dying tamarack

[frozen]

Greeting and best wishes to everyone - a new member checking in.

I have a problem of dying tamarack trees, a few acres of it, probably planted some 20 years ago. The trees have been attacked by a bark beetle and are dying one by one, some still OK, many sick and a number already dropping. Since saving the healthy ones would not be practical anymore, I want to at least put the wood to good use. People are telling me it is good for burning, as good as hardwood, so perhaps this could be an option. There is little lumber potential here, as most are only in 6 inch range. I do not want any money, only someone to come, cut, clean up the mess and use the wood before it rots (not necessarily all at once). It is becoming quite urgent, since I can see the whole mess from my front yard. I wonder how to go about finding someone interested and perhaps even invite the big machines to take the trees for pulp or whatever. What to do?

I am hoping other fellow New Brunswickers will see this post (I am in the Sackville area).

Thanks

[Mark Wentzell]

I would maybe try contacting your local marketing board. They'll have staff that should be able to help you and also should be able to help you find a logger. If you're in westmorland county I think that is under the southern new brunswick marketing board but I'm not sure. Tamarack does burn quite nicely so you shouldn't have much trouble getting rid of it as firewood, there's not much of a pulp market for it.

[beenthere]

frozen
Welcome to the Forestry Forum.

Sorry to hear about your tamarack trees dying.
Hope you find someone to use the wood. However, what do you mean by "clean up the mess" ?? 
i.e. there will be tops, small branches, stumps, etc. after the usable wood is removed. Or is that what you mean by "the mess"?

[thecfarm]

Frozen,welcome to the forum. A few acres might be hard for a company to do.Might take longer to move and set up the equipment than it would take to cut it all.  Too bad you could not find someone to use it for firewood,would work great in a outdoor wood boiler. I take it you don't burn wood? Having someone take the firewood and just saw up in short pieces the limbs,you would be surprised how quick it goes into the ground.

[chester_tree _farmah]

Tamarack pulp is going for about 13.50 per thousand lbs in ME. U can mix it with hemlock if that helps any?

[KBforester]

Eastern Maine is in a Quarantine zone (European Larch Canker) I doubt you could move it over the boarder. I don't know if Canada has a Quarantine or not. I burn larch almost exclusively, indoors.

I too have a small outbreak of Larch Beetle. They look fine one minute, and the next it looks like the bark exploded. I'm just concentrating my firewood efforts their. Any lumber is going to have worm holes. Around here, we have no markets for it except biomass.

[frozen]

Thanks you all for advice. Yes, I meant the branches and the tops sticking out, hoping the logger would cut it down to smaller chunks so they rot faster. And be careful enough not to rip the lawn too much (the access is across the lawn), but that may not be possible to avoid.

I keep looking for a local fire wood seller, but so far the response was minimal and I am afraid in a year or two there will be nothing to save. It is true the few acres is nothing for a larger operator.

I plan to plant cedar there after the tamarack is gone.

[thecfarm]

tamarack,hackamatack?,losses it's needles in the fall and look yellow before they fall off? That biggger stuff might be around for a while. I just cut up one about a foot across for firewood that has been on the ground for years. I got tired of it being in the way when I go through there.

[chester_tree _farmah]

Yup that's it. Larch but local names are Tamarack and Hackmatack.

[KBforester]

"Juniper" is another name used in Washington and Aroostook county (Maine). I wish people would just call it Larch. Such variation is ridiculous.

[snowstorm]

the story i heard many years ago was that some larch was imported from Europe to build the docks in eastport and that was how it started. any truth to that?

[chester_tree _farmah]

"Juniper" is another name used in Washington and Aroostook county (Maine). I wish people would just call it Larch. Such variation is ridiculous.

Yeah and White Cedar is actually a juniper and not a true cedar. It is in the  Cypress family.

[thecfarm]

Juniper,never heard it called that,but I am not in those counties talking to many loggers either.
My Father had some sawn and was put for a floor in the garage. Was a big garage,40'X60'. We stored hay on that floor. The boards was nice and smooth,from years of baled hay. It was build in a wet hole and started to lean,BAD. We tore it down and I built a deck with a roof over in at my other house. I used the floorboards for the floor on the deck.