Advice on downed timber

shelby27604

shelby27604

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 6, 2013
Location
Efland NC
We have had a couple trees come down in the recent storm, wondering if I can actually generate any income from them, rather than buck them into firewood I don't currently need (my firewood cup runith over).

I had a very large white oak come down, roughly 30"-36" at the base, and straight for 20'+ Would need to buck it into something smaller than that to get it out of the woods. Will timber buyers go through the trouble of picking up / paying for logs like this?

Second issue is the abundance of pine trees committing suicide on our property, I have a pile of logs, filled with beetles continuing to eat away at the logs. I don't mind making them into firewood if there is a market for them (out door boilers?). Whenever I see firewood for sale, it is never pine.
 
You need a small operation with a band mill. The market has really softened in the last couple years. The pine is gonna be a hard sell for anything other than chip wood or shavings. Beatle killed pine is almost worthless for anything other then chips or mulch wood. A small market did exist for something called "Blued Pine boards" or sometimes referred to as "Blue Jean" pine. The window is small due to the quickly deterioration of the heart wood and sap wood going bad even faster.

Blue Jean pine makes beautiful craft wood for siding (interior) and some less structural applications. Used properly it still needs kiln dried.
 
drkelly said:
My experience has been nobody wants the pines.
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That was my assumption.

WARRIORWELDING said:
You need a small operation with a band mill. The market has really softened in the last couple years. The pine is gonna be a hard sell for anything other than chip wood or shavings. Beatle killed pine is almost worthless for anything other then chips or mulch wood. A small market did exist for something called "Blued Pine boards" or sometimes referred to as "Blue Jean" pine. The window is small due to the quickly deterioration of the heart wood and sap wood going bad even faster.

Blue Jean pine makes beautiful craft wood for siding (interior) and some less structural applications. Used properly it still needs kiln dried.
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Do people pay for these, or at least pick them up for free?
 
I've been piddling with this stuff for nearly 2 decades and its still one of the biggest challenges. My parents have a neighbor that will take oak for firewood if I don't want it, but he won't pay for it. There's a sawmill near me that will take pine for about $5-7/ton, and another that will pay a little better by the boardfoot but they are harder to deal with and aren't always buying and have weird hours. Nobody around here buys hardwoods, so I end up splitting it or cutting it on the sawmill and watching it rot. I need to build a shed to put it under. I've had some spalted maple, black walnut, red oak, white oak, and cherry boards listed on FB for over a year and I've sold ONE board. All that to say, its hard to get rid of timber unless you have enough to entice a logger, or something really special.
 
shelby27604 said:
That was my assumption.


Do people pay for these, or at least pick them up for free?
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Side hustlers want everything free! Doesn't matter the hustle in my experience.

Small legitimate business may pay. Most of these would rather come custom cut what you want to keep or trade a portion of the lumber. You get some they get some.

In the end the headache probably isn't worth it. A free wood add targeted at a small band mill, mulch operation might hook a potential deal but unlikely. The market got real soft when everybody and their brother bought cheap Chinese mills thinking they struck gold.

A local high end wood workers shop or guild might get word to a potential interest. That or search a local band mill operator in your area and reach out.
 
shelby27604 said:
That was my assumption.


Do people pay for these, or at least pick them up for free?
Click to expand...
I had been slowly taking the pines down on my property, but there were just too many of them, so I ended hiring a guy. Nobody quoted doing it for free. I think I paid $8,000 for a guy to take down about 50 pine trees on my property. I had him push most of them in a gulley, so he didn't even have to haul them off.
 
I burn pine a lot, but also oak, maple, Bradford pear, birch, poplar, and whatever else I can get. But its almost always just ejat somebody had blow down and its always free.
 
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