USFS as a log source

[Gary_C]

Good to hear from you again Rocky Ranger.  I hope you have made some progress in your marketing and utilization efforts. 

I think you are being too kind to our Congress. I just saw where the overall approval rating for Congress is lower than Pres Bush's.  :

[Snag]

Nice job Getoverit.  Congrats on your success.  Now dont forget to post some pics of those logs when you get them.

Thanks for the post Rocky Ranger.  Its always nice to hear different angle of a situation.

[kderby]

A local forester had an observation I want to share.

He says, "The US Forest Service and the forest resources in its charge are being managed by courts, public opinion and emotion."

He is disgusted by the position that professional foresters are not allowed to access and address forest health and production issues.  The "screens" in place effectively cripple competent and concerned land managers.  He used the analogy that if you had to ask public opinion and not a surgeon, the out come of your medical condition might not be what you had hoped.

This is a choice that the USFS has made.  Lack of leadership is a huge part of this.  The agency has become lost.  I do not know the outcome but I do know it is broken.  The largest majority of the agency personnel understand it is broken.  (There is a dirty little secret inside the agency.  A significant portion of the employees are happy to not have any timber sold.  They still get paid just as much to say "no" as to say "yes".)  For the people with a managerial work ethic, they have learned not to be a loose cannon on a rudderless ship.  It is a tough place to work and has been for a while.

I started this thread because I wanted to hear from people in areas not owned in the majority by USFS.  The effect they have here is profound because USFS manages millions of acres.  They talk about supporting the rural economy and managing a renewable resource while "Caring for the land and serving the people.  They are accomplishing little of either.  I continue to be deeply distressed by the complete inability or refusal to sell a few trees.  If I was looking to demolish vast tracts of prime timber, my concern would be baseless.  I am just asking to buy a few blown down fir or bug killed pine.  The answer is "No."  (I got a call this week from a forest service employee who wants to build a log cabin and the USFS people in the local office told him to call me.  They couldn't sell him any logs.) 

For as long as they are locked in this pathetic spiral of looking busy while the "renewable resource" is untouchable I will push  and cajole.  If you get a chance, say something nice to a USFS employee.  Then, wonder if the agency can redeem itself. I wonder if  USFS should just be melded into another natural resource agency.  At least then the National Park and Forest Service would be honest within its mandate and its actions.

Cheers to all.

KD

[beenthere]

Your local forester is right, in a small nutshell.  These courts are crippling many good decisions attempted by caring people in many different avenues, not just the US National Forests.

However, your complaint or frustration that they should sell you a few trees is much bigger and more complicated than just your analysis of the situation.  If the employees could get the US timber for their own use, then it would be chaos in short order. Trees would suddenly show up 'dead' and in need of removal. Same would go for an employee's friends who want trees. Then you, a non employee and a 'non-friend' of an employee would still be on the short end - without a snow-balls chance to get the few trees you want.

Bottom line, are some very strict rules are in place because of abuse over the years, as to what procedures must be followed to get dead trees, used equipment, surplus equipment, etc from the Gov't. It's much deeper than you realize, but the end result certainly does seem rediculous on first blush. Don't lose any sleep over it. 

[getoverit]

I agree with beenthere. The court system is a problem for many things, not just the USFS.

The post I made earlier in this thread was not meant to try to hijack the thread, but as a suggestion for trying a different approach to getting what you desire, possibly from the USFS. You never know until you try?

[mur]

Excellent discussions and insights on this thread.  We don't have the USFS to deal with... only the BCFS.  The British Columbia Forest Service.  Different country - same attitude.
Many of the same ideas and attitudes though apply to both parties.  USFS is possibly a bit more tree huggy due to your court/environmental processes.  The BCFS here basically funnels fibre into the large corporations.  The big boys control over 85% of our fibre basket.  Basically, about 7 companies control the wood and the BCFS "works" with and for them.  Little people like me get the NO, NO, NO response at the main counter of the Forest Service.  I get around it partially by buying a lot of my product from sawmillers who are larger than me.  They too have trouble with acquiring fibre but we seem to stumble along.   Alliances are important.  Hard to run a business when you have to compete with Canfor for logs. 
So, you have to play the cracks here and stay small enough to stay off the radar screen.  Wish it wasn't like this but that's the reality. 

[kderby]

Hey Getoverit,

I appreciate your perspective.  I am giving it some thought.  there is mention of stewardship agreements and I am watching the USFS andBLM develop the concept.

I had the thought today that this culture is similar to the reclusive Eccentric Howard Hughs.  Wonderfully full of potential.  Lots to offer.  Hung up on dirty finger nails and the potential for unkempt results.  We want every thing safe, balanced and clean.  From meat wrapped in plastic to the children not allowed to play out of doors.  Who am I to advocate an elk carcass in the shed or a child playing in a mud puddle full of tadpoles? 

