How Green are you

[Patty]

Well put, Buzz. I couldn't agree more. Taking care of the land that provides for us is a good carma thing. Norm & I both so much enjoy our little piece of paradise, we would never think of  harming it in any way. Too bad most folks don't get the opportunity to enjoy the land. Even more too bad that it is those same folks who think they need to tell me how to care for my land.

[Buzz-sawyer]

Patty
I think by nature , man has inborn caretaker tendencies....for our world .
It makes us feel "right" and fullfilled in a higher way than some of our more base tendencies.

 to take what we want the He@@ with the consequences.......
Isnt it fun when a government agency that knowns better than you, how to care for your place, tells you how much of your corn "Thier" deer can eat before they allow you to do somethin about it...............

truth is if they managed your place it would recieve NO love...they are a sterile...heartless beurocracy...

for the most part ran by people who go home to cut thier lawn and watch tv after telling you whats right for you and your land you watch over ;)

[Ron Wenrich]

I think I may have to disagree with you somewhat.  I've seen privately managed stands and state government managed stands.  By and large, the state does a better job than most private jobs.

The state takes care of their roads, they do selective harvests in some areas and clearcutting in others and no cutting in others.  They fight fires when necessary, manage wildlife, aesthtics and other non-timber products.  They maintain a steady source of timber for the neighboring mills.  They do all this without throwing up a "No Trespassing" sign.  

And every one of those foresters have a love of stewardship equal to any landowner.  They could choose to work in the private sector for more money, but they don't.  They don't deserve all the hard knocks that they get.

[Tom]

I"ve seen some beautiful government backed stands of timber.  The National forests around here are a good example.  The don't harvest much anymore because of the threat of litigation so the timber falls and rots in place.   That is causing some of the fire hazard that some talk about.  It also makes it more difficult to get into the forests for management practices.  

While the Government foresters do a good job, it is their job they are doing.  I believe the bad taste landowners have for the Government is its tendency to "trespass" upon the landowner's rights and find some way of mandating that the landowner do the government's bidding rather than allowing the landowner to do his own.   That's not an agenda of any government forester I know but it is of some of the political bureaucracies.  (I have one specific local tax assessor in mind right now)  He claims to be schooled in Forestry and has been know to threaten landowners with performing a sale immediately or losing their Agricultural zoning.  He makes judgements on the health of your plantation and whether your management policies match his, etc.  It's not the "real" foresters with their recommendations that intimidate landowners but it is the bureaucrats who can make life difficult for a citizen that does.

[Buzz-sawyer]

Fine to disagree....
I said ,"for the most part"

thats my experience in the larger perspective of natural resource managent  :P

[SwampDonkey]

Well around these parts when wood is harvested off private lands its most often a high grade or a clearcut. For some reason the folks aren't focused on the quality of residual trees to leave, just on the the ones they want. Alot of woodlots have many trees left behind that were suppressed or in poor form or the whole stand is near decadence from age or past budworm outbreaks. And there are many landowners that don't care if wood is ever cut from their land (which I personally am not against), because they have a job to go to every day and aren't too concerned about the woodlot. One example I don't like to see is this guy says his crew thinned or did selection in a hardwood stand and all ya see standing are suppressed or weak, spindly hardwood that'll not likely die before a person has to start to pre-commercially thin the stand. Then because of all that residual trashwood in the stand some guy in government says its too much overstory, so we aren't going to thin the new growth.

On company or crown lands they tend to be more wise to the effects of silviculture and if a contractor's crew doesn't perform to best management practices or company harvest policy, then they're out of work. Now I'de have to say the best management practices movement has come into being over the last 12 years in my area. Because when I used to travel company and crown land forest roads there used to be oil jugs, split oil in yards, skidders runnin up and down brooks...etc. I've been on crown hardwood stands where they were high graded by a hardwood mill leaving behind trash wood  and calling it good management because they were following the licensees management plan. :  

