Log Prices?

[nativewolf]

To get the white oaks you really need to first check to see if there are any seedling already regenerated in the understory.   If so then it is game on in terms of growing the new oak forests and just give them some sun, cut the junk, harvest as you need.  

  If not then it will require a heavy shelterwood process but you'll want to retain the best genetics, best form, straightest, etc.  You are exactly correct in terms of removing the undesirable trees and that includes the blackgum and red maples.  Drop them and leave them.   White oak bumper crops are irregular and it is really the WO bumper crops that produce the over abundant mast supplies, tricky situation.  You have to retain quite a lot of WO to get a new WO forests or you need the WO regeneration to be there.  Seedling will stay below knee high for up to 30 years just slowly poking along, getting browsed and regrowing. Just waiting to explode in the sun.

We've got one stand now that looks like it has cabbage growing the oaks are so thick.  

[mike_belben]

My observation has been that any WO above the browse line but under a closed canopy is already split into a multi leader umbrella reaching sideways and twisting around for little patches of sun, that i dont see much future in.   I just dozer cull the whole patch so that soil distubance brings up a thicket of all species at once in order to feed the deer and maybe let a few oaks slip by.   Oak doesnt seem to be a first choice in cervids if theres a wide variety of brush. Really bushy regen can get more good WO starts above the browse line.  I push multiple tops into these patches to make it harder for them to clean it out. Sapplings will come up through the obstruction.

[nativewolf]

Just drive over the seedling or hit them with some fire or whack them.  They will quickly express apical dominance.  

[ehp]

have to see how bad this rain is going to be but most likely will go once I see what the ground is like and start cutting this junk beech 

[OH logger]

I agree with what Mike said about the firewood business being good for the health of the woods.   I have a firewood processor to feed and I try to give it a steady diet of cull trees. There seems to be plenty and I can't get em all cut and still feed my family but I do put a dent in em when I'm logging out the good quality trees. 

[SwampDonkey]

That's all I cut when thinning is junk and trail wood for firewood and corduroy rails. I need to get more light in to, the undergrowth is nil, not even a hazel bush.

[mudfarmer]

I tried to work with a couple new buyers this year because trucking was a big issue. We could not make it work on either end but they were nice guys and hope to do business in the future. Thankfully got hooked up with another good trucker, I want to keep this guy and the one with the lowboy happy for sure 

[Hogdaddy]

Would any of y'all venture to guess what white oak will do for the rest of the year?

[ehp]

It will be good, normally would drop in the summer months from heat but it might drop abit  but just the same it could easily go up more, your on good ground so your white oak should be fairly close to mine in growth but not in color as I'm on pretty white sand . No one has any good stuff , the veneer mills in the USA are screaming at us to produce more here , if your cutting good stuff news travels fast and they will find you 

[ehp]

they should be beating OH Logger door down on his house wanting his stuff , its quite bad , they got the orders to fill but no product to fill the orders

[OH logger]

They'll take all I can cut.  Sawmill inventory is low around here too.  We're in the middle of farm country here and most all woodlots were pastured at one time. So some lots have a decent amount of staining in the wood.   But in the right area with a little bit of roll to the ground they get way better. White oak sure don't seem to wanna regenerate though 

[ehp]

We got a fair bit of white oak here but to get the right to cut them seems to be harder than most places , lots of it will die here which is a shame

[mike_belben]

I think white oak prices have achieved a point of being driven not by weather or work ethic but simple scarcity.  Theres no more hidden hollars without cel acess holding thousands of acres of it just waiting to be discovered by out of state revenuers.

  The regions that grow it best are picked clean.  Whoever still has it either doesnt need the money or until recently hasnt had enough volume to get the equipment moved in.   But now single trees are worth buying, because finding one is better than none.  

I have a veneer buyer coming monday to look at one tree. 2 guys stopped by this morning that are cutting about 2 acres for my neighbor who wants to extend pasture into some junk woods. They brought in a skidder and knuckleboom for nothing but pallet wood at $40/ton. I said how you making any money on that. They said we arent.   id told her id push it over and burn it for $125/hr but am busy for a few months. She found 2 guys foolish enough to pay her.  If she wants it stumped now its gonna cost 2x as much. 

[Nealm66]

Starting a pole job next week. Been quite a process. They don't typically mark poles anymore since everything went mechanized and the computer lets them know if it qualifies or not so I followed the pole buyer around and hugged a bunch of them trying to see what he was seeing. Thinking I'm on the same page but he's going to come out after I get a load decked and give them a look see and mark some more. These are 100 year old Doug fir and some will be 105-125' so waiting on the truck owner to do a site inspection to see how he wants them decked etc. $1400 segment scale. Got some pics in my gallery cutting one down but can't seem to get it on here. Really have to approach cutting these differently and treat them like eggs

[Nealm66]

Here's one 

[Nealm66]

These were cull trees I cut a while back but a good representation of the stand 

[Nealm66]

I should add that these pay about $5-600 per thousand better than the top dollar export markets so worth the trouble 

[Hogdaddy]

Getting back to the subject of mills buying in front of loggers.. they sold the boundary i was telling you guys about. About 55 acres that had been high graded in the center of it, a lot of beech and hickory left. The way I looked at it I thought there would be 15-17 acres of good timber with a lot of big white oak scattered though it, not much had been cut out of it. The rest, like I said was hickory, beech, hard maple with WO and ash scattered in it. It brought $300k. A mill bought it. 

[ehp]

Good log prices keep going higher but that should stop here shortly , veneer buyers are coming from everywhere looking to buy logs  but I do not cut great stuff so not looking for me , 3 bushes sold here last week for over $300,000 and not very many trees , one was only 70 trees and went for $326,000 and NO I didnot even look at any of them . With the market the way it is I try to stay $100,000 or less incase she crashes so I'm happy cutting this lesser great stuff and keeping the heat , lights on and everyone belly full of food 

[Hogdaddy]

Geeezzz! 326,00 for 70 trees??!! Wow, that has never happened in my area.  Yall's timber must be worth a lot more than we have.  If you cut some decent white oak, could you take a picture of the wood? I would like to see if I can see the difference in the timber.. @ehp   Do you know how many feet were in the 70 trees?

[Southside]

That comes out to about 2X per tree more than folks get per acre here....and that's a clear cut.

[SwampDonkey]

Before the big crash here around 2005, when things were flying high, some stumpage was going for $2000/acre up here. That was for woodlots 50 acres and more in size not little 10 acre building lots. That is lump sum and was up to the logger to get the most out of his wood. Normal stumpage at the time was around $500-600/acre. The frenzie was about 2 years long. Nothing ever since that came close to that.

[ehp]

Those 70 trees were walnut and some had 800 ft of veneer in them , count on 10 grand a tree but may not get that , I have cut walnut worth that before just not at that amount of trees , white oak  here is averaging $5/ft for veneer in USA coin, , I do cut a few veneer each week , I'm old and slow and work by myself and I'm not pushing myself hardly at all 

[ehp]

I pay on normal timber that is not white oak, hard maple, walnut or big white pine about $1500 to $3000 per acre on very select cut , On clear cuts that I have done you get some pretty good numbers per acre , 20 to 25 grand per acre is not out of the question and if good timber its more than that 

[Southside]

That's amazing