What would be the purpose of marking small 12 inch straight stem white oak but then not making the big 28 inchers?
I ask a forester about this once and his reply was....Cut out the small trees so the big trees can drop acorns and then after the next tree crop is established then have a sale and cut the big trees.
It seems to me they already have a 50-60 year start on good straight trees, why not just remove the big ones now before they are over the hill? And leave those straight smaller trees to grow. Maybe just thin a few if needed.
That's what I'm thinking. Seems like a lot of foresters have issues with uneven aged stands. They are definitely harder to manage. Dropping one of those big ones without smashing the smaller ones is no picnic. ;D 8) 8)
It may be that the smaller trees are actually the same age as the larger ones, just they lost the race to become dominant. So they are suppressed and spindly, and wont respond well to being released?
If that's the case, then it is better to take them out, leave the better trees for seed and shelter, then remove those in a couple of years once the new seedlings are established?
But that's only a guess.
Ian
That's a good guess Ian.
Its called the shelterwood system of silvaculture. In that system, you cut your understory to allow seedling germination and establishment, then cut your overstory at some time down the road to release the seedlings. It works well for heavy seeded species like oak, but also works for white pine.
The common myth that many people believe is that age and tree size are related in some way. It leads to the most common mistake of doing diameter limit cutting. For the most part, forests are even-aged. Compartment size is smaller when you get to the uneven-aged type of management. At some point, you do a clearcut. That clearcut is often very small in size - 1/4 acre. Even natural stands will have small compartments that are clearcut due to disease, insects, downfall, lightning or some other type of event.
Many think that the selection process involves taking out mature timber and leaving small trees to take their place. As a tree gets older, they respond to release slower. Also, trees that are growing under large trees often aren't very straight. That leaves a poor quality tree to replace the good quality tree that is often removed in a selective cut. Selective cutting can be silvacultural suicide when done poorly. I've seen a lot of it. Sometimes done by people who should know better. Sounds like a pretty good forester.
Good lesson Ron... glad Nemologger bought this up.
What kills me down here is the folks that clear cut hardwood and cut all the 8" to 12" hardwood like oak along with the the bigger, often low grade trees. They are cutting a tree that is maybe 25 years old and just about ready to move into a sawlog class not far down the road. They then sell it as hardwood pulpwood for $5.00 a ton and lose 25 years of stand development.
Years ago, before I knew all of the above above,my Father and me was cutting our white pine here. I cut down one of our pine,about 80 years old,more than 3 feet across. There was a small white pine,just about the size of a telephone pole,just about as straight and tall too. A real pretty tree. It grew close to it,but thought it would be ok to leave. One of the limbs hit the top of the the telephone pole tree and brought it down with the big one. We was both bummed out that happened. I sawed the telephone pole up for a log or 2 and saw the tight grain. I tried to count the rings,maybe 60 years,it was hard to tell. Had one that was well over 3 feet across and 10 feet away way this one no more than a foot across. Suppressed growth at it's finest.
Quote from: WDH on June 14, 2013, 07:37:21 AM
What kills me down here is the folks that clear cut hardwood and cut all the 8" to 12 hardwood like oak along the the bigger, often low grade trees. They are cutting a tree that is maybe 25 years old and just about ready to move into a sawlog class not far down the road. They then sell it as hardwood pulpwood for $5.00 a ton and lose 25 years of stand development.
A lot of the Missouri stands were cut during WWII. In my woods there are lots of different age trees, since the woods is a mix of big decadent mostly wolf type trees with younger, better trees that filled in the pastures/abandoned fields over a period of about 75 years now. Some of the poorer land still has not closed, which is ok, as I like to see the orchids and penstemons in those areas. Anyway, it isn't always the best trees that win the race, just ones that got a head start in the first place. A few years at the beginning make a big difference.
We started thinning to the best and most valuable trees in 1991. We have had good or better results with any trees we left to grow unless they were in the supressed class, especially supressed walnut and cherry.
