Madison Paper made the news tonight!

[Woodhauler]

Cutting back production, More on this Tuesday! Seems to be a non stop bad news winter!!!  On top of mills closing and cutting back I Have to go haul my iceshacks off the pond because its spring time in January!!  That is my last place I can go and Get out of this crap going on! The mill said it was sworn to silence until Tuesday when asked for comment!

[Woodhauler]

Link is on WABI TV 5 website. I have no idea on how to put it on here.

[dgdrls]

http://wabi.tv/2016/01/28/union-president-says-madison-mill-cutback-will-hurt-workers/

Here we go WH,

Dan

[deastman]

Just got news that TRG is dropping their  log price and heard a rumor that Moose River Lumber might be closing, how much more bad news can there be out there?

[grassfed]

TRG is dropping their  log price

So what species and how much?

[thecfarm]

Moose River?? Where are they located?
Madison,I think,was like what was known as the Otis mill in Livermore Falls,Chisholm,Jay. A small,old time paper mill. Hard to compete with old machinery and a small mill too.

[sawguy21]

There is one pulp mill left in BC, the local natives have filed suit for huge compensation over loss of the land and fishery, want it shut down and removed regardless of the employment it provides. It was opened 60 years ago. I have no idea how this will play out but it is one more nail in the industry coffin.

[deastman]

TRG is dropping their  log price

So what species and how much?

Spruce and fir logs are gonna drop $7/ton on Monday. Forester called tonight and asked if we had any on the yard  and if we did could we get them in tomorrow before the price drops.

[deastman]

Moose River?? Where are they located?
Madison,I think,was like what was known as the Otis mill in Livermore Falls,Chisholm,Jay. A small,old time paper mill. Hard to compete with old machinery and a small mill too.

Moose River Lumber is just above Jackman off of rt 201 in Moose River . Funny thing is Moose River was just bought by Pleasant River Lumber out of Dover and now comes news that they might close, who can keep up with what's goin on right now?

[Woodhauler]

Hopefully its just a slowdown for moose river! If it closes there won't be 15 people left in town!!! I'm kinda antsy about the silence till Tuesday at Madison paper. I think its more then a financial anouncment!

[Woodhauler]

Moose River?? Where are they located?
Madison,I think,was like what was known as the Otis mill in Livermore Falls,Chisholm,Jay. A small,old time paper mill. Hard to compete with old machinery and a small mill too.

Madison is small but I think a very modern mill. Lose this softwood market and you may as well bulldoze your fir into a pile and burn it! barely worth cutting now!

[thecfarm]

I drive by Madison mill about once every 8 weeks to get my dog groomed. I also have a guy that sharpens my sawmill blades up there too.
The news is not good for us guys that cut wood. Things will change,that much is sure. The state of the forests will change too. Like a thinning on a wood lot. Where will all the small stuff go? A land owner will have to pay the logger to thin his wood lot.  :

[Logger RK]

One thought of what to do with the small wood,could be like what they did over this way a few years back. Three of the bigger Logger's got together & built a pellet mill. They make heating pellets also cow bedding,floor dry & even kitty litter pellets. And it's locally owned. 👍😎

[Sixacresand]

Sorry to read that your paper company is closing.  What ever the reason, it does not make it any better for the local people.    Middle Georgia plants have closed due to cut back in the US oil production, mainly the fracking business.

[Ken]

Here in NB we went through a rash of paper mill closures 10-15 years ago.  We only have 2 softwood pulp mills left.  One in the north of the province and 1 in the south.  We've been leaving our softwood pulp in the woods for quite some time now.   It's a shame but I don't see anything changing in the short term. 

[lynde37avery]

Maine is in tough shape I hear. I wish you folks luck up there. My brother lived in Bangor for 20 years. Now in Nashville TN. He told me of the big mills and their importance to you community
I live in a small town where the big factory and family sawmill closed over 20 years ago leaving hundreds jobless and forced to move. I learned how to make my living off the land. I hope our country gets up some manufacturing again especially in the wood department.

