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Marking Trees

Started by Good Feller, May 04, 2008, 07:38:43 PM

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Good Feller

How do you guys mark trees for harvest?  Is there a standard?  If there are 100 oaks and 75 walnuts that you want to harvest do you go through and just number them 1,2,3,.....100 for the oaks and 1,2,3.....75 for the walnuts???   Do you mark all 4 sides of the tree?  Do you spray on them the board foot volume estimate?  What about skid trails, property lines, hazard trees, and trees you absolutely do not want cut or any other special conditions?

If you had 50 acres of trees to mark where do you start and finish????  Seems like it would get confusing.  Just zig zag north and south or east and west..... which ever is easiest walking????  Would you want your marks on the up and downhill side of the trees?  Thanks a lot guys you have been a big help!
Good Feller

Ron Wenrich

Marking trees sometimes depends on the size and shape of the tract.  If it is a really large area, I would set them up into cutting blocks.  You can use some sort of natural boundary, such as a ravine, a stream, an old logging road, or whatever is handy.  But, for small jobs of less than 100 acres, I'd mark the tract as one unit.

You want at least 3 paint marks on the tree.  One is put on the stump, below you cutting line.  That way anyone will be able to see that the tree has been marked for removal.  Always put the paint somewhere where it won't get rubbed off. Any indentation will do.

You can mark with either a slash or a spot.  I always used spots, but a lot of guys are using slashes.  You want to mark the tree on both the uphill and downhill sides.  They should be visible from all sides.

The best procedure is to select the tree to be marked.  Go to the tree and measure the diameter, preferably with a diameter tape.  Mark the tree and move on to your next area.  After you get about 50-100 feet away, look back and estimate the number of 16' logs in the tree, for sawtimber.  For pulpwood, you can use 4' bolts.  Then mark it down in your tally book.  Your tally book should be set up in 1" or 2" diameter classes.  Most guys use 2".  Your tally book will also be set up in the number of logs per tree - 1, 1½, 2, etc.  I never went over 4 log trees and that was mainly in tulip poplar, pine and hemlock.  Use a dot tally to mark the trees in your book.

There is no need to number the trees.  I've only seen that done one time on a high quality veneer job where there were a number of guys trying to out guess each other.  Never mark footage on the tree.  All you figuring is going to be done in the office.

As you start marking, you do it in strips.  Follow the terrain.  Don't go up and down hills, or you'll be shot before lunch.  I always started at a back corner and followed the boundary line, which should be marked before you start any marking.  Work a couple of hundred foot wide strip.  When you get to the end, turn around and mark the next strip.

In the office, you'll take the number of trees by each diameter and height and species to figure up your volume.  You can break the volume down any way you want.  Some guys will seperate volumes by size class.  That can be beneficial for bidding purposes, since trees of certain diameters will only yield certain grades of logs.  Veneer is very hard to get in trees less than 18" dbh, for example.

In the end, you'll have a spec sheet that states there are so many trees of which species, and their respective volumes.  Don't be afraid to mark trees that have little or no value.  If they have no value now, they probably won't in years to come. 

Cull trees are those with less than 1/2 the volume in defect, usually from rot.  Those trees are marked with an "X" and no volume is given to them.  They should either be girdled or cut.  Hazard trees you might want to mark with an arrow to remind you what you have seen during marking.  Trees you don't want cut should have no marks on it.  Property lines and skid trails can be marked with surveyor ribbon.  Use florescent for the lines, and a different color for the skid trails.   No need to paint lines, especially if you aren't a surveyor. 
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Good Feller

Ron,

Just curious why foresters wouldnt number them????  Wouldn't that make it easier for organizational purposes?  Like if you need to go back in your notes and see how much bdft a certain marked tree had, the dbh, what kind of quality, or other notes you had about that specific tree,  etc.... 

What does an arrow have to do with marking a hazard tree?  Do you mean an arrow pointing up to remind you that there are dead branches above? 

Thanks so much!!!! 8)
Good Feller

Ron Wenrich

Yes, the arrow would point to the hazard.

Unless you're in some really high quality trees and you're bidding some really high prices, numbering trees just isn't worth the time and effort.  Besides, you might have a sale that has over 1,000 trees.  That's a lot of paint and time. 

Only procurement foresters bid on trees.  Consultants just mark the timber and put it out on sale.  They generally conduct a tour of the area.  Some loggers will say that during the tour, the forester will take them past the best trees and they won't see the poor quality.  Most guys will go back in after the tour and walk the entire area.  Some loggers will ask how you scale trees, and they can figure out how good your numbers are. 
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Cedarman

Just finished a job that had 1683 marked cedars on 27 acres.  Some were 6".  That would be fun to number those. :D :D This was a state job.  I am trying to convince the foresters that boundary sale is only way to go, like pine.  The foresters were easily convinced, but the higher ups have to deal with people that can't understand cutting 6" trees makes sense.

All trees were marked with a paint gun on 2 sides and the base. 
I am in the pink when sawing cedar.

Gary_C

Here is a picture of a MN DNR job. The forester that marked this job has a lot of experience marking this type of sale.



Notice the tree with the large L and the mark at the base is what he scaled as a log. He will also put a V on a tree he believes is a veneer log. The others with the line or slash are pulp logs and only the larger pulp logs get a mark at the bottom.

Here is another picture that shows the marking system he uses.