We run into this situation regularly, where the biggest trees are poor quality and the younger (usually) trees surrounding them are good, straight ones that just need some room. We look for the lowest quality trees or an opening to drop the larger trees into. Then we drop any other trees we want to remove into the opening created by the first big tree. After the stand gets opened in this way, the trees we leave standing start to fill in pretty fast after they recover from the shade they have been growing with. Our losses are mostly to inadvertant smashing by the falling large trees and ice storms, particularly in the first few years after the opening. There are usually enough nearby trees to protect the trees opened up from windthrow, at least under our conditions with our mix of hardwoods with an occasional cedar.
I would also like to comment on the idea that most stands are even aged stands. I suppose it is a matter of definition, but to me an opening caused by the death of a really big tree here and there is an even aged stand? Well, sort of, but on the larger scale isn't this an uneven aged stand?
My uncle in Ohio has a stand of about 40 acres of what was called the Black Swamp. They cut 10 acres of it in 1879 to build their house and barn as they cleared the rest of their land to farm. So this forest is from 130+ up to several hundred year old virgin forest. I can relate what the woods looks like. It was nothing like I expected. Most of the woods is trees that are 1-2 feet in diameter, 80-100ft to the first branch and just a few scattered giants that are up to 6 or more feet thick. The elms are gone in there now, but you would never know it, as the forest fills in and the dead trees disappear. Now the ashes are dying. In 20-30 years you will never know they were there in the first place.
If you look at this forest and don't know the history, you might think it was an even age stand with a few scattered wolf trees. It isn't. Those big ones are just the survivors that outlived all their peers.
I don't actually know how much this helps the discussion, just stuff I've seen. ;D
Its hard to tell whether clearcutting a stand is right or wrong without the data to support it. I've seen 8-12" hardwood that is 60 years old. But, that's up here and your hardwood growth is different.
A lot would depend on the BA of those small trees as opposed to the large, low grade trees. It could be that you would want to start all over. The low grade trees were probably residuals from a high grade operation, and the small trees could be those stunted trees that we're talking about. If there's sufficient reproduction on the floor, I could see why they would clearcut. But, recommendations shouldn't be made without some sort of data to back it up. Too often that doesn't happen.
Northern forestry and Southern forestry seem to be 2 differing viewpoints, and a lot of that has to do with available markets and ecological conditions.
Mesquite:
Even aged vs uneven aged can be a discussion about compartment size. Essentially, when the compartment is small enough, you get to even aged. When taken as a larger compartment, you would get into more diverse age groups. Usually, when you plot out BA (basal area) by diameter class, you will find that even aged stands have a bell shaped curve, where uneven aged stands are trying to be flatter by having a representation in all age classes.
Every time I have charted out BA on most stands, I would come up with a bell shaped curve, with many bumps on it. Those bumps are where there were thinnings. That selective harvest that everyone talks about. If you want a real joy, plot out by whether your BA is good, fair or poor. That would be by tree form and/or species. I've often noticed that those in the smaller diameter ranges have often been poor or fair. Are these ones that should be taken ahead into the next stand?
There's also the point that when there is an opening in the woods does not mean that a larger pole tree will take over. Quite often the juvenile stages of tree development will shoot a newer tree over one that's been suppressed.
Quote from: WDH on June 14, 2013, 07:37:21 AM
What kills me down here is the folks that clear cut hardwood and cut all the 8" to 12 hardwood like oak along the the bigger, often low grade trees. They are cutting a tree that is maybe 25 years old and just about ready to move into a sawlog class not far down the road. They then sell it as hardwood pulpwood for $5.00 a ton and lose 25 years of stand development.
It's not just the south, see alot of that up here with firewood. Those small pole 8"-12" trees that are a future sawlog run through a firewood processor real nice...... :-\
The only way to get big sawlog trees, is not to cut them when they are small trees smiley_lit_bulb. Simple advice, but seems hard to follow for some.
You can't get large sawtimber by cutting small and medium sized sawtimber. Diameter limit cutting usually cuts into those sawtimber size classes to favor bringing poletimber into the small diameter class.
Excellent discussion, close to our discussions in Silviculture, back in the day.
Yes, hardwood silviculture in the South and North face different challenges. Most of the good hardwood here is in the drains, creek draws, and bottomlands. Pine is on the uplands. Sweetgum is everywhere. Bottomland hardwood silviculture here deals with relatively fast growing trees. Sometimes a clear cut is best to start over when a stand has been continually high-graded. My issue is the good 12" DBH bottomland oak that is 30 years old with a good crown that goes on the pulpwood truck because the entire stand is being clear cut to generate the most cash, right now. Many times, it is poor use of the growing stock.