When the big industrial forest companies felt a strong breeze blowing behind the certification movement and new environmental laws they began to change their ways. Now all NB crown lands are under certification and most Industrial freehold forest lands are as well. Nobody wanted to take the risk of not being certified and possibly loosing markets or forest licenses. Certification hasn't seemed to phase private woodlot owners any because they are against someone else telling them how to run their lives. I do several management plans on private and not a single person has expressed interest in attaining any sort of certification. They want to know what its all about, but aren't committed to it. I believe the reason for this is that the woodlot is only there to supplement their income and they don't have enough wood ground to have a sustainable annual income and they want something substantial in return for this certification. What was enough 30 years ago isn't any longer because operating costs and living expenses have out paced returns from those 100 or 200 acre woodlots.  A 4 wheel drive pickup costs as much as a new modular home, which is totally insane. Same thing happened to farming. Everyone in the business has become slaves to the banks and finance companies.

Currently, there are several trial certification private lots in the province that hope to be part of the PanCanadian certification system. It remains to be seen what benefit this is to any woodlot owner or woodlot association. And what will be the costs?

Ok I said quite a mouthful already. :D

[Norm]

Thank goodness we still have some private property rights in the US, government owned land for the good of all has always been a disaster, think collective farms in the good old USSR. Last national forest I was in had more rules and regulations than you could believe. State owned land here is off limits for all but the controlling government agency. I take care of my land better than any federalista's, so do my neighbors. We depend on it for the food on our's and your table.

The no tresspassing signs on our place are to keep the county assessor off.

[Cedarman]

The latest Sawmill and Woodlot magazine ends with an article by Steve Bratcovitch. Steve decided to e-mail a writer about some misinformation in an article. Steve ended up getting an invite to discuss his points on the air.  Steve's point is that we need to do what we can to educate others, join organizations that promote good forestry, and not just sit back and bemoan the junk left growing next door.

[SwampDonkey]

Beleive me there's been lots of effort put into educating woodlot owners in this province over the last 30 years. The majority of the folks that attend courses are the weekend doodler that only supplement income from wood they harvest. They have regular jobs they drive to during the week. The trouble from a harvest contractor's stand point is that his costs go up with increased effort to do the best thing for the land, and the mills don't pay more for his efforts and the land owner wants the maximum he can get. So, since the woodlot owner wants to maximize profit from the harvest, he sells the wood lump sum to be clearcut because that's the only way he can get his stumpage rate. I know of some folks that try to do the best they can for the woodlot owner are barely getting by, while the wife has a job nursing or teaching to keep the operation above water.  I agree the woodlot would be better looked after in general if the owner did the work. The owner can't make a living off the woodlot only. In my area there are over 450 members of the woodlot association and over 400 of those produce under 300 cord a year, the rest is harvested by contractors that produce 90 % of the volume. So if you do the math and assume those small operators cut about 150 cords a year on average and assume they net $40/cord after operating costs, they have $6000 in their pocket. I don't think your going to have enough food for Christmas dinner after you take out all your living expenses and income tax. The only guy living on that is someone that never left the nest to go look for a full time job. This is why I say that in these times the woodlot only supplements the annual income of the majority or in some cases its just sittin idol and in alot of cases the wood has been harvested  a long time ago and its gonna be a very long time before there is wood to cut again on that woodlot. If you live in northern Maine and you cross over into New Brunswick your going to see a big difference in woodlot management. There are way more clearcuts over here on private land. We just aren't getting enough value from the wood harvested unless there is some kind of value added process, such as operating your own sawmill with your own wood. And I know alot of those private mills that are idol more days than they are running. One is just up the road and they don't saw wood until about December through to April and not every day, maybe 2 days a week. And they buy all there cedar. They came here and got land real cheap from bankrupt farmers, hired woods contractors to clearcut everything and now have to buy wood. Go figure that one out. :

[Ron Wenrich]

I've seen a lot of the "educate the landowner" scenarios.  I even offered an evening course in woodlot management at the local community college.  I got 5 responses and they didn't book it.

I've helped woodlot owner organizations get started.  None ever lasted more than 5 years.  

The only successful educational thing that foresters have done is to promote Smokey the Bear.  It was so successful that now you can't convince people that we need controlled burns.  