Timber sales always look like a mess to the untrained eye.  The broken branches and disturbed soil jump out at you.  With experience we learn that the exposed soils is actually a seed bed for a new generation.  The broken branch is mulch. 

As a culture we are correct to recognize that we can not cut all the trees they ask for all the time.  How or when do we also learn that on a 1.2 million acre National Forest, There is enough productivity to allow a local rancher to cut some corral poles.

There needs to be a movement that is not bassakwards.  A "Movement" that recognizes that it is ok to manually turn soil in a garden if you do not have a name brand roto-tiller imported from overseas.  This applies to forestry because our ability to interact with and harvest the fundamental forest product...a tree, is at risk.  Any of us with experience in the wood knows that you can create a tree recovery event and leave the area looking like a city park.  The economics of that recovery effort you are soon out of business.  That is not an argument for rape and run forestry it is an argument for balance.  The balance requires leadership and the USFS has lost its focus on balance and leadership in my esteemed and now repetitive opinion.

Thank you again for listening.  I will quiet down now and stick to my knitting.  Plenty to do even if the opportunity that USFS lands present is not available to me.

regards,

KD

[solodan]

Hey kderby,

I also live in an area that is about 90% USFS land. Small sales are pretty easy to come by in my area, but I have never got a straight answer to the question you originally asked. Which the way I undersood it was, "what about wind fall and deadfall trees?" Until I get an answer this is what I will continue to do. I cut all of my mantels, flooring, shelving, doorway beams, or whatever short stock I need, from these downed trees. Then I use personal fuelwood load tags. As long as everything is cut under 6' I am within the law. I have loaded 6 foot logs, and 6 foot demesional lumber. I have never been stopped or questioned. I would rather take this material in 16 footers, but I would still need to cut stuff short for some of the custom work I do. Ask about the cull of some of the big sales. sometimes good logs get left behind as cull for one reason or another, like not being able to get more than a 1/4 of a load. These logs have already been paid for by someone else and many times the larger looging outfits will let you take these logs.

[SwampDonkey]

Ask about the cull of some of the big sales. sometimes good logs get left behind as cull for one reason or another, like not being able to get more than a 1/4 of a load. These logs have already been paid for by someone else and many times the larger looging outfits will let you take these logs.

Probably still need some form of permit, otherwise who'd know of the source when your passing through USFS lands.

[solodan]

SwampDonkey,

Either you can get load tags from the outfit that bought the sale, or sometimes the USFS willl just give you load tags.

[Tillaway]

You can buy logs off service contracts that have embedded timber sales on USFS sales in region 5 and maybe region 6 too.  The logger gets the service contract (defensible fuel profile zone.. say) and buys the estimated wood fiber at a lump sum of $.75 per 100 cubic feet.  They can sell to whoever they want as long as the logs are not exported.  The logger will supply the USFS load ticket and the logs will be branded and painted according to the sale contract specs.  Logs hauled in Oregon require four readable brands to be legal.  No load tickets are legally required however most sale contracts ,   public and private, require them.   

The stewardship contracts might be a good source for logs, see who gets them and if it is not a big company you might have a good chance of purchasing logs.  The big outfits that usually get them have quite a bit of bureaucracy so selling a few logs to an individual is pretty much impossible.  It would cost them more to try to account for the sale than the logs are worth.  I have sold one large firm a small pulp sale and getting a check issued was quite a process.

[kderby]

 smiley_turkey_dancing

Well here I am again.  I went to look at a "Timber Sale."  Some time back I went to the two local National Forests (Ochoco and Malheur).  They cover millions of acres of public land.  I asked to legitimately buy a single blown down pine tree.  I was told "No" in a courteous manner by each National Forest. ;D  They suggested I look at upcoming sales like this one.  Fair enough and I have purchased sales similar to this in the past.

Well, this was at the sorry end of defining a timber sale.  Few needles left on the dry and rotten trees.  The bark had slipped on most.  The two green trees in the sale had severe frost cracks, sweep and forked tops. 

I am not sure if I am insulted or still just sad.  No one who cared about natural resources would advise an owner of millions of acres to refuse to sell even one tree.  Or reccomend that they allow the forest to become dangerously over stocked with stressed, dead and dying trees.  Trying to market trees after they are rotten, what type of management is that?  I am surrounded by it and I feel both sad and insulted.

Usually I tell my self if I want something to "improve" I should go home and look in a mirror.  That keeps me minding my own business.  But these are the nations forests.  I do not want to join the polarized forces that mine wilderness or hug every bush.  I do wish that reasoned leadership would erupt spontaneously somewhere in the USFS and that it would be supported by the courts and administration.  Now I shall, for a while, go mind my own business.

Cheers from Kendall