logging in the back yard

[spencerhenry]

while i am a professional logger, i have a fair amount of time to work in my own woods. i keep my old cable skidder at home for recreation, and whenever i have time i go out into my own woods of 35 acres and remove all the dead trees. i have almost all aspens, some of the quite nice at around 80'. they are dieing off fast, every year i pull more out, this year it looks like i have about another 300 to 350 to remove. right now there is still waist deep snow but it is so wet that the skidder only sinks about a foot and a half, and once i have a skid road, it is like a highway. so today i have decided to keep track of how many trees i remove "for fun". as of today i am up to 52

[timberfaller390]

What do you reckon is killing them?

[spencerhenry]

some have canker, but not alot. some have a fungus that rots the tree from the center out, but most of the dead ones are just dead, no visible issues. my guess is that this stand is just at that time in its life span. i am cutting everything from 6" to 18" dbh trees, but they are tall, i pulled one out stump to crown, it measured 82'. from my experience that is a tall aspen. around here at my elevation of 8600' it takes about 100 years to grow a 12" diameter 80' tree. it has been a long time since i counted rings, but now that i think about it, i will count one from yesterday. there hasnt been a fire through here in probably over 100 years, and until i started cutting in '92 no one had done anything in this woods for a long time.

[indiaxman1]

Hate to hear of the blight...here in sou Ind, we are sweating the arrival of the ash borer...another *DanG import shoulda stayed overseas...a death sentence for the ash....we yearly deal with gypsy moths on oak/hickory..it weakens them, but they at least can put out new leaves....good luck on the clean up

[Sprucegum]

Aspens dying is just part of their normal cycle. They are probably all on the same root system anyway. The weaker ones fall to give the stronger ones more room. You can tell if they are on the same root - in the spring they will get their leaves on the same day, and in the fall they will turn color on the same day. 100 years is old for Aspen.

[spencerhenry]

my thoughts exactly on the life cycle. in the spring, it is noticeable, but even more so in the fall. i think i only have 2 or 3 different trees on the entire 35 acres. each "tree" leafs out or turns yellow at a slightly different time, and sometimes a slightly different color.
my goal was originally to get rid of all the dead falls and promote regeneration. before i started, it was difficult to walk through the woods. sometimes logs 3 or 4 deep. bottom ones half rotten, and top ones solid. around here it takes an aspen on the ground several years to rot. if it is off of the ground, it can take 20 years. now my woods is pretty clean as far as dead falls and leaners go. i have grass sometimes 6 feet tall. the regen is not as good as i had hoped. we have had several dry years and with that the trees are just hanging on. last year we had a good snow year, and the regen was amazing. every skid road looked like someone went by planting a new tree every 3 feet. i think this year, i need to get some livestock in here to mow down the grass, i think the thick tall grass is choking out all other grow in some areas.

[ErikC]

  If I was an elk hunter, which I am, I would look for a spot like that. Tall grass and aspen are their top two favorite things. Ever see any on your place?

[Sprucegum]

I was told "To get good regen of Aspen you need to clear a space with a diameter  2 1/2 times the height of the trees." Your 80 foot trees means you need a clearing 200 feet across to get enough sunlight for max regeneration. Then your saplings will be so thick you can't walk through them  :D

[spencerhenry]

about 1/2 mile off my property, on a guy's property that i watch over, i shot a 6x6 scoring 297 the year before last. shot a cow about 5 minutes later. archery season is my favorite time of year. archery season within walking distance of the house for trophy bulls, pretty awesome.

[shinnlinger]

And having a cable skider to go get he Elk you shot in your underwear off the back porch while watching football is a nice bonus also....

[ErikC]

  I can hunt deer all over within walking distance, we border the National forest. Nonetheless, I am jealous...

[woodtroll]

Aspen need openings to regenerate. Like sprucegum said.
They respond to hard disturbance. Plus elk love those sprouts.
Cows (beef) love sprouts too. I would keep the beef out. The aspen will pass the grass.