[Woodhauler]

I was there today with 2 loads, got to talk to scaler about things. He said paper orders are bleak in march. They was called to a meeting when I left???? May or may not have something to do with the feb 2 deal? He said if the mill loses money it will close. They have enough wood in yard to fill paper orders. 10 day supply of wood. They in the past have 50 days worth of wood in yard this time of year!!

[Maine logger88]

Did they make an announcement yesterday? Its sad used to be a guy could make a decent living cutting fir hemlock and pine pulp now if it doesn't have logs in it and it doesn't get knocked over it stays. Hope things change for the better soon

[beenthere]

What, if anything, has become of the great plans for woody biomass for energy?
Anyone have a feel for how much volume of wood is being collected and what the impact will be for forest management decisions, harvesting/collection equipment, and trucking needs??
Or is it another smoke and mirrors ethanol charade?  i.e does the pulp/paper industry see this coming in their future and competing for their raw material?

[Ed_K]

Well it's not totally smoke & mirrors, most of the big pellet mill are all built down south. They run y/pine thru and send it to Europe. I heard a rumor that a mill close to me is putting the pencil to building a pellet mill. Right now the closest one is in Jaffery N.H. and the big co's keep that full.

[snowstorm]

there are several pellet mills up this way. and i read in the paper there is going to be a new 7.5 megawatt biomass power plant in town. georges river energy or robbins lumber.they have a bio boiler must be building another one or making that one bigger 

[Woodhauler]

Well it's not totally smoke & mirrors, most of the big pellet mill are all built down south. They run y/pine thru and send it to Europe. I heard a rumor that a mill close to me is putting the pencil to building a pellet mill. Right now the closest one is in Jaffery N.H. and the big co's keep that full.

Pellet mills are full of unsold product up here! My cousin is manager of the one in east Corinth maine and the are going to stop production in a few weeks if things don't change. Athens mill is slowed way down, are not tasking wood. Building anymore pellet plants in the northeast is a recipe for failure!

[thecfarm]

Woodhauler,been an odd winter too for wood pellets. Oil is low and the temps have been high. I work in a hardware store. Our pellets sales are WAY down. I was there last year and we sold a bunch of pellets. We even ran out and could not get any last year. We have a truck load coming in next week. We don't want or need it,but it was ordered last year so we have to take it.
Sand,shovels,roof rakes,salt and all that winter stuff is way down too.

[GDinMaine]

It is unfortunate, but we can't seem to win.  When oil was very expensive, biomass boiler-created energy was the way to go. However. Hauling the wood was very expensive due to high fuel price.
In previous years pellet mills could not keep up with demand, but the mild winter must be hurting them, while it is easier on the wallets of the Joe Mainer.

Now that oil went down, they are shutting down two biomass plants in Maine, because it is too costly compared to (currently) low price of natural gas.  Thousands of tons of chips that had to be cut and trucked to the plants will stay in the woods.
http://bangordailynews.com/2016/01/07/business/biomass-plants-in-west-enfield-jonesboro-to-close/

[Woodhauler]

Update to this post. Wood buyer called me today, They really don't want any more wood this month. Not taking any in april. Will use up what wood they have on hand and if they get paper orders they will buy wood in may!!!! If the orders don't come in you can guess the outcome!!! As for the pellet plants, they are closed for now. The one my cousin is a manager of has layed crew off. He is running chipper for his boss at sappi now. He works for E.J Carrier. Verso is on a limited quota. I think they will make it now they have down sized. Grim time in the woods industry now. Firewood market is non existent. Hope the summer brings some good news!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Maine logger88]

Yeah let's hope they get some orders or fir really won't be worth cutting! I finally got two pine pulp tickets for verso which should clean up the pile I pulled out with my logs. Hope things loosen up a bit there this summer. Looks like Monday morning will be the end of it for this winter supposed to be warm all week

[Woodhauler]

Setting at Madison now. 25 trucks here. They are in slow motion here. Sad they can't unload more then 4 trucks a hour with the huge cat loaders they have.

[AfraidChocker]

I am not one to automatically look for blame, but I am a bit miffed at the University of Maine. They have been gleaning tax money from us from years in the form of state bonds to do wood based research, and their efforts have all been towards off-the-wall, radical new products when in my opinion they should have been looking at alternative products for what was already coming off the paper mills here. Those were the ones keeping towns employed.

