Creative solutions for clearing Timber/land?

truth

hey man i work on logging equi for a living and i just got laid off from carolina cat because the loggers are so bad off .the loggers are slowly losing there a## .housing market is down so that means logging is slow if you want a good price may need to wait until after 1st of year the only waythey can make it off a pulp wood track is if it is 25 ac plus the fuel is shutting this world down
 
sell the fire wood at URE?

build a REALLY big TeePee.

really really over do a bridge accross the creek.

build a pole fort around your house.

have a bon fire party.

Build and Ark.

I can think of more, but its busy at work today.
 
Sam much depends on how big the trees are. if it's smaller stuff, then pulpwood is about all it's good for. If it's big enough to mill then it has some value. you have a couple options.
Find a smaller timber guy to take a look see.
Cut it yourself, and haul it to the mill. Some mills will cut it into boards for money or part of the wood.
Pine will only be good for firewood after it's dried. Than means cutting it up and storing it untill it is. Then it's not the desired wood for heat because of how fast it burns.
I would say if you have a good saw, and a decent tractor with a loader or even a boom pole, cut it, stack it, and when you have a load take it and have it cut into lumber. then you will have lumber for future buildings
 
Caver had a guy come out a few years ago and take care of some trees we cut down in his yard. seems Caver made out pretty good on the deal, but I don't recall specifics about it.
 
Sammy, if you looking to profit, that's a hard row to hoe...

If you just want some portion of the clearing done for you, maybe not quite as hard.


mbalbritton said:
Caver had a guy come out a few years ago and take care of some trees we cut down in his yard. seems Caver made out pretty good on the deal, but I don't recall specifics about it.
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I cut down 25 trees (4 pines, 2 wild cherry, 2-3 poplars & the rest oak) the pines were the smallest at approx 12" thru the butts. I cut them all down, chunked into 8'-10' lengths and piled them in the backyard. Spent WEEKS hauling brush to the curb for the slack city crew to remove (since I can't burn outside of the fireplaces or chimenea :rolleyes: ). Then had a guy from King drag his diesel sawmill in to cut the lengths into lumber. Didn't cost me anything other than many hours dragging the scabs off the saw and stacking it (IMO, much less work than dragging all that timber somewhere)... he hauled off 3+ loads (8'-10' long even with the bed of his CTD) of assorted boards. Normally, he does it for folks wanting the wood @ so much/boardfoot, but is planning to build a house completely of wood he cut...

If this is something you might be interested in, LMK & I'll pass along his contact info. Very nice guy...
 
Sam contact Joe Whicker in Kernersville he has a small saw mill set up and may be able to help you out to rough cut your timber. PM me for me info.
 
There's a couple of guys around here that have the woodmizer portable sawmills, I'm sure that there is somebody with the same up your way. They charge so much per bf to saw it up for you...then all you have to do is stack and sticker it, cover it, and in a year or so you'll have some decent rough-cut stuff for a shed/etc.
 
Profit I am not worried about, would have been nice to have gotten paid for this stuff but otherwise just wanting to clear the lot over the next year or so.

Was looking at the various "chain saw mills" and/or making a workshop out of the logs myself! I have the room, and will obviously have a ton of wood.

CHIP, most of these are probably 8-12" logs, mostly pine. I assume they would be ok to build/use for walls in a rustic workshop/cabin?
 
Sam,
First we need to know what size you are working with.
Go to an average tree and measure the diameter 54" above ground.
Use a couple straiht sticks if necessary to get outside edge.

Anything above 7" is not pulp.
7-10 is CNS and 10+ is sawtimber

These exact numbers may move an 1" or 2" depending on which mill you are talking about.

If any of it is above pulp you shouldnt be paying to have it removed. You may be in a give it away proposition and only when they are cutting a trac close, but certainly not paying.

If you can get a forestry consultant to ook at it, he can get it sold for you regardless.
 
If you are clearing land that you intend to landscape, then you have to deal with the stumps too. Nobody has mentioned that nasty part yet. I am in a similar situation Sam. I have about 200 pine trees in the front and side of my house. After having about 25 of them fall in storms etc over the past 3 yrs, I investigated having them all removed along with the stumps and the ground graded smooth. I was quoted $6,800. I decided against cutting them all down since I really don't want to lose the privacy. Instead, I have started cutting the ones close to my house, and the ones around/along the driveway down. I have been burning the brush, and hauling the logs to the local LCID. He charges $10 per pickup load, and $10 per 5x8 utility trailer load. The guy across the street from me just opened an LCID, and I guess since I didn't sign the petition to get it banned, he is going to let me dump there for free.
 
