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Newbie Help Please - Managing my own Woodlot - NOT for timber/profit?

Started by Filson, April 12, 2014, 02:48:59 PM

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Filson

Hello guys/gals,

I'm new to the forum, and tried to use the search function to find information I was looking for, but came up short, so thought I'd ask, hopefully this is the right place (mods, feel free to move if needed). I thought I'd give you guys a run-down of my woodlot first before asking questions, to make it easier for you. So questions at the end.

My wife and I recently bought a 40 acre farm in NE Washington State. The farm has about 13 acres of very dense woods, and another 5 acres of what I'd consider "open woodlands". The 13 acres runs continuously into many more acres of similar timber (just not my property). The other 5 acres of open woodlands is flanked completely by small pastures.

We have tons of deer and wild turkeys in the area that spend considerable time on our property, with literally several dozen game-trails going through our woods and field. The vast majority (90-95%+) of our woodlot is Ponderosa Pine (which we like a lot). It looks as if someone has planted a hundred or two pines of another species that has much smaller needles, very similar to the pine trees I was used to growing up on the west coast. There is an occasional Douglas fir mixed in, but there are perhaps only a dozen or so in total.

The Ponderosa pines range widely in size. The largest we've seen, right on the edge of our property, and the singles elsewhere by our field, is about 28-30" across, and the sizes go from that, all the way down to little things you can leap-frog over. But the vast majority of the trees fall right in the 6"-14" range. The other breed of pine are all small, from little saplings up to 12-15' tall at most. They tend to be clustered and look as though they were placed by man, in the past.

One thing I've noticed, is that the bulk of the big trees on the property, and around our area are growing more out in the open. Our woodlot is VERY dense and it's not uncommon to be able to keep a hand on one tree, and being able to reach out with the other and touch 4-5 more trees. All in the 6-14" size. It's obvious that thinning is needed.

So, here is where I need help. While I am open to hiring someone to come out and walk the property with me (which we may end up doing) I'd like to learn as much as I can myself about how to manage my woodlot. If I can learn enough, I can just manage it myself. If nothing else, I can at least work with the professional better when we work on a plan if I know a bit about what I'm talking about, what's possible, and to better understand their advice.

The bulk of what I've been able to find online so far, for woodlot management is about managing for more productivity out of your woodlot for more income. This includes cutting down big mature trees to sell and give the smaller trees more sunlight... This is just about the exact opposite of what I'm interested in.

My goals are to see these trees grow over the decades into giants that I can enjoy spending time with the family in, doing some backyard camping with my kids, hiking, etc over the years. I'm 28, and I (hopefully) have a lot of years ahead of me to see these trees grow and enjoy them before I pass it on to my kids. Secondary to that, I also want to impact the woodlot as little as I can, in terms of keeping it a home for the deer, turkeys and upland birds that I see in there.

So my questions for now are... What methods should I use to give my trees the best chances possible to grow substantially in size?

Thinning seems pretty obvious – but how do I pick out which trees to remove? Should I go for the 18' between trees rule of thumb?

Should I leave some of the tight clusters alone, periodically for wildlife?

Many of these trees have obvious-to-the-eye dead branches for the first 10-12 feet, should I remove those or let them fall off naturally?

There are not many downed trees in my woodlot, should I leave a few on the ground for wildlife when I thin them out? If so how many?

Should I thin out over time, opposed to doing it all at once?

Any other thoughts/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your help everyone, and taking the time to read my long post lol.

Green marks my property. Blue is a potential 20 acre plot we may purchase, but not at all a sure thing.












thecfarm

Filson,welcome to the forum. It's your forest,grow it the way YOU want. You probably will have to get a forester to help you out. Tell him the same thing you told us. How would you get out any trees you cut? Nice post,nice pictures.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

goose63

Iam not much help on this one but welcome to the forum Filson that's a nice chunk of woods you have there
goose
if you find your self in a deep hole stop digging
saw logs all day what do you get lots of lumber and a day older
thank you to all the vets

Filson

Thanks guys!

We're pretty excited to have it. And I'm glad I didn't get shot down for not wanting to make money off of it lol (which is what I see the vast majority of writing about the subject is based on). For getting the timber out, there are actually two old tractor trails up into the woods. One is completely overgrown with up to 8" wide timber growing straight out from the middle of it, with some places not even remotely resembling a road. The other ends half way into the woods, and while it's now just a grassy open part of the trees, it's still smooth enough to get access in there. Anything I've fallen and decide to remove, will be bucked up out there, and thrown into a trailer, or even the back of my truck (I think I can get it in there).