Ron you did a good job of explaining this to me...thank you.
As stated in the tread below this, A lot of forest companies have been leaving understory fir for decades (which grows thicker than sweetgum) when they take off the overstory softwood or maple. It's old old suppressed junk. I sure cut a lot of it with a brush saw and wade through a lot of rotten wood and tops to cut it. If this is what they are depending on for future logs or even pulp than they are in for one big fibre shortage. I know when we sold pulp over the years, any rot was reject. If it's red spruce, we have a different story to tell. Red spruce will respond well to long suppression periods and lives 4 times as long as balsam fir. It will actually produce a decent log some day. It's growing season is probably 3 weeks shorter than white spruce and fir.
Pictures taken today:
red spruce
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/11009/SD_red-spruce1.jpg)
Notice the shoots are just busting the scales now.
I thought I lost some of these to grass and dogwoods over growing them. Nope, they sure are dang tough trees. I think they could grow in a closet. :D Yellow green is the natural color of red spruce.
white spruce
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/11009/SD_White-spruce1.jpg)
Scales are all shed from the shoots. Needles are almost blue. ;D
Notice the much longer new shoots this year already than on the reds.
My point in all this, is to know the silvics of the species your managing before you make interventions. If not, than someone will not be getting what they hope for. ;)
Quote from: celliott on June 14, 2013, 10:14:55 AM
It's not just the south, see alot of that up here with firewood. Those small pole 8"-12" trees that are a future sawlog run through a firewood processor real nice...... :-\
The only way to get big sawlog trees, is not to cut them when they are small trees smiley_lit_bulb. Simple advice, but seems hard to follow for some.
Maybe that's what the landowner wanted? It's hard to tell from a pile of tree length firewood if the right thing to do was to remove the 8-12" trees.
High grading seems to be a popular method of logging in northern New England - more often than not the logger is calling the shots and the landowner wants money. Plus pulp markets, and sometimes firewood markets, can be poor enough where it doesn't pay to cut anything but the logs. Many loggers and landowners believe that leaving those 8-12" trees is a good thing - if that's what they want then so be it, but given a chance a forester should at least collect some data and accordingly advise them of different options. More often than not the residual 8-12" trees are the same age as the larger trees that were cut, and often have poor live crown ratios. To compensate, trees retained in a stand with less than C-level stocking often develop epicormic branching up and down the stem, which reduces grade. In many cases the trees will never be high grade sawlogs - a pulp tree is a pulp tree. Another fact: older hardwoods (>60 years?) often don't respond well to release.
In northern New England, given the correct conditions, clearcutting is an excellent silvicultural tool. I've seen the results on thousands of acres: a 30-year old stand will be entering the stem exclusion stage and will have 5000+ trees per acre of northern hardwood or mixedwood. When retaining just the overtopped/intermediate trees the regeneration is often as dense as what would have occurred with a silvicultural clearcut. However, the landowner often loses the value of the residual trees, or if they harvest them X amount of years down the road then regeneration is often compromised and the harvest is 95% pulp/firewood/low grade sawlogs.
If you retain the overtopped/intermediate trees how long do you have to wait until a sawlog is produced? 10 years? 20 years? 50 years? Never? The time value of money will generally favor the money coming in now versus the money received in "X" amount of years down the road.
There are so many scenarios - it's hard to give an opinion on a stand of wood unless you've seen it.
That's the trouble, when the wait times can be a decade, a half a lifetime or more before payback. The thinking is 'me and now' for a lot of management, not about some far distant time ahead for someone else. Then consider all the life challenges and the tax man always with his hand in the pot. Many things can influence how the woods is taken care of. It's easy to stand out by the road, look into the woods, and judge people by their actions on the land.
