I need lots of advice

[Luckyfarmer]

I have been offered 1,000,000 bf of pallet.  cottonwood on an island, on the Missouri river at Herman Mo.  There is 150 yards of river to the island..  These trees are so big only a swing mill will work and afraid to saw on the island due to flooding.  any ides on this


thanks

[Frank_Pender]

Get a BIG chopper?  Or, a taller tower yarder on the mainland.

[Jeff]

The first thing you need to look into are environmental concerns on working around the river. Things just ain't the way they used to be. Check with your local department of resources to see what all these concerns may be. They may be immense.

[kderby]

I agree with Frank!  
Think Big!
Make it pencil handsomly!
Host a swing mill convention?
Find a market for your waste!
If you manage the process, set up reasonable bites and accomplish them with a competent team this can be a great leap forward!!!

Success lies where the fearful dare not tread!

I know these are platitudes and there is a lot more to it then I understand.  That does not mean I hold back on any degree of hope or support.  I see yarders and helicopters working timber on a regular basis and know that it is big but it is possible.

As always...show pictures to the rest of us!!

KD

[beenthere]

.....been offered 1,000,000 bf of pallet.  cottonwood on an island.......

What is "pallet. cottonwood"   ???

Sounds like a choice of moving logs off or sawing between 'floods' and moving lumber off the island.  Can you get a barge across the river to easily move in a mill and move out lumber?  If you have to move off all the slabs and sawdust per enviro rules, so the flood doesn't clean house for you, that will be more work and expense.

[Luckyfarmer]

right now there is only three feet of water, river is low. we are waiting on word about cleaning up

[Captain]

Seems it may be easier to move logs across the river than a sawmill and individual boards??  Unless moving the logs on the island is the problem...

Captain

[beenthere]

Depends on what one has to move stuff around.  :
A row boat could move the mill in and the lumber out (sure, a lot of trips) but wouldn't move out a cottonwood log.   ;D

[Ron Wenrich]

We had one outfit that floated logs out by boat.  I'm not sure how they got their skidder to the island, and may have drove it over during low water.

We also have had situations where guys simply drove across creeks with their trucks.  A lot depends on the river bed.  If its all stone, then you have a few other options.  Better check with your fish commission or whoever enforces waterway laws.

If the island floods, what are you going to do with the tops?

[ARKANSAWYER]

  There is a reason them trees are still on that island.  The going rate for pallet stock is around 26 to 30 cents a bdft.   You will not be allowed to saw with in 100 ft of the river nor fell timber in that green belt.   Unless there is some high dollar oak or walnut there will not be much money to be made which is why the timber is on the island.   It would be more profitable if you went in and felled a few trees and slabbed out thick chuncks and floated them out.   If I remember right Cotton wood is like sickymore and does not float green like some other trees.

[jpgreen]

Sounds like a Missouri boat ride..  ;D

[UNCLEBUCK]

Tie a bunch of good floating logs together for your hauling rig and get 200 yards of lightweight aircraft cable for pulling . Unless like Arky and everyone says .  In canada my dad made a plywood barge for next to nothing and put a 25 horse johnson on it and we hauled alot of lumber in it up and down 7 miles of bad river, never even painted it , pl-400 and sheetrock screws , 2x4's and plywood , that was it  :

[highpockets]

Success lies where the fearful dare not tread!

Don't you love that thought ?    The older I get the more lightly I tread. 

Good luck.

[Percy]

 I dont know what the "enviro" regs are like around your area but up here in Canada, B.C. to be more specific, I think you can be fined for breaking wind too close to a fish bearing stream/river/body of watter/fish tank/toilet  :D :D :D Like Arky says, there is a reason that the big guys havent gobbled it up. Now if you can figure a way, jumpin thru all the hoops and all, to make a buck at it, youll be dancin.....builda better mousetrap....... ;D

[Luckyfarmer]

  My partner on this came by today after talking with the corp..The island is private owned and they told him we could do what ever we wanted.  He claims they have nothing to say about private islands.  We can cut on the edge of the bank, we can cut the bank down to make it possible to get logs out.  The Forster checked it and he says there is 1,500,000 bf.  He claims he seen many trees that will go over 1000 bf.  This is a timber man's dream

[loudsam]

I like Unclebuck's idea.  The one about using good floating logs to make a sort of barge/raft to float the logs to the main river bank. 

[BBTom]

I sure do hate sawing cattonwood,  I believe it is the wood that requires the sharpest blades.  The bark is super stringy and slimey, but if you really want to do this.  I think that If there was a place to set it up, a big winch on the mainland would drag those logs across that 150 yds of river lickity split. 

[Luckyfarmer]

Uncle Buck, we are going with your idea.  I found out tonight this man also has 110 acres of big beautiful white oak and walnut.  Everyone has tried getting the 110 a but who ever finds a way to cut the island gets the good cutting 8)

[Ron Wenrich]

Just out of curiosity, have you ever undertaken a timber sale of this magnitude before?  You're now talking a couple of million bf.

[isassi]

For a novice like me, this project sounds like fun. Wish I was close enough to come help/watch/learn.  ???

[Luckyfarmer]

Joais

I wouldn't know how to begin a project this large.  I am a farmer not a timber cutter.  My partner has many years of timber cutting, I am just the banker on this deal ;D

[TexasTimbers]

Just because I'm paranoid doens't mean everyone isn't out to get me.

I still think if some meddling fed decides you are cutting on a "marshland" or any other thing he wants to categorize it as that he can shut you down pronto. Not to mention mega-fines etc.

I'm not trying to start a constitutional debate, but there is no such thing as de facto private land anymore and hasn't been for a long time, there is only de jure, and that means it's only yours as long as they say it is.

I think you better do some more checking around. Like with the EPA. Because you can invest alot of time and money, and maybe more importantly, alot of hope and dreams into this and one man with a federal badge can hear about it, come out and look, and I gurantee you he/she can find any number of a dizen reasons why they can shut you down and there ain't a DanG thing you can do expcept fight a long, expensive battle for the right tho log on property that doesn't even belong to you. And unless you have a contract with the landowner of course you have no cause of action.

I hope and pray you get to do it, I just think you better do a little more asking.

[jpgreen]

I know a guy that bought a huge piece of property on a river that was sand and gravel.  He figured he would sell off rock materials and without checking with anybody, started selling loader bucket loads.

Well he got shut down to the exstent that they will never ever let him move a shovel full of marterial off the property for not getting the permits in the first place.  The property now is otherwise worthless. He can't even build a house on it...  :

[thecfarm]

I own a meadow that borders a brook.All that grows there is swell grass and white maple.Some kunckle head drove his 4 wheeler across it.Game Warden came up to the house when I was gone and started to give the wife a hard time about us driving a 4 wheeler across the meadow.She said my husband would like to find out who did that too.We don't own a 4 wheeler.Can't even drive a 4 wheeler on your own land.That's bad.

[beenthere]

What would be the reason that you can't drive something on your own land?  Wasn't this your family farm?