You've gotta do the management work before the harvest.  After 30 years of educating the landowner, I wonder when its going to kick in.  

[Arthur]

On average we only mill hardwoods two days a week but this gives plenty of wood to value add.  The rest of the time is taken in drying and value adding.

after spending many thousands buying dressing equipment most of the wood goes out as decking.  

Just by air drying the wood we increase the value from $500/cu m to over $1200/cu m.  Finished decking is over $3000/cu m.

By taking the time and effort we have reduced the number of trees needing to come down and ALL the waste is used back on the farm.

Paid for the mill in 6 months, the dressing equipment in another 12 months and currently pays our mortgage.

[SwampDonkey]

Ron:

Yup have to have to mind set to manage the woodlot for starters, then plan it all out, then implement. Also, have to have the returns from your hard work to allow you to implement it to.

Our best Management Practices courses always have had excellent turn outs and folks who attended them have always had positive things to say. Only trouble recently is the Provincial Forest extension was cancelled and a new organization was formed to take their place. This organization is funded by the Federation of Woodlot Owners in NB and their job has been to update and enhance the old material they inherited for the past 3 years. So our local assocation has not been putting these courses on for the past 3 years now. But they have been sponsoring first aid, chain saw safety and maintenance courses, all free. Some assocations have gone ahead and put other courses on and are even more active than ours at the moment. Interestingly, I haven't gotten an up to date newsletter this year and before we used to get them bi-monthly. That is why I advertise with 'Atlantic Forestry Review' and have a 2 year subscription, so I can be informed. Also, there are all new staff who have no experience in organizing such courses and they are waiting for the material to get updated before they go ahead with the management courses. With any course its all in the presentation of the material and not getting too technical so the woodlot owner knows what's being presented. I for one couldn't sit there for 3 hours and listen to the manager of our local association attempt to put on a course. It would be totally frustrating because he's not a confident speaker, and I know he couldn't keep my interest that long. As I said before, the folks that attend most these courses are the weekend 'doodlers' or weekend loggers and for the most part those folks try to do their best, for sure. Won't find too many big farmers, with larger woodlots, to those courses unless they are semi retired. I do know one old fella though that is a large land owner and was a big farmer. He sold his farmland and kept the woods, and to this day the old guy watches over things even though he can't drive himself and is half blind. He really cares about his ground. He's got 4 sons that couldn't give a flying ...... about the woods. To them its there to be cut and sold to fill their pockets when the old guy kicks off.

The trouble with all this education over the last 30 years is that its not getting to the large operators who cut the vast majority of the wood. You've got to show them that it is a great benefit to them to attend these courses, hasn't happened. Then when the local association recently found out that the AAC in our area is far above the volume being harvested, it just causes more passivism. They're gonna keep on with the old ways as long as they don't break environmental laws or tresspass :

[MemphisLogger]

My buddy Clint Trammel was on NPR today talking about the management of Leo Drey's Pioneer Forest in Missouri.

Y'all can check it out at

http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?wfId=3862208
  

[SwampDonkey]

 Link to a lecture on New Brunswick Woodlot Owner Associations

[Cedarman]

We have more than 700 members in the Indiana Foresty and Woodland Owners Association.  There have been good turn outs for the forestry field days.  In Indiana research has shown that there is good money in managing woodlands.
But we still have way to many landowners that let loggers cut the best and leave the rest. As more owners are aware of what they can do to help their woods, more of them do so. Most owners do not know a thing about their woods.  We heavily promote the use of consulting foresters to assist.
Also the general public needs to be educated as much as possible about our renewable resource.