Swampdonkey hit the nail on the head. Ive brought this topic up a time or two here, not from an explanatory standpoint but from a selling good forestry standpoint. When I started out cutting timber I saw (and still see) plenty of stands that could really use some work. The gravy was already plucked, the bigger trees that were left were poor quality, and the right thing to do in my eyes was release the stump sprouts and better quality seedlings. But to sell that idea to a landowner, more often than not you can forget about it. They say things like " abc sawmill paid me 50,000 for all those trees, and you want to buy my next crop of trees for 2.00 a ton? Are you crazy?" Theres no understanding other than the dollars involved today, not that what is right for the woods will reap rewards 50 years from now. The best Ive been able to do is get on a tract with a healthy stocking of mature timber, and convince them not to cut every one of them, and allow me the discretion to cut out the inferior species and poorly formed trees while I am there. At the end of the day, its a good feeling knowing you are doing it the best you can, but more often than not landowners see you left a nice 20in tree for seed and wonder why you didnt cut it, because its worth more to them in the log pile than standing in the woods.
I know the feeling...About 5 years ago I cut a nice stand of whiteoak and left a lot of trees that were in the 18 inch stump range. A couple of years later another logger came to the landowner and told him there was still several thousand dollars left in his timber. He sold it again to him and now he has a blackberry patch.
I know the area you're in up there in Tioga county. I worked up there for awhile, and I fully understand what you're up against. I couldn't sell that type of forestry down in my area. I gave a management plan and appraisal to a doctor one time and his wife wanted to know how to get the money. I told her to cut all her trees.
I've also had loggers come in within weeks after we had jobs finished. They took all the leave trees and paid a lot less than they were worth. It's what helped to drive me back to the mill.
I heard one large forestry consulting company owner say that landowners deserve the kind of management they get. I'm not in that camp.
It is a hard deal. Some landowners won't cut a single tree. Then they die or sell out and the next owner cashes out to help pay for the land without any consideration for the next crop.
The farmers feel like the loggers will cheat them, and unfortunately, there are loggers out there who are dishonest, giving everybody a bad name.
For most farmers, woods land is a place to hunt and occasionally a paycheck. There aren't that many who consider their trees a crop. They just grow. We can all do better.
I have had the actual logger contracted to do the work talk to the landowner and buy the crop trees as he is cutting the sale. It can be frustrating working with private landowners. The absolute worse situation is when a piece of property has several different landowners. Other hard to work with landowners are preachers/pastors, school teachers and lawyers. I have learned to avoid these types, or back out of a job if I get the least hint or suspicion that there could be trouble ahead. I'm sure others here know the type.
My theory on that is some professions give advice all day long. Rarely will they take it. Bankers and doctors also fill that niche.
It's not only professions. Sometimes a fellow is set in his ways, and that's all it takes when it's his land and his trees.
Sometimes we forget whose really the boss to. And people also change their minds. Should try running a silviculture program on private land, when today people have spoken for 500,000 trees and by spring that's down to 350,000. Long after the trees where ordered up at the nursery who want to be paid for them other 150,000 trees to. ;)
There are some really poor customers out there.
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... :-\
Reminds me of the economic theory espoused by mathematician-turned-amateur-economist John Maynard Keynes: "In the long run, we're all dead" ::)
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Quote from: mesquite buckeye on August 20, 2013, 11:23:18 AM
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.
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.
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.
That is sad to hear about what you don't want to get going about. :( Others probably feel the same way.
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
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.
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.
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
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.
Quote from: mesquite buckeye on August 21, 2013, 08:21:43 AM
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.
Take some pics of the stands and lets talk about them. The hardwood guys on here will have some good perspective.
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)
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.
Quote from: mesquite buckeye on August 20, 2013, 11:23:18 AM
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 :o
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.
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.
Quote from: WDH on August 21, 2013, 08:50:32 PM
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.
I think you can get both an improved forest and more $ if you do it right. I do my own removals/salvage with regular farm equipment and a small mill. Pulling a tree here and there as they reach maturity isn't a problem for me. In fact, I can't keep up with the growth. If you consider that the premium species have been preferentially removed from the forest, I don't think increasing their relative frequency in a stand is a problem. My east 15 acres was once a pure stand of black walnut before it was cleared for agriculture. Missouri is also supposed to be a crummy place to grow cherry. Funny, I get some pretty nice ones in my woods and have seen a stack of lumber at a local mill from a perfect 30" d.