These DNR sales are sold at auction and are sold either as "sold as appraised" or a "scaled" sale. In general you can expect about 10-15 % over this foresters scale but you bid based on your own guess as an overrun is not sure. On some of the scaled sales, some foresters will be as much as 50% short on their scale and some foresters on a pine thinning that is not marked will make estimates that are 50% or more too low even on a sold as appraised sale because they do not want to take the time to make a better estimate.
Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.

Ron Wenrich

That's not a bad system.  The only drawback is making a veneer determination on a standing tree.  I assume they don't guarantee any veneer volumes.  Has this worked pretty well, or is it mainly dependent of forester experience?

When I was doing procurement work, I played around with marking and grading on my tally.  That should give you an idea of the estimated value of the trees.  But, nature is full of all sorts of surprises that you see in a log that you don't see when scaling a tree.
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

woodtroll

Ron has hit it pretty good.
I do not mark veneer or any any thing specific, just cut or cull, you can tally it for your own estimate (guess) as to what your sale should bring. It is up to the buyer to figure what it is worth. They will decide how close your cruise is. When they get use to your cruising they may rely more on it, weather you estimate high or low ect. Just stay consistent. After they log see how much of the trees they really took. See what the loggers in your area take as merchantable.
For bid information you may put the number of veneer trees that you thought you found, it may make your sale more appealing.  Definitely tree species, #of trees marked, and estimated volume. Maybe average tree volume per tree species.

As far as hazards, it is a curtacy to mark them, bee trees, wire, ect. 

Gary_C

Quote from: Ron Wenrich on May 05, 2008, 04:36:34 PM
The only drawback is making a veneer determination on a standing tree.  I assume they don't guarantee any veneer volumes.  Has this worked pretty well, or is it mainly dependent of forester experience?


This system works very well for this particular forester as he has a lot of years of experience in this area, but no, there are no guarantees. Very few of the other foresters will mark so the logger can see which trees were scaled as veneer, you just have to guess.

Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.

Ron Scott

I paint a ring around the tree at breast height and slash a stump mark to the ground with a spot. The logger's here like the painted ring at breast height since they can see the trees to be cut from all sides and it helps in there falling pattern with less damage and skinning of the leave trees.

The timber buyers also like it as they can easily see what they are bidding on from all angles. I may paint a "V" on a tree if it is an obvious veneer tree just to give awareness to it, but the buyer and logger need to determine and process their own quality and grade during the harvest.   
~Ron

Corley5

Good Feller,
  What did they teach you in forestry school  ???  Don't they have courses on marking trees and handling timber sales as part of the degree  ???
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

Ron Wenrich

They didn't when I went to school.  Back then, they figured we'd get on the job training, since the government was the main employer of foresters.  Then came a recession and government hiring was over.  You needed a masters degree just to get a job as a technician, and then you also needed a couple of years in the military for extra points.

That left only industry to get training as a procurement forester.  Most of the really large companies weren't hiring.  I worked as a survey technician, choker setter, a pole inspector, and a mill hand before I got anything related to forestry work.  The mill hand led to being a mill foreman and log scaler.  Then, I got to be a procurement forester where I learned about marking timber with another experienced forester.  We eventually had our own consulting business.  The recession in the early '80s put the whammy on our consulting partnership.  We survived through the high interest years of the late '70s, but couldn't get over the hump. 

What happens to guys that don't get the on the job training is that they put out a shingle and start up a business.  Its an uphill climb from there. 
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Good Feller


You would think that some lessons on marking trees would be something obvious for forestry school.  Everyone knows how school is,,,, they don't teach you much that you can really use.  They teach you how to learn though.  It's like what's the point in taking Calculus?  It's to make you think.  If you can figure that crap out then you can figure anything out. 
Marking trees isn't rocket science so we didn't spend anytime on it.  You spray a couple lines on the tree you want cut.  If I wasn't such a perfectionist I wouldn't have asked you guys how to do it.  I just want to do everything right.  I want to know how the experienced do it.  I have never had a chance to do on the job training and since I couldn't find a job with the DNR I figured I'll just make my own work and be my own boss. 
Good Feller

Ron Scott

We had some basic training in timber marking during Michigan Tech's forestry summer camp at the Ford Forestry Center in Alberta, MI in 1958. The mill was also running there back then. Now it's a museum. We marked timber, prepared a sale on the 4000 acre school property at Alberta and watched logs sawed at the mill.

Got much more intensive on the job training with the USFS after leaving Michigan Tech. The work was checked and rechecked with strong performance elements. ;)
~Ron

Riles

No training on marking at LaTech, as recently as 2007. Lots of discussions on selection, but nothing focused like you would expect from an industry standpoint. Probably best that way.

Ron, the state of NC is moving to prohibit anyone other than a registered forester (or employee of) from doing forestry work for profit. That's going to eliminate all the beginner "shingle hangers." I'm already prohibited from calling myself a forester. Unfortunately, not too many people hiring 46 year old beginners.
Knowledge is good -- Faber College

Ron Wenrich

In PA, you don't even need a degree to call yourself a forester.  We had one forester around here who graduated from 8th grade before he went to the mill.  We also have several people that do forestry work, but don't bill themselves as foresters.  They will mark timber and put it up for sale. 

I was in the first class at Penn State that didn't have a summer camp.  What little practicum work that we got was from field trips that would last for 1 or 2 afternoons a week and it was a 10 week course. 
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

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