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Does anyone know...

Started by HiTech, March 09, 2016, 06:33:47 AM

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HiTech

where the logging industry is headed? New technology has made logging safer with no feet on the ground. Huge amounts of wood can be harvested in a day. Pulp and Paper mills have all but disappeared. Markets for saw logs closes quickly when the big boys start hauling logs in. Chip burning plants are now finding wood chips more expensive than oil or natural gas. I guess there is a market for wood for wood pellets. Just curious I guess. lol

furltech

It sure would be nice to have that crystal ball .I have been pondering the same things

lumberjack48

 It went down here 36 yrs ago, the state was pushing for no boots on the ground or a chainsaw in the woods. The State and the Fed's got together with the big mills and drove the stumpage up to drive small loggers out of business. Then they stopped handing out small contracts, 200, 500 or a 1000 cds. It went to 5000 cds and up, so if you wanted to stay in business you would have to buy big equipment. All the timber brokers started disappearing, there were one or two in every little town, then there were none.
My father said, theres no way the big loggers can pay this high stumpage an make it, [ theres some footsie playing going on under the table with the State and Feds with the big mills ] theres no way the loggers can pay more for stumpage then the mill pays for it delivered.
The high stumpage went on for about two yrs or until every small logger was out of business. There was equipment setting every where for sale, the banks didn't want it. At auctions it was being sold for pennies on a dollar, sad, sad days.
I knew one guy, he had x amount of equipment on the ground, 7 trucks on the road. They put 200 cds a day on the landing. He told me, if he made a dollar a cord after all the dust settled he was lucky. This was 35 yrs ago.
We don't have loggers around here anymore, just equipment operators. I would like to give one of these guys a chainsaw, measure stick and a pick/axe and say, you can start you strip over there and make sure your strip roads are 8 feet wide, cut stumps low and fill holes.
Third generation logger, owner operator, 30 yrs felling experience with pole skidder. I got my neck broke back in 89, left me a quad. The wife kept the job going up to 96.

Remle

Looks to me that it is headed the same way as the dairy industry has, BTO, commercial operations capable of fulling all needs have taken over squeezing out the family farm / logging operations because they cannot compete, small tracks of land are being bought and turned in to large tracks of land now owned by them,laws have changed, hard to find some one to work for what wages are being paid by small private operations and make a profit, especially in states (NY) where the governor with the stroke of his pen can raise minimum whether any one likes it or not!! As you say the machines were supposed to enhance the safety and welfare of workers. Well it has advanced safety and more of those who were employed are no longer need are on the welfare rolls, things look pretty clear to me..Sorry for going off on a rant, so I'll shut up now go clean the crystal ball (fish tank)and maybe things will be better if I get up on the other side of the bed tomorrow.. at least maybe the fish will appreciate it. ::) ::)

CCC4

The market is super saturated due to no Winter I think. Tie buyer are saturated, stave buyers are in the midst of a boom...everyone is logging. Buyers are telling us we need 2 weeks of straight rain to keep the loggers out and the tie prices will hold through Summer.

lopet

History always repeat itself.    Only thing different this time is, that we have a global problem now, with all the banks selling each other bonds, or bundled mortgages or loans. All this credit expansion and bailouts we had since 2008 was just kicking the can a little further down the road and making the bubbles bigger.
Now we get to pay the price for this exaggerated borrowing !  It's not sustainable, we no longer can borrow money to live a live we did not earn.   Over 90 % of the money is created from banks out of thin air.

You can call me a pessimist as some of my buddies do , but while I am prepared for rough times, it's gonna be a rude awakening for a lot of people.

It's too bad we didn't learn from history !!

And Trump is gonna make things a lot worse a lot faster.


" There is no means of avoiding a final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only weather the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved. " 
Ludwig von Mises
Make sure you know how to fall properly when you fall and as to not hurt anyone around you.
Also remember, it's not the fall what hurts, its the sudden stop. !!

Ozarker

Quote from: lopet on March 09, 2016, 09:24:48 PM
" There is no means of avoiding a final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only weather the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved. " 
Ludwig von Mises

Ludwig von Mises is the man!  smiley_clapping

4x4American

Alot of people named Ludwig seem to be smart...yea, what he said!
Boy, back in my day..

wannaergo

LJ48, I hate to disagree with you, but I like to think that even though I spend almost all day in a machine, I am still a logger, not just an operator. When Running a harvester, I still look for the best skid roads, keep them neat, remove damaged or dead trees, utilize log trees as best as possible, and yes, I still use the trusty husky now and again. We take just as much pride in doing a nice job as you guys did back in the glory years, we just do it different. We all have the same goal, utilizing the forests while maintaining and preserving them for our grandkids.
2016 Ponsse ergo 8w
2014 Cat 564
Husky 385

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