I'm not suggesting removing everything but the best species. I am suggesting keeping the best trees of whatever species you have and favoring their growth. Sorry, though, if I can get a big clear black walnut or black cherry out of a piece of my land or a defective shingle oak or a multitrunked box elder, or a cherry growing in the midst of a stand of pole elms that will be mostly dead in the next wave of dutch elm disease, I'm keeping the good ones. :snowfight1:
The area where my farm is in Missouri has a long history of high grading. The last one happened just before I got the farm. Trees were dropped on top of and crushed young red oaks, walnuts, cherries without regard to the damage created or any future forest growth. It took me 5 years just to cut up the treetops, smashed trees and just get started thinning the pole stands for better trees. I have been working this woods for over 20 years now and the quality of both the forest and the timber has improved greatly at the same time I have been getting lumber from the thinnings and removals. Making money isn't a neccesarily a crime and turning your woods into a forest preserve isn't necessarily good. I've seen many a forest held back from any harvest only to get raped and high graded when the land changes hands. If that same forest had been managed and had timely removals, the big trees wouldn't have accumulated to the point that the high graders are attracted to it. They do leave all the big junk trees though, for what that is worth. >:(
I'm not afraid to cut good timber, like fir and aspen. They are short lived anyway. Use'm or loose'm. Also a nice spruce or a yellow birch here and there. After all, why bother just cutting junk. Your never getting any reward. I've cut cherry and butternut as well, there's still all kinds because I didn't go out on a mission to cut them all down or high grade them. Cherry up here is pretty much a junk tree anyway, you might get an 8' log once in awhile. Black knot hits it hard. Makes burl wood, which I have a few growing now. Worth more than the tree in the right market and if it's quality figure. ;D Ontario banned cutting of butternut because of the canker, no such laws here in NB. We don't have that canker around here that I've seen. I see more butternut get damaged by ice storms and wind than anything else.
The reward for cutting junk trees is increased growth in the trees that you don't cut. You don't even have to use them. Mulch and soil fertility are a good end uses. The nutrients get recycled when the junk trees die, more water and more light for the trees left.
An old forester told me, "The best way to plant a great forest is with an axe."
Does require a bit of patience. If you don't have a lot of patience, growing trees probably won't be your forte. ;D 8) 8) :snowball:
If your vision is where you want to be in 20-40 years, you have potential to grow a great forest. ;D
Maybe if you leave'm on the ground they might make mulch by 30 years. I thinned my whole woodlot, lots of stuff on the ground. And my saw cut it to. It will be all 'in' the ground, gone, by ten years. Up here, if you left all the junk behind in mature timber 70% or more would be on the ground. A nice mess. ;D If you did it on Crown land you would be arrested for waste. My reward is to be able to use the wood, it's what was meant to be. And since I don't practice clear cutting, I have lots of trees to look at and think of what I'll be needing them for. :)
I think our rot rates are probably twice yours. We will see most forest debris up to about 6" diameter gone in 5 years. bigger stuff other than rot resistant species are mostly gone in 10. I've seen some pretty big snags of debris completely disappear remarkably quickly. These spots are prime locations for wild turkey nesting (we have lots of them) as well as our #1 spots for the establishment of new cherry trees. The down tops keep the deer off of them until they get tall enough to survive the deer. Open grown cherry seedlings get wiped out. We do have a very large whitetail population here. ;D 8) 8) :o 8) :snowball:
Important take home lesson. Nature is not neat. One person's debris disaster is a habitat for several of the little people (animals) who live there. Too bad that people who live in government offices don't spend enough time out in the woods to begin to understand how things really work. I am glad you take care of your own land, SD. The world needs more of us. ;D 8) 8) 8)
SD and mb,
You sound like my kind of guys! ;D
Andy B.
Fir and spruce take longer to rot than hardwoods, but if it's small stems then it's gone in 10. Big softwood is mush by 15, but still in tact until you step on it and slice clean through it. :D Cedar lasts decades.
You guys have a longer growing season down south, so only seems right it rots quicker. Stuff stand stills when it's frozen solid. ;D
Here in NB, Timber Management branch is in conflict with the wildlife biologists. Go to their office building and find more Irving trucks than DNR. The provincial wildlife biologist I know is a frustrated fellow. For years, wildlife management was spelled deer. They set aside winter areas, now they are cut or just falling down because the winter habitat type for deer up here was found to be old softwood, especially with old man's beard lichen. The same that fed the woodland caribou. You cut an old fir in the winter, covered in that lichen, and watch the deer go after it.