Do you guys have any ballpark idea what it might cost to have someone come out and look at it? I'm not in a position to spend thousands right now, after just buying the place.

What kind of "forester" would I want to get in contact with?

Thanks again, for the warm welcome!

terry f

    Love your plan, its a lot like mine. Contact the state forester and see when he could come out, its free. I don't see any reason to pay someone, just learn as much as you can. Thinning is where its at, and identifying the leave trees should be fairly easy. Check out Small Forest Timber Owners Blog for Washington, lots of information on state help and wildlife help. Don't touch the big trees, it takes too long to get that way.

Filson

Quote from: terry f on April 12, 2014, 11:34:07 PM
    Love your plan, its a lot like mine. Contact the state forester and see when he could come out, its free.

It's free!? Oh hell yeah lol. What will he all do when he comes out?

Quote from: terry f on April 12, 2014, 11:34:07 PM
I don't see any reason to pay someone, just learn as much as you can. Thinning is where its at, and identifying the leave trees should be fairly easy.

That's what I'm gathering. I actually walked around a lower portion of the woods and took stock of it myself after posting and doing some further reading, looking at the trees I think should be kept, and which need to get removed. I have a lot of gardening experience, and this really just seems like giant-sized gardening. Some of the density of tree growth is pretty amazing. In a roughly 20'x15' area I counted 17 trees, all but 2 were 30-40 feet tall, and about a half dozen of them were 8-12" across.

That amount of density, or thereabouts is very common in my woodlot, some major thinning needs to take place. Though I worry about cutting too much of it out at once and risking wind damage from the keeper-trees that have been used to the "support" of others. Perhaps several stages of thinning is in order... after figuring out all the trees I need to remove, I'll thin them out every 3-4 years, taking maybe 25% at a time to let the keeper trees strengthen up? Not sure if that should be a concern or not.

There are also number of small places that have no trees growing. While I'd guess 3 out of 4-5 trees on the lot will need to be removed, I can probably plant at least half of those numbers in the areas with no tree growth. I plan to leave some of those open areas be, as I've read some wildlife like it that way, but there are still plenty of places to plant many hundreds of trees. I wouldn't mind adding in a few aspen to the mix as well. =)

Quote from: terry f on April 12, 2014, 11:34:07 PM
Check out Small Forest Timber Owners Blog for Washington, lots of information on state help and wildlife help. Don't touch the big trees, it takes too long to get that way.

Thanks for the heads up about the blog, I'll be checking it out in just a minute =) And as for the big trees, I definitely plan to keep them where they are lol. There are quite a few spots that have a couple (2-3) large trees growing within just a couple feet of each other... Depending on how they align to the path of the sun, I may leave both. I've seen very large trees growing very close together before, if they're both getting good sun and there's not too much competition around them, screw it, I'll keep the doubled up pair. =)

Side note: After walking my forest more in-depthly (there are still tons of little areas I haven't even set foot or seen yet, only having owned this place for 3 weeks), I've found an area that has some very large pine trees of a different breed. Frankly, they may be douglas fir, but I could be mistaken. I'm using the identification guide to pine trees from arborday.org, but I need to go up and actually grab a sample of the tree to finish answering their questions lol.

Thanks for your reply!

terry f

    The smaller needle pine might be Lodgepole, first to go if its a choice of that or Ponderosa.

Ianab

Our pine is managed differently, so bear that in mind with these comments.

If a stand is badly crowded, then it may be too late for effective thinning. The tall skinny trees don't respond well to being released, and as you say, there is a danger they will just blow down in bad weather. In that case, keep the best, and open up small clearings in the badly crowded spots. Pine regenerates best in full sunlight, so you want a decent clearing, not just a small gap in the trees. The "good" trees left around the clearing will then act as a seed source, or you can get a couple of years head start by planting some good seedlings.

Pruning? If you are after future timber, then take off those dead and dying lower branches. The sooner you allow the tree to heal over the branch stubs the more valuable clear timber will be laid down in the trunk. If dead branches are still attached for the next 20 years, this leaves a loose "black" knot in the timber, which tends to fall out. A live branch is still physically attached to the surrounding wood, and leaves a "tight" knot. It's a defect, but not as bad as it stays in place.  You may also reduce the fire risk as there is less chance of a grass fire spreading up the tree into the crown, which is when it becomes serious.