Yep the guy yesterday quoted me $9000 for him to take away, $12,000 and he would remove stumps, and plant grass, etc.

So I am thinking I can BUY alot of stinking equipment for that, use it to clean up my property and even if I lose 20% on them when reselling I will be FAR FAR FAR ahead.

(Anyone know where you can rent a really big bulldozer? I would guess one of them could push em all down / create a really big pile (mess) but I imagine I will use the tractor instead to move them a few at a time in some orderly fashion)

Sam
 
I've got a Komatsu D21, 9000lb dozer, and have been selectively clearing my land where I will be putting my future house. Anything under 8 or 9" pushes right over. Trees in the 9-12" range generally take 10-20min of groundwork. Ive had a few 16-18" pines that ive spent 2-3 hours fighting down.

Once the tree is down, I cut it off close to the stump, push all the stumps in a pile, cut the trunk at 17' intervals till it gets down around 7" and then burn the smaller stuff. I stack all the trunks with the dozer and push all the stumps in a pile.

Once I have a good stumppile, I load them onto our small dumptruck and take them to a friends land where they are filling gullies.

I still have not dealt with the trunks for the same reasons you have run into. I have about 1 truckload of pine from the 1/2acre that I have cleared so far. I have a good bit of oak/beech/hickory that I will be using for firewood.
 
Timber

I would wait, timber sales will come back. You are correct, you could buy the equipment for the price given. If you can use the lumber, having it milled on site would be a good option.
 
unfortunatly Sam you are trying to do this at the worst possible time. Domestic lumber prices are at an all time low, so no one will want to go throught the extra trouble of harvesting timber from a small lot. Like others have said if you can wait a little while, you may or may not be better off depending on what prices do. If you plan on trying to get much/any cash out of then for lumber you really do not want to cut them down and have them sit around for an extended period of time, they will dry out and split effectivly losing yield out of the log. on the other hand if you are going to cut fire wood, fall those suckers and start cutting. If you are handy with a chain saw and have a tractor you can cut/clear much of it yourself and then bring in some heavy equipment to remove the stumps.

Fred
 
Well I am not in a huge hurry "yet".. I am planning on putting our current home on the market after Christmas. Not really in a huge hurry to sell, probably will wait for the market to come back to us (rather than discount the house to get it moved)

So meanwhile I will be either taking my time to clean this property up (or) I suppose I can let it continue to grow and the timber market come back.

[Any ideas on where you can buy or rent a bulldozer / used... craigslist doesn't seem to have much in that way...]

Hmm, bulldozer is the ULTIMATE "offroad" vehicle, yeehaw!

Sam
 
Look in the equipment trader.

BEST DEAL is equipment auctions.
A friend just bought a D9 with a busted track last week Martin&Martin in Anderson for $4500. He will spend some $$ fixing the track, but his plan is exactly yours use it to clear his land and then sell it for what he has in it.

I know where there is a small (D435, I think) sitting for sale, for aa reasonable price but the hours are ^^^^
 
SkyHiK5 said:
Look in the equipment trader.
BEST DEAL is equipment auctions.
A friend just bought a D9 with a busted track last week Martin&Martin in Anderson for $4500. He will spend some $$ fixing the track, but his plan is exactly yours use it to clear his land and then sell it for what he has in it.
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Alright, I gotta know. How do you transport a 50 ton immovable piece of equipment? And then how do you work on it?
 
Looks like buying a small dozer is the way to go if I am going to clean this up myself. We can use it on my property plus we have 30 acres up in Caswell too.

Course once you own a dozer "everyone" will prob need a little work, not to mention the "cool" factor of owning your own dozer heh.

Looks like there is some that sell in the $5k range, John Deere 1010, etc. Would love any help / suggestions on what to buy / avoid, etc.

Knowing my dad/myself we prob will end up "restoring" it and making it look nice while we have it. Ebay appears to be a good source too on these.

(Would love good examples / pictures of what to avoid or watch out for on the tracks or other similar thoughts)
 
Watch out for $5k machines. Rebuilding the undercarriage can quickly double the price. My D21 isn't quite as strong as I'd like it to be, but it gets the job done. A loader is better for pushing trees over since you can get up higher on the tree.
 
jeepinmatt said:
Alright, I gotta know. How do you transport a 50 ton immovable piece of equipment? And then how do you work on it?
Click to expand...


I have no idea.

Why I didnt bid on it
 
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