Looks like I am coming into this discussion late, but I can add something of value I think. I just got back from a week of studying and looking at oak regeneration techniques in the ridge and valley province and the Appalachian plateau province of Pennsylvania. I think that we sometimes need to step back and examine the sole purpose of silviculture, and that is to regenerate a natural and valuable stand of timber. Oak happens to be a tree that needs even age management. Cutting what we may perceive as being a future valuable tree in a stand is looking at a small snapshot of what is really a bigger picture. Cutting that small tree is directly related to the shade tolerance of a species and trying to prepare the stand for a change. Forget about that tree and look to what is going to grow up under the canopy of the stand. The stand likely needs light manipulation to flush the advanced regeneration and prepare it for an overstory removal. There is some pretty new information on oak regeneration. I am sure some of you are familiar with the USDA publication "Prescribing Regeneration Treatments for Mixed-Oak Forests in the Mid-Atlantic Region." If not, I suggest you look it up. I don't have the time right now to get into it deeper, but I may have some time later.
I think regenerating intolerant species is easier in the western parts of the Eastern Deciduous Forest with the lower tree stand densities we get. Drought is a powerful scythe.
Thanks, Ron (Wenrich) for your replies in this thread. Food for thought. I do think that the average person's insight as to what to cut, if they are practising amateur silviculture, may lead to average or bad results, not good results. Not being elitist here, even though I have had my own woodlot for decades (5th decade now) I have for quite a few years now asked for professional advice from forestry professionals. Not only have I learned a lot but I also noticed how many times my own initial assumptions were contradicted by their advice. :-)
SwampDonkey, I hear you, I'm in Nova Scotia, Irving and their ilk are a problem here too. I also similar attitudes when it comes to what to cut, I do get North Nova Forest Owners Coop advice and it's well taken but some areas on my woodlot are no-brainers. If you've got one patch of several acres of mostly spruce, super packed, it's not rocket science to take out the dead standing ones (which are still typically solid and burn well) and then thin some more with standing green ones, not really much deliberation needed. Nothing I've done on my woodlot over the decades seems to have disinclined wildlife to show up, including deer, and possibly has helped.
I also have a lot of ash which grows quickly, along with birch, at the edges of open areas - lawns/fields and forest roads. I get a decent percentage of my firewood every year by simply felling every Nth ash of decent size, and after I'm done you can't even tell trees are missing. :-)
I'm definitely not in the business of making my woodlot look like a European managed forest or an Irving tree plantation, I like for people to look at it and think that it's natural. So lots of deadfall and snags, whether spruce/fir or poplars or birch or whatever. You'll also see my property dotted with lots of spruce branch piles, and I have to assume that's good shelter for something. :-)
Guess I missis this one back over the years, glad it came back to the top. Banjo
I missed it the first go around also. Read it all last night. Second edition. :D
After reading the thread, I got on ebay and looked at the books mentioned. I wanted to get the book Ron had suggested, but it has went up quite a bit in price, but I scored the other The Practice of Silviculture by David M. Smith 1986 edition for $3.99 postage and all. Said it looked never used and still had the dust jacket. Probably over printed it. For 4 bucks I cant go wrong. Thanks for all you folks that made this 2013 thread. I know my woods needs work and I am doing the best I know how to remove trees of lesser value and let the better ones remain. I only cut the good stuff when I have an order that requires it. I have a custormer that orders 100 2 x 6 x 8 each month of hardwood. Thats where I am using the crooked and bad leaners, as you can work with a bad log when its only 8 ft. long. It is helping but thats not a lot of wood either. Pulp market here is severely depressed. Banjo
Yes, this thread is right down my alley. I even started threads on this forum about this very subject and I never saw this thread to my knowledge.
I am also glad this floated back to the top, I just read through and appreciated hearing from some experienced folks sharing their wisdom.
We have 8 wooded acres ourselves and I would love to figure out a plan to ensure the next generation of trees starts off on the right foot.
Off to look for the books recommended!
Thanks everyone. 8)