The planted trees? If you want to keep them, you can thin them in stages. As they are only small, they wont be suppressed and weak yet. Aim to keep the canopy closed, while opening up the stand. Sort of hard to explain, but your best growth is when the branches are just starting to touch. Wider than that, and light is falling on the ground, and just grows weeds. The trees also don't shed their lower branches as early, and grow as a heavily branched "pyramid", rather than a tall straight "timber" tree. Tighter than that, and the trees are fighting each other for light, and growing slower. Don't worry too much about an exact spacing, look more at the individual trees. Take the sickly ones, the double leaders, the bananas etc Keep the best, and if that means 2 are a bit close, and then an extra gap to the next one,  don't worry too much

Lastly, they are YOUR trees. So you can pretty much do as you like with them  ;)
You obviously like your forest land, and want to make it "better". Take your time, learn about the tress you have, and enjoy the process.

Ian
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

thecfarm

You won't have to plant trees unless you want something that is not there. You start cutting and disturbing the ground and it's almost like kicking a hornet's nest. Or my land is that way, I have places that need to be thinned,the white pine is so thick,I can't even walk through it. This was in areas that not much was growing under the big trees.
I brought someone from work here,because he thought cutting wood was bad. He had no idea that the forest will come back on it's own. I took him to places that had not been cut,which needed to be,to places that I just cut and all the way to about 5 years of cutting. He left with a whole differant opinion of cutting trees.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

Filson

Ian - Thanks for taking the time to reply with such a great post! You could be right, that it could be too late for thinning to do much, but it's still most likely something better done, than left undone. Some areas that are not real dense, have grass and little plants growing beneath the trees, while the really dense stuff has many inches of dry pine needles covering the forest floor. The trees are only 30-45' tall for the most part, I added two more pics (one of a map of the property, and another of looking at the woods from the pasture) to give you a view of the trees from the outside.

Pruning - I'm not worried about timber, but I think the massive amount of dead branches on the low parts of the trees are both unsightly and would aid a fire in a pretty negative way, if one were to ever break out. I can leave a few slash piles and downed trees spotted throughout the woods for wildlife, as a bit of a counter-balance to removing all the dead limbs.

For the planted trees, I get what you mean I think. I like the idea of suppressing ground vegetation a bit (not that it's very bad now or anything), by keeping the canopy pretty closed. I will leave some of the little 30-50' across open areas here and there, to allow more shrubs and such to grow here and there for wildlife.

Thanks for the advice on spacing! I don't mind a few trees close together here and there, that's natures way lol.

Thecfarm- LOL! I think your mission was a success. I'm glad to hear that the forest will replenish itself naturally. I *do* want to add some Aspin and misc maple to the area, but just as visual accents spotted about, I'll be keeping the woodlot 90-95% of what it is, just cleaned up and thinned out to make it more healthy, promote growth and reduce fire risk.

I left an email to my local office about having someone come out and take a look at the woodlot with me. I hope to hear back from them next week.  8)

All you guys have been a great help so far, thank you!

terry f

   I hope things work out where you can get the 20 in blue, you can never have too much land. I want more, and I can't even take care of what I have.

Filson

Quote from: terry f on April 13, 2014, 12:53:19 PM
   I hope things work out where you can get the 20 in blue, you can never have too much land. I want more, and I can't even take care of what I have.

Haha, I'm not sure that's a bad problem. ;)

BaldBob

If the other pines have the same number of needles per bunch as the Ponderosa, they are most likely Lodgepole pine and were very unlikely to have been planted. Regardless of what you do, trees of that species will never get very large (10-14" dbh would be the likely mature size of most trees on your site).  Compared to Ponderosa, Lodgepole pine are quite short lived - 100 years old would be an overmature Lodgepole.
If those pines have 5 needles per bunch, they are Western White Pine (which may have been planted) these can get quite large and are beautiful trees if they are adapted to your site (adequate moisture) and aren't nailed by blister rust.
As for planting the openings - they are most likely open for a reason that has nothing to do with past tree removal.  In the Ponderosa Pine type such openings usually indicate patches that are not amenable to good tree growth - e.g. shallow soils, poor drainage, frost pockets,or etc.
As has been pointed out there is little reason for spacing to be uniform after thinning. The key is to have the proper basal area/acre after thinning rather than a uniform distance between trees. One simple approach that would probably work well to meet your apparent goals would be to thin from below (taking the smaller and weaker trees) until the crowns of the remaining trees average from just touching to about 5-10 feet apart.
The leaving of occasional thickets 50-100' across could be beneficial to wildlife - 1 or 2 such thickets on the property would be adequate. These thickets would however be prone to  Mt. Pine Beetle attack.
When thinning the pine, unless you can pile and burn the slash before Ips populations build up in the slash, try to time your thinning between July and October.

