Logger damage to residual stand

[CCC4]

I hate to keep stringing this 13 page botched job thread along...but I can't help myself! !

One thing that no one has really talked about in 13 pages is what it is like going in behind a botched cut and trying to fix it. Well...it fricken sucks!

I get bounced from tract to tract cutting where I get told to go. Late Summer I got in on a FS block that had a deadline coming due on the contract. The crew who owned the contract was banned from ever cutting FS jobs again due to they got a kid killed this year. Dang this is gonna be a long story...

Ok, so while the FS job was opening up, I started a private land tract for our truck driver. I went in and thinned a couple sections of pine and cut a few loads of oak before I was moved to the FS block. For some stupid reason, the crew that got banned from the FS job I was now in control of, took a Hydro Ax and started behind me on the Private sector....fricken go figure!! I was like, "You're a Millionaire...could you have not just waited a month or so till I got back"???

So immediately I started hearing complaints from the LO...too much was being cut...too small...residual damage...cutting across the line...busting timber...on and on...everyday I was hearing the complaints. The LO would ask, "When you gonna come back and cut...these guys are ruining my place!" I was like Hell you know I have to finish this FS block before the end of September...why the heck did ya let those tweakers in on your land anyway???

So I got moved back over there finally and have been trying to fix their crap job. I was a in a pine thicket that was gutted in the center instead of thinned. What was left needed thinned due to the tweakers hadn't looked up I guess and left touching tops and forked timber still standing. So I called the LO and told him I was removing all forked top pine, damaged pine, damaged oak, unthinned young oak and some big mature oak that was supposed to be thinned.

I fixed the place pretty good and should wrap this job up in a couple days. The thing that makes me made was this kid knew how to thin pine and oak...never should he have taken so much timber in this cut. My boss always has said that if you thin pine properly...you can actually harvest a 1/3 more timber and still leave it looking right. This is very very true! Bottom line...cuz I'm tired of typing...Do a good job and you will stay in work! !

[CCC4]

Dangit...I didn't make my point...omg

Point is...I had to go back in a set that was over cut and cut more timber in order to do the thinning properly like it was supposed to have been in the beginning. there now...I'm done! Happy Thanksgiving! 

[KyLogger]

You KILL me! I am cutting in block right now that is all oak. 2/3 young White Oak (under 16") and the rest are BIG neat-o Black and White Oaks, tall with HUGE tops......Supposed to cut everything 14" DBH and up...........makes things interesting................very...............interesting. Population is crazy as well.

[treeslayer2003]

ok, some of you cut alot of 14" dbh stuff........what is your min top? i like to stay around 8"..........so it seems to me y'all cut some small timber........i don't try to grade any thing less than a 16" log. what y'all do with all the toothpicks?

[1270d]

We cut down to a 3 inch top.

[CCC4]

Our normal mixed timber saw logs are 10" min

Premium Red Oak is 12''
Black gum and Sweet gum is 11"
Scrag hardwood is 6 to 7''
Pine sawlog tree length is 7"
Pine pole tree length is 2 1/2''

[CCC4]

You KILL me! I am cutting in block right now that is all oak. 2/3 young White Oak (under 16") and the rest are BIG neat-o Black and White Oaks, tall with HUGE tops......Supposed to cut everything 14" DBH and up...........makes things interesting................very...............interesting. Population is crazy as well.

One of the biggest lawsuits in my area was over a cut like you descrbe. The LO agreed on 15" stump on a mature and ripe stand of mixed oak. WOW what a mistake that was! There were tires shot out, gates ran through, brandishing of firearms, hoses cut....what a mess! I got drug into court over that one but only due to I was on the contract...but for ERC  ...so I was clear.

This type of cutting on a payed in full lump fashion is a disaster in the works! You cut by contract guidlines and is it your fault that 85% of the timber got cut? Nope...but the LO is gonna have a fricken heart attack everytime! ! ...and rightly so...error and misunderstanding and lack of judgement on percentage of what size timber to be cut is to blame.

[treeslayer2003]

Our normal mixed timber saw logs are 10" min

Premium Red Oak is 12''
Black gum and Sweet gum is 11"
Scrag hardwood is 6 to 7''
Pine sawlog tree length is 7"
Pine pole tree length is 2 1/2''

so a 14" tree with an 10" top............unless it has no taper it will be short.
you call pole wood what i call pulp right? i won't cut it now.......its almost free........i can't work for free.
oh, happy thanksgivin brother.

