Yardbird said:
I take it you are in the western states.
After taking a wagon across the plains our family moved to the Spanish territory of what is now Oregon. Our barn from that era is now falling down. Someday I will start using more of the wood for projects. Some of it is beautiful and probably highly valuable.
Yardbird said:
From what I have been reading the guy selling the logs is not the one making the money, as your receipt shows. The CME futures has lumber around $1600 and it looks like you are getting $150-$250 if I am reading your receipt correctly. It does not seem that logs have increased in price in relationship to dimensional lumber.
Our receipt is for MBF or 1,000 board feet. :-\ Not a fair price at all compared to retail.
Yardbird said:
I did notice while at Menards that fir structural lumber was priced higher than pine, which makes sense.
Fir and Western Larch (Tamarack) are higher dollar value than pine. We have Ponderosa Pine. White Pine grows well, and we planted a few test trees 30 years ago, but haven't planted much as we don't need to, except we planted 10,000 trees after the fire which is all we could get. We wanted 40,000 trees to plant. Planting trees with a spray of Milestone around them is $3.50 a tree. Last time I hired someone and we sprayed post planting. Next time we will pay to have it done upfront.
Yardbird said:
We did some select cutting years ago, and here in the mid-west (southern Illinois) what the loggers like is white oak. Hickory and the other oaks not so much.
They won't even show up to log unless you have a decent tract of land. Loggers don't like eco farming either. Line loggers want to clear cut, so it is pretty much impossible for us to get one willing to walk their equipment along the ridge tops, and keep re-rigging. Cost prohibitive.
Yardbird said:
You can almost make more money leasing for hunting rather than logging.
True that! Although I do not want hunters and trespassers on our land. It is next to impossible to keep people off as we are open range, and abut to Forest Service land with no fences. Someone shot one of *our* bears a couple years ago, then apologized, thinking that would solve everything. We have herds of elk that pass over our land every year. The bears, mountain lions, wolves, elk, mule tail deer, grouse, turkey, etc are safer on our land, if we can keep hunters away. I prefer to shoot with my camera. Go ahead and kill the coyotes though, as they are a menace, just ask permission first.
We do write a sheep grazing lease for 2 bands which is a few thousand sheep. With the right ranchers, sheep are better than cows and do less damage, with more control so as to not over graze. They also keep the brush held back for fire suppression. Last year sheep fed one bear, one mountain lion, and the wolves. No predators were killed. Livestock loss is paid for by the government.
Edit: OOPS!