Filson

What's this?



Baldbob - thanks for all the info! I need to take and gather a little sample of some of the other species of trees I'm seeing and bring them down to the computer and identify them. I've seen some that are quite large, as I've began to wander more areas of my woodlot.

As for the slash you mentioned - what is "Ips"?

BaldBob

That bulge you pictured is called a canker and in western pines is usually caused by a rust of the Cronartium genus. It usually is not a severe problem in western pines, but it isn't desirable either. If it isn't to much trouble, it would be worth cutting it out and burning it. Ips is a genus of bark beetle that usually doesn't outright kill live Ponderosa or lodgepole pine unless they are stressed by drought and/or severe over crowding. The insect, however, often kills the tops of pole sized Ponderosa, and their population can explode if they have lots of green slash available.

Filson

Man there is a wealth of knowledge here!

Thanks Baldbob for all the help. I feel like I have a lot better understanding of what is beneficial (or hurtful) to a woodlot after reading the replies from you guys. I still will likely have a forester come out some time in the near future, as pictures don't do justice to being able to walk around the property.

I've started to clear some of the low dead limbs (from ground level up to about 10' high) on some of my trees today. Aside from reducing fire-related issues, does this help anything? Hurt anything?

After a number of replies about not worrying about sticking too closely to a specific distance, I think I have enough understanding on how to clear out what's harmful and not, without getting too technical about it. I've googled some pictures of before/after forest thinning, and to me, most of the thinning after pics look too thin. After spending half the day up there, around the edge of the woods, and looking around a bit, I've realized that the bulk of trees in a thick area have just a few big healthy trees, and a lot of smaller, weaker looking trees. Many of these little trees do not reach up as high as the bigger healthy trees, and those look pretty obviously like the ones to take down.

There are quite a few instances however, where three to five 10-14" trees are growing close together, with just 3-6' of distance between each other. It makes it hard to decide which ones, or if any really, should be culled out. But I've started to just look up into the crown to see which ones seem to have the more favorable position for sun, etc. Very often, it's the center one that looks a bit shorter, though about equal in circumference down low. I haven't decided if I will take those out or not, though it seems like "technically" I should.

I think I will thin in stages, taking out the diseased, decayed, broken, etc trees as well as the littler trees that are growing in those clusters around the larger trees first. After doing that, it should be easier to pick out which of the larger and healthier trees need to be removed.

You mentioned a basal area. How would I figure that out?

Also, as for the mysterious other pine species... They're Douglas Fir. They looked like little pines to me, live and learn. So, Ponderosa Pine make up 95% of my forest, and Douglas Fir pretty much makes up the rest. There are a few that are around 18-24" in diameter and one that I did not measure but am estimating around 28-34". The little trees that were in question are pretty far from the bigger trees (up to 100-120') and they look a bit different to me, maybe the fact that the little ones are light green compared to the dark green bigger ones, but I just assumed it was two different species, but they're the same.

Thanks again everyone, for sharing your wisdom!

enigmaT120

If you were in Oregon I would refer you to the OSU extension service, as they have foresters and offer classes.  That's in addition to the state department of forestry stewardship foresters.  My first class was one to help me develop a management plan for my place.  Do any of the WA colleges have an extension service? 

Ed Miller
Falls City, Or

terry f

   Did you get a chance to check out that blog, lots of info on Washington extensions. Another fun interactive site is Forest Landowners of California.

pine

WSU in Pullman offers extension courses for beginner and more advanced folks on managing your private forest, writing forestry management plans and helps in making contacts with folks.  $100 fee for both of us, basically covers the supplies and notebooks you get (that was several years back however may have gone up)  Well worth the small price.  Your county should have a county forester (at least in western Washington they do) and then the regional DNR office will have a forester that you can get help from as well. 

pine

I just talked to some folk more in the know than I.
In your area there are not county foresters apparently but there are more DNR folks available than on our side. The DNR web site will show you which region you are in and contact info.  I will PM you the name, email and telephone number of the WSU guy for the eastern side and he should be able to help give you more info.

