damned.
This type was fortunately in the minority.

[chain]

I think every forest stands in its past management. Some have been clear-cut, some have suffered severe forest fires and disease, some have been grazed, some have been left for old growth, and some are managed as modern forestry as the locale dictates. And it's not easy being a forest manager, not when the forest seems to 'change' its purpose, after all it is a living entity.

For instance, in our oak-pine Ozark forest the red oaks are dying, short-leafed pine is beginning to evolve once again as the major species, as our pioneers traveling westward nearly two hundred years ago wrote of the 'park-like' beauty of such pure stands of pine. I've stated before, we have been fortunate to have three species..red oaks, white oaks, SL pine where as the ROs will soon become a fond memory, the WOs are next, pockets of those are beginning to die also. Mother nature dictates, she will have the final say in forest management.

[Andy B.]

Read The Practice of Silviculture by David M Smith 1986. There may be a new addition by now. There is a lot of information packed inside and I have found it to be quite helpful, both to understand the terminology and at least an inkling of how the forest ecosystem works. If you get a feeling for how the system works, you can tweak it to produce more and better of what you want from it and help to keep it all healthy. ;D Good luck.

Mesquite,
There was a 9th edition published in 1996.  Needless to say, I can find the 8th edition for a few dollars used, the 9th edition is closer to $50.  Do you think much would have changed in 10 years to warrant the newer edition?

Thanks for the other suggestions as well.  I am going to call the local Penn State Extension tomorrow.

Andy B.

[thecfarm]

I wonder if your local library could get the recent copy from the state library? Could buy the one for a few dollars no matter what.

[Andy B.]

Don't even get me going on my "local" library.  I'd pay the $50 just to avoid setting foot in the place.  Heck, I'd rather spend the $50 on gas and drive out to State College and get a copy from Pattee. ;D

Andy B.

[thecfarm]

That is sad to hear about what you don't want to get going about.  :(   Others probably feel the same way.

[mesquite buckeye]

I'd be surprised if very much has changed. The book is a college level textbook for a beginning silviculture class. The publishers like to make new editions to force the students to buy new. They add or subtract a page here and there so when the professor assigns reading, you get the wrong pages in the older edition. Most of the information is timeless, so for you, who cares? Nobody will be assigning reading except you. ;D

[Ron Wenrich]

Andy, I'm a little over an hour from you.  Sounds like you have ties to PSU.  I don't do a ton of woods work anymore, but may be able to give a peek after leaf drop.

I have the 7th edition of that book with the date of 1962.  It cost nearly $13 in 1970.  The things that have changed are probably the pictures (mine are black & white) and the dollar value when they are using cost projections.  The concepts are probably the same.  But, a lot of those concepts won't pertain to your 14 acres of woodland.  You could borrow it, and it wouldn't be as far to drive as State College.

Most woodlands go through a series of landowners within a rotation, at least here in the northeast.  During that time, the management objectives change with each landowner.  All you need is one that wanted to optimize his current income by doing a high grade operation.  It makes no difference whether the previous management was good or bad.  You have to work with what you have on the ground and go forward from there.

I've found that landowners generally don't do much actual management work.  They won't spend the necessary money to get a good inventory and appraisal which would be necessary to develop a good management plan.  Most times the "plan" is a walk through with someone knowledgeable in trees and markets.  If a plan is developed, physical implementation is lessened if it has no immediate commercial value, or involves the landowner to input either money or time.  Folks like One with Wood are hard to find, especially for their dedication. 

Service foresters don't do much work in the field.  They often shove things off on the consultants and mill foresters.  This has been our state policy for 35 years.  They used to give service to large and small landowners, but no longer.  Its important to have your forester on the same page as you, and to get several opinions.  Some know the right things to say, but practice what they want as the landowner has no way of knowing what the quality of work is.

Another option is the Tree Farm system.  At least you get someone to look at the property every 5-10 years and give you an idea of what needs to be done.  http://patreefarm.org/  Note:  some of these inspectors are mill foresters looking for timber.  Not necessarily a bad thing.

[mesquite buckeye]

Pictures are still black and white in the eighth edition. If you are serious about taking care of your land, you can make a big impact in 5 years if you are not afraid to work on it.

[SwampDonkey]

Our DNR pretty much closed the doors to individual woodlot owners years ago, along with that went any courses they used to do. They pretty much stick to monitoring silviculture that gets invoiced by marketing boards and PSP measures every few years on woodlots. I never found the attendance art courses that great anyway, and never really brought the people in that are doing the largest volumes of silviculture. Mostly someone looking for information so they can sell off their wood and know a little something about the business before hand

[WDH]

It helps to have a vision of what can be and not just a vision of $ today,  but that is probably OK too, if that is what drives you.  It won't matter much in the long haul as nature is a big circle, like in the Lion King.  After we have killed each other off as a species, and several thousand years go by, nature will have her way again.  I bet the dinosaurs saw some very nice timber stands. 