[Tom]

[SwampDonkey]

Cedarman:

I concur. The 450 members in our association is only one of seven provincial associations. Some have over 1000 members and there are about 40,000 small private woodlot owners (an owner with under 2,500 acres). All the associations come together under the Federation of Woodlot Owners which has existed for 21 years. Some associations are 43 years old. There are at least two woodlot demonstrations per year in the province and each association chooses a woodlot owner of the year in which the industry gives cash awards or trees for planting. Some industrial companies also help with the cost of semi-commercial thinning programs in softwood stands, some with hardwood commercial thinning. Our assocaition receives $100,000 from the hardwood pulp mill and each producer of wood contributed 0.5% of wood sales toward a management fund. The amount contributed by mills is based on annual wood deliveries and isn't a sure thing. Annual sales is over $10 million and on a slow incline with more value from hardwood now and implementation of provincial wood tracking system. More folks are becoming wise to sorting their hardwood veneer and sawlog from the pulp pile.

[SwampDonkey]

Tom:  like your stick people

Yup, yup, yup.....only thing is, it has stagnated. No real job growth for the last 10 years since mill upgrades, globalization and increased efficency. More seasonal forestry workers now. Enrollment in Forestry schools is on the decline.

cheers

[Tom]

Sometimes it is all in the perspective.

We tend to look at the world through our own window and suffer from self-fulfilling prophesies.

Really, what are our goals?

Can one take his education and sit on the park bench waiting for someone to discover that he is the one they need?

Can one offer seminars to the population to generate income and not become a teacher by profession?

Can the population come running to an advertisement on a class in a far-away town and spend its money on time, room and board when "school", in his life,  was only something to get away from?

Can a fellow sit in the woods and let his trees rot down around him, expecting someone, out of the goodness of their heart, to come save him?

Can we commandeer anothers property to force him to do our bidding and call it freedom?

Can a man invent/discover, in his lifetime, all there is to know about the land, the forest, the science that it takes him to be successful?

From a Forester's perspective, he may wonder why nobody hires him or uses his education.

From a small land-owner's perspective, he may wonder why there aren't any Forester's out there running a business?

From a large land-owner's perspective, he may be proud of himself for providing that one job for the starving Forester, not understanding why there are so many starving Foresters.

There is one thing a man should never forget and that is "we work for ourselves."  

To be successful, we either have to be born into money and a position, be very lucky and have life handed to us or get out there and "SELL" ourselves.  

I have seen apathy real close.  What do you say to a young man who says "There isn't any work out there",  when he didn't finish high-school, showed no interest in college or trades, never seriously looked for work, argued with the boss in every menial job he ever held and has spent the last 10 years sitting on couch, watching a TV, mooching off of family and friends and repeating, "there isn't any work out there, the economy is sure bad, it's the President's fault".

If a tree falls in a forest, does it make a noise?

What are we selling?
When do we give up?
Do we expect the hoards to go to the mountain, or do we bite the bullet and take the mountain to the people.
If you sell to someone and he doesn't buy, do you try to sell him tomorrow?
Do we quit because our customer won't do what we want, or do we try to find out what the customer wants and discover some way to help him make it happen?

Do we quit the sawing business because the price of pallet wood goes down, or do we look at producing flooring?
Do we quit our job because the price of fuel went up, or do we walk to work?

We are all guilty of finding some reason that we haven't been able to succeed in one effort or another. Usually it is because the world wouldn't do our bidding.

That little do-dad I drew has 4 sides.  One can get a different perspective depending on which of 3 he looks at it.

Do you know who these fellow are?
A.J. Albritton, Sterling Allan, Stanford Andress, Joe Bellis
Kenneth Bonnell, Harry Braun, Fred Cook, Eric J. Davis, Georgia  Hough, Keith Judd, David Mevis, Andrew Rotramel, Joseph Schriner, Tom wells, A.J. Wildman

They are 15 of 35  write-in candidates for President of the USA, to date.

If, and when, they aren't elected, will it be your fault for not discovering them?

I don't mean to get on my high-horse and, even though I may sound like I'm mad or disgusted, I'm not.  I just want to bring up the fact that there is always another side to every coin.  If things don't go the way we want, have we found an excuse, or are we looking for another way to succeed.

Is the problem solved if the "doodlers" all study and become Foresters so that they can look after their own land?  What does the Forester who wants to provide a service do for a profession then?

