yellow pine

[WDH]

Weyerhaeuser, I assume?

Yep.

[Phorester]

"Of course, that was a unusually bad storm"

WDH, we've had those too, but the loblolly didn't suffer any worse than other trees in these really bad ice storms. Some were indeed broken or flattened in these bad storms, but no more so than other tree species.  Can this also be said in the storms you describe, or did the loblollies suffer worse in those bad storms than other species? 

[WDH]

The loblolly got the worst of it, especially the stands that had been 1st thinned within the last 3 years.  The region was out of power for a week or more, so this was not a normal storm.  That may be why the damage was unusually bad.

[Phorester]

Yep, recent thinning makes the ones left more suceptible to ice and snow loads until they grow out a little.  I'm talking about closed stands.  Fortunately with the small amount of pine thinning here we haven't had any stands by heavy ice in the first couple of years after they were thinned.