[treeslayer2003]

You KILL me! I am cutting in block right now that is all oak. 2/3 young White Oak (under 16") and the rest are BIG neat-o Black and White Oaks, tall with HUGE tops......Supposed to cut everything 14" DBH and up...........makes things interesting................very...............interesting. Population is crazy as well.

One of the biggest lawsuits in my area was over a cut like you descrbe. The LO agreed on 15" stump on a mature and ripe stand of mixed oak. WOW what a mistake that was! There were tires shot out, gates ran through, brandishing of firearms, hoses cut....what a mess! I got drug into court over that one but only due to I was on the contract...but for ERC  ...so I was clear.

This type of cutting on a payed in full lump fashion is a disaster in the works! You cut by contract guidlines and is it your fault that 85% of the timber got cut? Nope...but the LO is gonna have a fricken heart attack everytime! ! ...and rightly so...error and misunderstanding and lack of judgement on percentage of what size timber to be cut is to blame.

this last couple lines you typed.....exactly right.....well said

[KyLogger]

We log on the percentage, the landowner said cut anything that will make a saw log..... Makes good "foldin' money" he said......  I take saw logs down to 10" min.... I try to keep it a little bigger than that. The rest gets left in the woods. Those little old swell butted White Oaks that meet the minimum but only have one log in the butt, I am leaving. Contract says we can take em' but it just feels so wrong......

[Banjo picker]

Those little old swell butted White Oaks that meet the minimum but only have one log in the butt, I am leaving. Contract says we can take em' but it just feels so wrong......

Just a question here...Are those trees not at least partially stunted anyway?  Just asking...Banjo

[KyLogger]

Most definitely, but it does not pay to take em' outta the woods. Logging in our area is not done for holistic purposes, money is the motivator for the landowner. There are definitely some cull trees that should be cut, but this is a dollars and cents business. Plus the more trees I leave the better the job looks when you are done anyhow. LO's take notice that "It doesn't look that bad"  when I get done. I know this sounds crass but that's the way it goes around here. If left up to me I would not cut much less than a 20" dbh tree anyway. The only market we have available to us is for sawlogs, and after about 12" at the tip you ain't makin' no dinero on sawlogs.

[Woodhauler]

Most definitely, but it does not pay to take em' outta the woods. Logging in our area is not done for holistic purposes, money is the motivator for the landowner. There are definitely some cull trees that should be cut, but this is a dollars and cents business. Plus the more trees I leave the better the job looks when you are done anyhow. LO's take notice that "It doesn't look that bad"  when I get done. I know this sounds crass but that's the way it goes around here. If left up to me I would not cut much less than a 20" dbh tree anyway. The only market we have available to us is for sawlogs, and after about 12" at the tip you ain't makin' no dinero on sawlogs.

We  worked in west viginia one spring logging, took a little while to get used to leaving stuff in the woods!

[treeslayer2003]

Most definitely, but it does not pay to take em' outta the woods. Logging in our area is not done for holistic purposes, money is the motivator for the landowner. There are definitely some cull trees that should be cut, but this is a dollars and cents business. Plus the more trees I leave the better the job looks when you are done anyhow. LO's take notice that "It doesn't look that bad"  when I get done. I know this sounds crass but that's the way it goes around here. If left up to me I would not cut much less than a 20" dbh tree anyway. The only market we have available to us is for sawlogs, and after about 12" at the tip you ain't makin' no dinero on sawlogs.

you got a grade or veneer market i hope

[KyLogger]

Oh yeah....we do. As well as stave logs. I was merely referring to the fact that there is no market for chips, pulp, poles etc.... and barely..............barely........a pine market (sometimes)

[SwampDonkey]

Nothing to do with Tom's situation, but tree length skidding does not have to tear the land up or the residual trees. Just takes someone trained and experienced to do the job in the proper manner. On this site we were on 85 acres of hardwood with removal of aspen and fir and thin hardwood. There was road wood and I measured 5 acres spread hither and yon on small patches that was complete removal (aspen-fir). This is marked, trails and trees. Obvious trees in a trail all go. It was all cable skid tree length. We made two entries in consecutive winters (Feb-March).

Before, obviousy thick sugar maple.



A couple years later in smaller wood.