[SwampDonkey]

One thing I've been pondering lately is :

Why do people clearcut their land and then decide to do a management plan?  : Not all woodlots I do plans on are clearcuts, but a large percentage is. This year its been 75 % clearcuts (over 50 % of the land was clearcut on these lots) so far. I have a feeling that some folks think the silviculture program will fix their woodlot. Then again, who would give them this idea?

To be quite honest with you Tom, I think alot of foresters have looked at alot of your points and questions. I know the majority of them have gone through my mind.

I've also been pondering over the fact that there aren't many (if any) industrial foresters, on the forum. I know we have some from government and self employed folks, but where are the industrial foresters. Interesting. Raise your hand, one only please, for the head count. ;)

cheers

[OneWithWood]

Hey Cedarman.  The IFWOA and other active organizations in Indiana are having some impact.  
There are two field days coming up that may be of interest to area folks who have an interest in environmental issues and management techniques.  On Sept. 18 there is a field day at the Meyers farm in Johnson county sponsored by IFWOA and on Oct. 9 there is a field day at my place sponsored by SWCD.  Our district forester, Ralph Unversaw, and a Purdue Extension Wildlife biologists, Brian McGowan, will be leading tours and discussing timber management, BMPs, wildlife cover, edge habitats and food plots.  I will be demonstrating my Woodmizer mill and discussing how I have financed the timber and wildlife management activities through selective harvests and my own timber/milling activities.  We will even be providing a chili lunch for those that come out.  For more info see the Forestry Education board.
Here is a link:

https://forestryforum.com/cgi-bin/board/YaBB.pl?board=edu;action=display;num=29

[Tom]

We clearcut as a management practice here because our crop is pine.  Pine doesn't do well in un-even aged stands. Interspersed pine taken from a hardwood forest won't return.  It needs light, specific amounts of room and little competition.

I know, as a forester, you know this.  I just wanted to describe an instance of a valid clear-cut.  While pine stands can be thinned, they usually end their rotation in a clear-cut, land-prep and re-plant.  

I have read that Aspen is treated much the same way, is that true?

To develop a management plan after a 'first" clear-cut may be folly.  That is more of a row-crop farmers mentality than a tree farmer mentality. It may happen because the owner knows no different.  Someone needs to get to him and tell him.  If there is no Forester on the prowl, looking for a customer, then the only contact is the logger. Someone in the industry with an inkling of forest management needs to make the owner aware of what his options are.  The loggers are out there knocking on doors, looking for wood, perhaps they should be the initial "Forester". Perhaps the Foresters should be working for the loggers. (?)  Perhaps a procurement forester is quite valuable to the perpetuation of the industry.

Not all land owners leap before they jump. It takes a special breed though to study and follow through with the idea of being a tree farmer, not just a land-owner  When the goal is urban development, a replaced forest is not in the cards. It's those mis-guided landowners who need to have their door knocked upon; and not after the trees are all gone.

[Ron Wenrich]

Hey Swamp.  I might have to put my hand up part way.   :D  I've been a procurement forester.  Did I do good management?  Yep.  And I know of a few procurement foresters that do good work.  The ones with the local paper company do better work than most other foresters, since they aren't really interested in crop trees.

They took a poll of private landowners in our state when they did the timber inventory.  They found that the primary and secondary reasons for owning timberland was not timber production.   Aesthetics was number one, if I recall.

Maybe we're just not on the same page.  We talk about mangement plans, silviculture and harvesting and they're talking about green backgrounds, birds and deer.  We also have to recognize that non-management is a management option.  

So, if timber production isn't a primary motivation, why should the landowner persue forest management?  We know, but the landowner does not even have the slightest idea of how much their timber is worth or how much it could be worth.

I tried attacking that angle by trying to sell appraisal services to guys that could use it - realtors, real estate appraisers and banks.  Never had any bites.  How much can a bunch of trees be worth?, is their reasoning.

I don't know if I've seen anything that shows the landowner how much trees increase in value as size and quality increases.  Maybe they would be more motivated if they treated their timber assets like a financial asset.  

