Future of timber (for timber owners and aficionados)

Heineken

For this thread I put on a slightly more optimistic hat and assume that some scaled-down version of civilization will continue.

I own about 75 acres of timber (both hardwood and pine). Many of you, if you own land, also own timber. Several of you own hundreds of acres of timber.

I'm fairly familiar with how the timber industry operates, but does it have any future? One could hardly imagine a more energy-dependent industry. Huge machines are used to harvest, process, and transport wood, as well as to perform intermediate treatments (such as thinning) on growing stands. If there's an economic depression, which I consider certain, demand will shrink drastically.

Timber has been in demand for thousands of years, of course, through thick and thin.

Maybe there's a post-PO future for timber the commodity, but I have no idea what it might look it.

One possibility might be selling carbon credits to polluters in exchange for agreeing not to cut your timber. There are a couple of fledgling carbon-trading exchanges. This would be very attractive to me, since I'm increasingly biased against ever cutting my timber, except selectively.
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Ludi

Trees will always be a good long-term investment. Just remember to diversify. Smile

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SpringCreekFarm · Intermediate Crude Joined: Mar 03, 2006 Posts: 925

I have about 60 acres of hardwood bush. I'm thinking that in a few years time I'll be fighting off poachers that come in from behind and steal firewood. I think that in my area, firewood will be a booming business. It is something that I look forward to as a means of making an income, should my job be gone. It may be all I have left one day. Crying or Very sad

Specop_007 · Expert Joined: Aug 12, 2004 Posts: 6265

We've been harvesting timber since the days of the stone axe. The lumber trade isnt going to die anytime soon. It may change a whole lot though.

I would let the lumberjaacks onto my property as long as they replanted when they were done, although I wouldnt let them cut it all.
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rattleshirt · Heavy Crude Joined: Oct 26, 2006 Posts: 114

Cutting trees on my property will be strictly planned, limited, and personally monitored. When my grandparents did a timber sale a few years before I aquired the property the loggers cut trees they weren't supposed to, left trash in the woods, and cut some small trees for no reason I could establish. Never Again.

Don35 · Heavy Crude Joined: Feb 07, 2006 Posts: 143

The timber industry will not disappear, but at this moment the price for timber is LOW. My brother thought about selling some the price wasn't enough to justify the fuel cost.
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PrairieMule

We have done a some selective harvesting. Seems like the market took off right after Hurricane Andrew(1992) and lasted till a year before the housing bust. With the market down, Weyerhouser and Georgia Pacific are selling off lands cheap. You can buy hard timber in SE Oklahoma for around $2K an acre.

Hard timber have other purposes as well. Smile

http://www.hightechredneck.com/freeclickedphoto.asp?cpo_id=654
http://www.hightechredneck.com/freeclickedphoto.asp?cpo_id=1349
These photos were taken about 4 years ago.
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alokin · Intermediate Crude Joined: Aug 24, 2007 Posts: 872

Timber was always used, with or without machinery.
The English forests and the forests around the Mediterranean sea were cut without a drop of petrol.

I hope that we will be able to buy land in maybe two years and I want to plant timber trees and bamboo. It's for superannuation.

skyemoor

There will be logging with axes, crosscut saws, and horses, along with portable or water-powered sawmills.

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dunewalker

Over a span of 50 years I've wandered the slopes of the California Sierras as well as the White Mountains and Hays Ranges of Nevada. It seems that everywhere there are stumps left from logging before the machine age, mostly for firewood, or for feeding the railroads. The timber must have been removed by pack animals, as there are no remnants of roads anywhere. In the future, it would seem most timber will be used for fuel once again, rather than for construction.
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Heineken

Interesting comments as always; thanks!

I live on 25 acres of hardwoods; my remaining 50 acres (in 23-y.o. pine) is 75 miles to the south. I visit there once or twice a month and work my ass off. But I worry that gas prices etc. will get so out of hand I won't be able to get down there and I'll lose my ability to work on and oversee the property. I visualize the roads and bridges falling into disrepair. The route I take passes through some thickly forested areas, and it takes the continual attention of road crews to keep the growing branches from blocking the roads. I've owned this property for about a year and love the place and its wildness.

Maybe my worries are silly or at least premature.
_________________
"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog

"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother

bobaloo · Heavy Crude Joined: Oct 14, 2004 Posts: 484

My suspicion is that you'll see an increased demand for firewood and a decreased demand for lumber. I live in Oregon and in the 80's there was a major depression here due to the downturn in the housing market, we're seeing the same thing shaping up again now. Stump prices are down about 50 percent in the last couple of years and headed down.

On the other hand the price of firewood just keeps going up, people are actually getting over $200 per cord for fir, which has about half the heat content of oak.

TnAndy · Heavy Crude Joined: Aug 31, 2005 Posts: 100

The person with 50-100ac of woodlot in the future is going to be a wealthy person.

We live on our 100ac and have been processing our own wood for the last 17 years......it has built our house and heated it all that time, plus built barns, sheds, and 3 rental homes.....and I have yet to put much of a dent in the timber.

We got a bad infestation of souther pine beetle here a few years back and that produced the 3 rental homes......and I didn't even have time to get it all logged out and sawed before it went bad.

Pile of white pine floor joists from beetle killed timber.

Future log cabin in drying shed......some assembly required Very Happy

My "log skidder"

About 1/2 the logs that came off one acre I cleared for a new apple orchard:

Heineken

Impressive, Andy.

It could be noted from those photos, though, that you're using lots of gasoline and diesel, and machinery that requires plenty of maintenance and specialized parts. Someone once told me that a portable sawmill is a mechanical nightmare; I have no idea if this is true (or true any more, with today's improved engineering).

I recognize my good buddy yellow-poplar in that log pile. I love those trees, although they have a propensity to get struck by lightning. I've lost several magnificent specimens to lightning in the past two years. They'll make great snags, though, for wildlife.

One of the things I like about enlightened, smaller-scale timber management is that it can actually improve the woods (if done carefully and properly) while still extracting useful products. The Germans have practiced this "positive-impact forestry" for hundreds of years, and Americans are starting to get a clue.
_________________
"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog

"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother

SpringCreekFarm · Intermediate Crude Joined: Mar 03, 2006 Posts: 925