[spencerhenry]

snow has melted enough that i am shut down until it dries out. probably a month or more. just out walking through this evening and wondering whether i should take out all the trees that have the fungus on them. i dont know what the fungus is called, but i call it a shelf fungus. the trees have a little clam shaped fungus growing at multiple places on the stem, and the center of the tree is always rotten, doesnt matter if they are live or not. if it were only a few trees i would just take them out, but in some areas i would be taking out up to 50% of the live trees. i know that this should help regeneration, but around here it takes about 100 years to grow a 10" tree. does anybody know from experience if i should take them all out?

[hick_huckster01]

I believe what you are referring to is tree conk. Pretty much fits your description perfect! Associated with it is a large amount of wood decay. I don't know for sure but I figure logging out the stand so it has the room to regenerate while at the same time keeping some tree's with lots of conk on them and also perfectly healthy tree's around to ensure a nice looking stand that would regenrate and have a source of nutrients. That's my two cents.

[spencerhenry]

i have decided to do just that, take out almost all the infected trees, leaving a few here and there to make it still look good. i just have to wait for it to dry out now. unfortunately we have been getting snow ever day this week, and next week is calling for snow too. about 10" just today alone. so while bored not wanting to get out and work on machines in 17 degrees and snow, i finally counted rings on an aspen stem. stump measuring 11" x 12" has 95 rings, i counted it twice and came up with the same both times. it is sometimes hard without a magnifying glass, 95 rings in 5.5" means that the average ring is only .057".
so it appears that a 12" tree around here is about 100 years old, at least aspen anyway.

[stonebroke]

I guess you are not in the best place in the world to grow trees then?

Stonebroke

[Sprucegum]

 8) There's more to an "Old Growth Forest" than mossy redwoods.  ;)

[spencerhenry]

i have a handful of live ones that are pushing 20", i wonder how old they are? several years ago while do some fire fuel reduction work i took down a large rocky mountain juniper, i milled some lumber out of it. i have one piece about 10" wide that requires magnification to count the lines, i have counted several times and have come up with between 575 and 700 years old. no i didnt cut it live, it was killed a lightening strike and subsequent fire.

[indiaxman1]

In these eastern woods, we have dealt with the dogwood canker..a fungus..30 yrs ago..you would see the white dogwood blossoms busting out with the redbuds....had a fencerow at one time..now they are scattered and rare...as mentioned we sweat the dang bugs....ash borer/gypsy moth....no more baseball bats...cull them out when you see em, but the fungus/bugs still spread...just keep encouraging the good wood-oak, hickory, beech....and girdling the trash trees ...sweet gum, shortleaf pine, water maple...nature adjusts

[woodtroll]

The aspen can have a dramatic growth rate differences. The 20 inch aspen is not necessarily 300 years old. I would bet it is around a 100. Just in a better spot.

[spencerhenry]

i agree that it is not necessarily twice as old, but i think it is probably substantially older than the small trees. they are all from the same area. i dont know exactly where the tree i counted came from but it was within a maximum of 100yds. i have a handful of over 16" trees, but they are scattered over about a 100yd radius. hopefully they dont die soon, but if one does i will count the rings. maybe i should count one of the 6" trees that are pushing 85' tall.

[sjfarkas]

Are you able to send these dead trees of to the mill?  If not do you have another way of dealing with the logs?  The reason why I ask is that our local mill will be shutting down soon and I have seen an increase in bark beetle kill in ponderosa pine and I don't know what to do with all of the dead kills.  I need some ideas and I can only use so much lumber myself.

thanks

[spencerhenry]

there is a mill that buys aspen logs, but they only take green, and it is worth only slightly more than the trucking to get it there.

[sjfarkas]

do you chip them or do you burn them for firewood or do you have a nice size deck that's going to rot?

[arojay]

Spencerhenry,  What elevation is treeline where you live?

[spencerhenry]

i sell firewood. but i only have about 14 cords of logs and 6 cords of split wood. around here i could leave the logs in the deck for at least 3 or 4 years before i had any loss to rot. logs left on the ground in the woods are good for up to 3 years.

treeline here is about 12,100'. i am at 8600'

[spencerhenry]

if i cut the conks themselves off of the trees that only have one or two, will the tree continue to rot or will the rot stop?
as of today i am at 221 trees, only a handful of green ones with conks, but now that i am beginning to accept that alot of green trees are infected, i will be taking alot of them. cut one tree today, a dead one, that my 20" bar just barely cut through.