cypress

[Tom]

I don't know how true this is although I can see it coming.

Some of my customers saw a fair amount of cypress.  There are two mulch mills in the area and I saw cypress at one of them.  People will buy logs from the mulch mill and I will saw them also.

A customer asked me to saw for him the other day and said that the mulch mill is having trouble getting cypress.  He didn't know where to go to get logs.  

I have always been concerned that the mulch mills were grinding up cypress indiscriminately.  Tops, limbs, bad wood, good wood, lot of saw timber is passing through the grinder because it is easier money than sawing and processing lumber.

Since it is not being planted back to any extent I'm afraid we are going to see the end of cypress sawlogs for 100 years.

It's not just the mulch mills that are to be blamed.

The people who drive the mulch market are the home owners who want to mulch their flower beds.  Many of these people are the same ones who would "spike' a tree or vandalize logging equipment.  Go figure. :-/

[Ron Wenrich]

I would imagine your cypress depletion to be pretty localized.  I know during WWII they depleted all the walnut out of several counties to be used as gunstocks.  But, they grew back.

Industry will deplete a resource as quickly as possible.  They then move on, and the resource will replenish itself.  It's happened all over the Northeast.

This is the primary reason that people are up in arms about chip mills.  We don't have any up here, since the resource isn't as suitable as southern pines.  The industry comes in, gives a few jobs, depletes the resource, then moves on.  

As for the armchair environmentalists, I've heard a lot of them speak.  Most speak from a point of ignorance.  But, we aren't judged by our words, just our actions.  

I like to make as small of an environmental footprint as I can.  Afterall, we're just kinda borrowing this place for a while, and I was always told to leave something borrowed in better shape than what I found it.

[Tom]

I hope your right Ron.  Cypress grows so slow and needs a special place to root.  If we had 50 years of rain and the swamps filled again they may have a better chance.  The past 5 years has been real dry in the Southeast and the loggers have been able to harvest in areas where they couldn't economically get into before.

It just makes tears come to my eyes when I see a 20", perfectly straight, fault free piece of Red Cypress dropped into a tub grinder.

Something else effecting the wood supply down here is the number of loggers who have hung up their hats.  That may have something to do with it too.

[swampwhiteoak]

When I lived in KY I would see cypress swamps occasionally.  Unfortunately most of it had been cut and the swamps filled before my time.  Hopefully not too much more of that goes on (thank you swampbuster act).

Sad to hear good cypress logs are being chipped.  

Unlike most trees I think baldcypress is going to have a hard time regenerating, and we'll never see old growth type logs in abundance.  It just grows too slow and has a hard time regenerating without a good seed source and the proper wet/dry season.

[marc]

I know there are a lot of companies bringing it up from the bottom of lakes and sawing it.

[Tom]

Not as many as you may think, Marc.  The Local and State Governments have gotten evolved and require permits be purchased which give rights to a certain portion of River, Stream or lake to the person with the permit.  Since many of thos old logs down here were lost from Rafts as "sinkers" they have a brand on them of the man who logged them.  The permitted person must make an effort to find the person or family who owns the brand before he can mill the log himself, I understand.  Kind of hard when they were branded over a hundred years ago with a brand that had no registration.  That's kind of like trying to find out who carved the "heart" on the oak tree a hundred years ago.

I is a pretty interesting industry though.  I get all excited about handling stuff that was lost before I was born.  That's why I enjoy metal detecting around old home sites.  Even finding an old axe head is a lot of fun.

[Ron Scott]

Yes, various governments has made it much more difficult and costly to salvage underwater logs. They even take over ownership and require the scale slips.

Also a lot more involvement from environmental groups concerned about underwater habits. Environmental assessments are required in most cases.