There is apparently also some monies available through DNR to help you, depending upon the region and what you want to do, so not only is free help available but there is a chance that you could "possibly" qualify for grant money depending upon the circumstances.  Your DNR region would know a lot more.  Fire risk abatement programs is where some of the money can be found.

BradMarks

Filson:  another resource you might find helpful and very much enjoy, is your local chapter of the Washington Farm Forestry Association(WFFA). It is a dues paying organization (mine is $75/year) that is full of folks just like you and willing to share their experiences as you are. They have an active website of info. I'm sure there is a chapter in your area, and many of the members will be full-on foresters.  On a side note, do you notice many old stumps?  From the aerial photo and your pics, it looks like the area was "high graded" years ago and what you have left would be the residuals and fill in trees.

Filson

Quote from: terry f on April 15, 2014, 02:41:03 PM
   Did you get a chance to check out that blog, lots of info on Washington extensions. Another fun interactive site is Forest Landowners of California.

I did (bookmarked it too), and read through several pages of posts by them and it gave me quite a few ideas, thank you! I'll check out the California one as well. =)

Quote from: pine on April 15, 2014, 04:28:04 PM
I just talked to some folk more in the know than I.
In your area there are not county foresters apparently but there are more DNR folks available than on our side. The DNR web site will show you which region you are in and contact info.  I will PM you the name, email and telephone number of the WSU guy for the eastern side and he should be able to help give you more info.

There is apparently also some monies available through DNR to help you, depending upon the region and what you want to do, so not only is free help available but there is a chance that you could "possibly" qualify for grant money depending upon the circumstances.  Your DNR region would know a lot more.  Fire risk abatement programs is where some of the money can be found.

I've already got in contact with the DNR guy for the area (Cliff Thresher). We haven't set an exact day yet, but he'll be coming by my place in May or June. As for the Pullman thing - that's over 3 hours away from me, one-way so probably wont be a realistic option for me any time soon. I'm an hour and a half NW of Spokane, just a couple miles from Lake Roosevelt.

I'll have to ask around for some more info on the possible grant money. I've waited to do much out in my woods so far, mostly just trying to learn, but we have started to cut off low dead branches or what you forestry folks seem to call "ladder fuel", going up between 8-12' high. I'll ask Cliff about it more too. Do you have any further information/sources that I could check out pertaining to fire risk abatement grants and similar? Thank you!

Quote from: BradMarks on April 15, 2014, 04:57:03 PM
Filson:  another resource you might find helpful and very much enjoy, is your local chapter of the Washington Farm Forestry Association(WFFA). It is a dues paying organization (mine is $75/year) that is full of folks just like you and willing to share their experiences as you are. They have an active website of info. I'm sure there is a chapter in your area, and many of the members will be full-on foresters.  On a side note, do you notice many old stumps?  From the aerial photo and your pics, it looks like the area was "high graded" years ago and what you have left would be the residuals and fill in trees.

WFFA - Definitely on the look-into list, thank you!

As for old stumps - surprisingly not at all. I grew up in the foothills of the cascades on the west side, about an hour north of Seattle and was very used to running into huge old stumps while hiking about, but I haven't seen a single stump along those lines (minus just a couple smaller/fresher stumps that look like the previous owners cut down for whatever reason).

What does "high graded" mean?

Thank you all for the information and help! I'm learning a lot here  ;D 8)

Ianab

Quote
What does "high graded" mean?

This means that someone has gone through and just cut all the valuable trees, and just left the rubbish trees standing.

As far a long term management plan goes, it usually sucks.

But this is not what you have in mind obviously.

Ian
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

thecfarm

The Forestry Forum Dictionary will answer that.
Go to the top,find the Menu Bar,starts out with Home,Help,Search. Go over to Extras,a drop down should appear,click onto Forestry Forum Dictionary,than "H" for high grade that should do it. Look around while you are there. Lots of stuff in Extras.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

John Vander

Filson, that's a nice piece of land you got there! Nice pics.
Tree and saw accidents nullify years of forestry experience.

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