[Andy B.]

Pictures are still black and white in the eighth edition. If you are serious about taking care of your land, you can make a big impact in 5 years if you are not afraid to work on it.

I'm definitely not afraid to work on it.  My problem at present is just figuring out what to "work on".  :D

WDH,

I can safely say as far as my little patch of woods goes, for my vision of what I'd like to do with it, $$$ are quite far down the list.  If a forester came in and the first thing they said was "tree X is worth $ and tree Y is worth $$ and tree Z is worth $", my response would be, "thank you for your time, next."  I know what I'd like to do.  I don't know if it's possible, or all of the proper terminology to describe it.  Making money off of it (well, by selling trees), is NOT what I'm trying to do.

I'll keep posting questions and eventually start figuring it out.

Andy B.

[WDH]

Take some pics of the stands and lets talk about them.  The hardwood guys on here will have some good perspective. 

[mesquite buckeye]

The quick and dirty of it is: gradually remove the junk trees (crooked, hollow, storm damaged) and encourage, by making room around your best prospective trees and you will make things better, often faster than you expect.

In other words, do the opposite of what has been done on most of the American hardwood forests for the past 200 years and you will do well. ;D 8) 8) 8)

[mesquite buckeye]

Another thing. Concentrate your efforts in the areas that will create the most benefit. For example, giving young walnuts and cherries (or other premium trees) some room before they get crowded out in pole stands. Don't spend a lot of time, at least initially, in parts of the woods where the work will be lots and the reward in terms of stand improvement are low. Hope this helps.

[Ljohnsaw]

Read The Practice of Silviculture by David M Smith 1986. There may be a new addition by now. There is a lot of information packed inside and I have found it to be quite helpful, both to understand the terminology and at least an inkling of how the forest ecosystem works. If you get a feeling for how the system works, you can tweak it to produce more and better of what you want from it and help to keep it all healthy. ;D Good luck.

I just ordered the 8th edition off Amazon for $5.00 and free shipping.  They had the 9th edition with prices from $136 up to $500 

[SwampDonkey]

It depends also on what forest region your in. Up here you could always be cutting the poorest of trees and have an endless supply of multi-stemed red maple scared up by moose, fir going rotten in the but from age and suppression (short lived), diseased beech, weevil and rust damaged white pine.....endless reserve of aspen which is suppressing fir and spruce. The trouble is, most start in one area and never get to the rest because it's a lot of work, plus money required to build and maintain trails and roads to get to it all. At times with either wood prices and demand for the low quality stuff, your pretty much working for less than cost. A big dis-incentive with most people. ;)

When you drive the NB highways, you'll notice the trees are small. The mature timber on most woodlots has been cut. The hardest cut usually is evident as pin cherry and gray birch takes over. Very few lots have not been cut, and if they weren't you find the volumes 30 years ago on those lots were more than now unless is a hardwood lot. Those lots tend to never get cut in any way significant. The next generation usually has a different perspective on management.

[Ron Wenrich]

There's more to the forest than dollar signs.  In some cases, doing nothing is an alternative management style.  Giving room to "premium" trees is looking at dollar signs.  Where Andy is located is outside the zone for really good cherry.  Its prone to attacks by the peach borer, and that yields gum streaks.  Walnut is relegated to the better growing sites.  I've been through his area, and some areas aren't good walnut sites. 

I think a good site to visit is one on full vigor forestry.  http://www.timbergreenforestry.com/  Here's a forester that has been practicing it for many years.  He has used the Menominee management techniques to manage his woodlots.  They've been doing it for a long time  http://www.mtemillwork.com/forest/index.php

The problem with full vigor forestry from a commercial standpoint is the expense of timber recovery.  You're only looking at a few trees to come out of a stand each year.  Equipment is pretty big nowadays and is designed to get as much volume in as short of time as possible.  Same goes with forest management philosophy.  Its hard to get around that unless you have small operators willing to use cut to length type of skidding operations, and working with small equipment.  The only way for full vigor to work is to have the entire operation from seedling to finished product incorporated.  Most of the money is made on the milling end, but you need the quality from the forest end to fulfill the market value.

If I was buying a book, I would look at the Forestry Handbook that was put out by the Society of American Foresters.  It covers a wide range of topics in forestry and logging.  The newer edition is pricey.  The older one (1961) can be had at a pretty good price - less than $10 in used condition - on Amazon.  The info hasn't changed that much between the editions.   

[chain]

It helps to have a vision of what can be and not just a vision of $ today,  but that is probably OK too, if that is what drives you.  It won't matter much in the long haul as nature is a big circle, like in the Lion King.  After we have killed each other off as a species, and several thousand years go by, nature will have her way again.  I bet the dinosaurs saw some very nice timber stands.

Dittos:  I know there are large forests buried under several feet of silt in the Ms. Delta. Large cypress, gum & tupelo and others were laid waste by earthquakes, floods, even sand storms. The Delta used to be part of the Gulf of Mexico.