And the lines weren't trashed either, by dropping trees over the line or cutting the line down that some like to do, allbeit illegal.



That's the painted line and a trail beside. And yes those maple there are thinned as much as they were going to be, so we didn't high grade the big wood. There wasn't big hardwood to begin with. A 14" incher would be a real big one. But stem count was high.

I wasn't the cutter or the skidder man, I was the guy in charge. ;)

[treeslayer2003]

Oh yeah....we do. As well as stave logs. I was merely referring to the fact that there is no market for chips, pulp, poles etc.... and barely..............barely........a pine market (sometimes)

pulp is to low for me here........big pine [8on a load] is ok but not what it was..........small pine.....let um grow.

[BargeMonkey]

 Hemlock pulp doesnt pay to bad, wouldnt wanna do it to survive but it helps pay the fuel. Pine pulp after i pay the trucking would break the bank, even if i was getting it for free. We take the hardwood right down to 2-3".  If i can get a 12' stick of firewood its getting a choker, every stick i can get out of top goes out, we will do alot of 12" stove wood and it works great for that.

[dustintheblood]

SwampDonkey, that's a job well done!  A much as our friend has a tale of carnage to show, it can't be forgotten that there are many, many good operators out there, and what you showed is a great example.

We just moved back home to Ontario after a two year project in Amherst.  Wish I'd had a chance to see your work before we came back.

[KyLogger]

We do have a hardwood pulp yard or two that one of the sawmills opened up. Buys it, then resells and trucks to Mead Westvaco up in Chillicothe. But it only pays $23 a ton. Numbers don't add up for hauling on a single axle. I think most guys that do take the paperwood are giving the LO about $3/ton.

[SwampDonkey]

CND $55/metric tonne ($50 short tons) or US dollars $43/ton delivered. The mill is 25 miles from here.

Chester in Lincoln, Maine pays about US $49/ton. Land owners around here getting about $10-12/ton.

[OneWithWood]

Most definitely, but it does not pay to take em' outta the woods. Logging in our area is not done for holistic purposes, money is the motivator for the landowner. There are definitely some cull trees that should be cut, but this is a dollars and cents business. Plus the more trees I leave the better the job looks when you are done anyhow. LO's take notice that "It doesn't look that bad"  when I get done. I know this sounds crass but that's the way it goes around here. If left up to me I would not cut much less than a 20" dbh tree anyway. The only market we have available to us is for sawlogs, and after about 12" at the tip you ain't makin' no dinero on sawlogs.

This sounds like a recipe for high grading and laying waste to a woodlot that will not recover in less than a century.  As a landowner this is one of the most significant reasons I use a consulting forester.  It is a dollars and sense business for the landowner as well as the logger/mill.  A carefully marked harvest, with the next couple of harvests in mind, adds more dollars to everybody's pocket over time.  The real challenge is to increase the thinking time-line for everyone in the equation.  One of the things I am fond of pointing out when I am addressing a group on the issue of forest health and sustainability is that woods people in the know think in decades and centuries, whereas the bulk of the population think in hours, days or maybe at the outside, a year or two down the road.

[Banjo picker]

Well put OneWithWood.  I have a couple of areas in my woods that Dad let his nephews cut when I was just a kid... they high graded it.  Now it has some real nice black jack on it. :D  Fortunatly its not too big of an area, and I have some pretty nice hard wood... The hundred year mistake is right on.  Banjo

[Jeff]

The recipe for a good harvest and management in my view is simple. Its not what you take, it is what you leave. Even if it is a clearcut, it is what you leave. That might be the right conditions for the new forest to emerge. I'll strongly echo what Robert Woodling, Mr. Onewithwood had to say. Not a better landowner for you to take heed to if you make your money from working with landowners.
OWW goes to Washington 
OWW National Tree Farmer Finalist

This is the simple reason why Tom has been so wronged in this. They have taken with no regard to what they are leaving.  The link earlier to the comparison to the Michigan hardwood harvest should be an eye opener to those that say Tom's job is not so bad or "just logging"  Maybe where you come from, but not here. It is a shame and one of the reasons I started this website.

[OntarioAl]

Jeff
Very well stated I whole heartily agree.
The tragedy in this whole affair is that Tom hired a Forester to protect his interest and he was rolled either through incompetence or other reasons by this fellow. 
Al