[SwampDonkey]

Up this way, where there is aspen, there is also balsam fir. They seem to be compatible species where one is intolerant to shade, quickly dominating the tree canopy and the other is very shade tolerant living in the understory and co-dominant. Sometimes the understory fir is as much as 20 years older than the poplar that tower over the top of it. Both species are fast growing and short lived, well short for a tree. Roughly 60 to 90 years. With fir they live closer to 90 in the north and fall down around age 60 in the south (in NB). Add the spruce budworm to the equation and you can't crawl through the deadfall and thick fir regen. : These stands are best managed with clear cutting. Some folks haven't woke up to the fact that a 60 year old fir can be 5 inches and it can also be 14 inches on the same site. Beleive me there has been plenty effort to prove it, but its hard for some to grasp when all their in tune to is tree size, since that's what's marketable at the mill. Age doesn't mean anything to the mill as long as it meets specs. ;D

White pine is long lived and shade tolerant until pole sized. It will be around for several generations of poplar and fir and will even survive fires if not real severe. I know a stand that had survived 2 fires, one 90 years ago and another 60 years ago. It regenerates best on disturbances and grows faster than most softwoods, even balsam fir. I think they manage red pine with controlled fires in Ontario. In New Brunswick its not a significant component of the forest, although thousands of acres have been planted on abandoned fields and some cutovers.

Row crop farmer is right, they are usually farmers clear cutting to pay farm bills. Or older folks that have to cut the land to pay for thier room and board at the old folks home, or siblings that subdivide the estate and cash in after the folks kick off. Or a renegade logger that knows the owner lives and works 100 miles away from the woodlot.

A point worth mentioning is that if you need to go into a home and you have assets such as forest land, a house and investments etc.  The government basically seizes those assets or they have to be sold to pay your way. This is in New Brunswick. If you have family and you plan to leave them anything, you have to turn it over to them 5 years before you go to a home or lose it. Isn't that just lovely? :

One thing you may have been overlooking about the forester. The forester is always knockin on the door and sometimes he's the logger to. For the majority of folks the forester is a middleman and land owners and loggers would just as well eliminate the middle man because that's more $$ in his own pocket. ;)

[SwampDonkey]

Ron:

Well if its any comfort, you and I are on the same wavelength for sure, just side step'in in different directions sometimes. :D :D ;)

Putting your hand up, doesn't make you a target, by the way. :D I just want a head count. Like to see more from big industry on here. I've cruised other forums on forestry in canada and they are pretty much idol or have no participation. Dunno why. Must be shy, scared or something. shrug!

Ron, I can definately believe your recollection of the land ownership pole. That has to be the reason folks in NW Virginia own land because they never cut wood, maybe a pickup load for stovewood.  I never saw a sawmill or loggin truck for miles around, just solid forests with 4 lane highways down through'em. :D

I think most foresters know and agree that doing nothing is a management goal to, I concur. I have relatives that have forest land sitting idol. The old man said not the cut it, so its never been cut since he died and that's been almost 50 years ago. Even the fields he grew big gardens in have loggable softwood and poplar now. They all had jobs that didn't include forestry so it never bothered them. And yup, over 30% of the natural forest volume has fallen down and has regenerated. Some mess to crawl through. But there is an old road that follows a brook that everyone including the neighbors keep cleared out to hike on or ski on. I hike it to see the big white spruce and poplar along it. I like look'n at the trees standing there too ya know. ;) The poplar is 75 feet tall in there, start'n to fall down now though.

Treating the forest land as a financial asset as been the problem here. Way to many have been cashing in. :D

I also approached the realtors on the appraissal angle, and as you say, there's ZERO interest.  They just see a middle man, which is a big turn off. But, I got ahead of one realtor who thought he was gonna get my fathers forest land for nothing. He applied $50/acre on it all. I said listen up bub, reforested land costs $450/acre to replant, fully stocked regrowth is worth $300/acre, swampland is $50/acre and mature woodland is going for $750/acre. I measured all the land and divided it according to stand types and got an average and said this is what we're gettin. As you say they have no clue and I don't know where they get this $50/acre stuff. I can't buy it for that. If so, where is it? :D