I agree that it is really cool for them to make gasoline, and use the resins to make an alternative type of plastic, but it is too bad they could not have looked for something more practical.

Even I admit that very little paper goes through my printer attached to my computer today, but with modern adhesives I cannot believe there are not other uses for something that employs so many, comes off rolls in sheets 24 feet wide and miles long every hour, and is renewable. Someone just has to think outside the box for what paper mills could gravitate towards.

[Logger RK]

I believe Sappi in Clouqet Minn went from making paper or whatever they used to make,to making cellulose. I think there's a big Asian market for it. I think they make clothes out of it.  :P

[concretecutter]

Logger RK you are correct I worked for sappi as a sub contractor cutting concrete for the shut down 100 million dollar transformation they still make paper but there main supply is making cellulose fibers out of pulp to ship over to China so they can make it into clothes I have many shirts from sappi made from wood you couldn't tell the difference it was either make the change or shut the doors glad they did

[barbender]

     I think Sappi made a lot of pulp, that they sold wholesale to other mills, before the conversion. One downside of the conversion was the shut down of a line at the Boise paper mill in International Falls, as they were dependent on the Sappi material. When they shut down that line, it also a killed a good portion of the chip market because Boise bought a lot of chips for that line. Several loggers went belly up as a result. So lots of repercussions, but likely a wise move by Sappi. Their mill is munching up the wood again. When they first started back up, they were only taking clean aspen and maple. That caused some difficulty, because prior to this they had bought pine pulp, ash, balmy, basswood, pretty much everything. But as time goes on, they get the chemistry down for their process on the other species and they have been taking some of them again.

[Corley5]

They're going to close by the end of May  :( :( 

http://www.wlbz2.com/news/local/madison-paper-industries-to-close-by-may-affecting-214-workers/82037787

[Woodhauler]

Yes they are done!! Workers need 60 day notice, that's why its end of may closing. Very depressing state of affairs in maine logging now.

[Woodhauler]

Well they are buying a little wood till the end of may! Hope this is a good sign, but I don't think so.

[Ed_K]

 Bloomberg, said I.P. just bought the pulp supply side of werehouser, maybe this will help some?

[snowstorm]

Well they are buying a little wood till the end of may! Hope this is a good sign, but I don't think so.

and you asked me to keep it quite  and you blab it all over the interweb

[snowstorm]

Bloomberg, said I.P. just bought the pulp supply side of werehouser, maybe this will help some?

how is tis going to work? wherehouser  just bought plum creek

[Woodhauler]

Well they are buying a little wood till the end of may! Hope this is a good sign, but I don't think so.

and you asked me to keep it quite  and you blab it all over the interweb

Well its everywhere anyhow. Don't think its any biggy. They are still closing end of month the wood buyer said today. Hope something changes.

[Mountaynman]

just saw that IP bought all Weyhausers pulp mills so they could pay down debt on buying Plun Creek Timber not sure what that means for all of us contractors but the big get bigger and those of us that cut the wood will have to work for nothing to do what we want to do maybe one day they will figure out that professional woods contractors and off road log haulers are a dying breed cant find any young men round here to go in the woods when the CEO's of the big companies don't have any Sheet paper they might ask what happened

[grassfed]

IP bought all Weyerhaeuser's pulp mills

I just looked up the story and it seems that IP is betting that global demand for disposable diapers is going to be increasing ( for young and old perhaps  :D ) I guess they use softwood pulp for that but I could be wrong. From what I could tell it looked like all of Weyerhaeuser's pulp mills are down south.  It sure would be nice if demand for softwood pulp would increase in the north east.

[WDH]

Fluff pulp for diapers is made from southern pine because of the long fibers.  Better for absorption. 

[Mountaynman]

That's the future boys grab me another beer and change my diaper when u get a chance they want all of us to keep putting the wood out till we cant anymore then who will do it I really wonder about that it has always amazed me that the men with the biggest and most expensive iron cut wood that aint worth much and then those of us with old small outfits cut the wood that is worth something keep plodding along