Just wondering what you all are cutting these days

Just about to move back into the red pine was in this winter. Roads are still posted here too, but the woods are drying out. Or I should say, “were”. Snow and rain for the next few days.

Little or no money in RP sawlogs either, but it’s on my land so at least I don’t have to pay stumpage.

I cut some scotts pine about 15 years ago. It was big, and squirrelly, but we actually had a market for logs back then. The prison farm used to saw guard-rail posts and treat them for all of the State highways. Then the steel market tumbled and the states all made exclusive deals to use steel guard-rails.

Anyway it was about 2/3 pulp, 1/3 logs.

Carl

This week we cut standing dead red oak about like the one Carl featured a while back. Broke our loader truck frame in half trying to load a butt log and will have to figure out how to get the loader set onto another worn out truck, just not quite as worn out as the last one. We also cut some cherry on a worst first basis for our own sawing and processing.

The pre dry shed is complete at the Natural Woodworking Company http://www.naturalwoodworkingcompany.com

so we are started to move lumber along the process for the other projects we have ongoing through the owner builder situation.

We will move into white pine soon for a owner builder timber frame barn deal. We hope to team up with some of the other Biological Woodsmen to work on that together. It is actually closer to them than us so it makes sense to team up on it so we can move along to the other projects we have scheduled.

We are selling the r.o. into the conventional markets, glad to be able to sell it at any price. The cherry goes into the DRAFTWOOD inventory as KD
lumber for later various uses for green certified lumber markets.

Lots of continued interest in Black Locust Decking so we continue to harvest that species on a worst first basis too.

Also still working on getting out English colt into the country and finding a home for the other colt we found over that that is worth importing. Lots going on, garden ground is ready and probably will put off any big plowing this spring.

Working on the ongoing SDAD efforts with vendors and sponsors too. Carl knows what a job putting an event together turns out to be. Worth it just to see the many folks that wouldn’t be able to visit our area otherwise. The American Suffolk Horse Association annual meeting will be held at SDAD this year too, so maybe get to see some of those folks too.
They will surly get to see some red horses with sweat on them.

Oh yea, also working on collecting our Stallion for A.I. this year with about a dozen mares or so, one being owned by our DAP member Donn Hewes.
Just covered a homegrown mare with him to crank up the reproductive parts to increase the chances of good collections to follow.

Hope y’all are well and busy as you can be.

~

Hey Taylor,
That jack pine looks a lot like our open-grown lodgepole out here. The two species are very close cousins. Quite the limbing fest with little clear wood

I am getting ready to take a look at some closed-stand lodgepole (clear wood, self-pruned) in an area that hasn’t been high-graded and is on very decent ground. From the sound of it it could be a decent, fun show that pays OK. Traditional logging job that I won’t have to pay stumpage on. Just punch in some group-selection and small patch cuts.

My faithful post mill has never denied me. Small roundwood is about the only thing that is moving around here and pays OK if you’re in the right stand with decent volume.

Besides that I’m looking forward to doin’ some serious post-n-polin’. Kinda fun, but then again I’ve been told I have a warped sense of fun.

Now if the snow will just leave and the ground firms up I’ll be in business…

@near horse 17727 wrote:

Treated 5″ dia. fence post 8ft long = $11 ea picked up at the treatment plant.

…and I get $2.85 stick delivered to the post mill. Just goes to show you how many people take their cut along the way. The post mill for peeling, the treatment plant for treating, and the ag retail store who puts a 40-50% mark up on it. The treatment plant you purchase from Geoff is just charging the current market retail price.

Still, if I cut/haul a 100-125/day that is a pretty good day for hard-bitten consistent horse logging. You have to be in the right timber with the right stocking level to make it work though. Also, the ability to get a minimum of 2-3 posts/stem is critical to making the numbers work.

I really enjoy cutting post & poles on a great site. Perfect one horse, low tech, low overhead operation where I can haul my own volume to the mill on my flat bed truck or gooseneck. Good straight lodgepole just looks like it needs to be used. Anybody remember Lil’ Abner and the shmoos? Just like shmoos live/love to be eaten, lodgepole lives/loves to be cut and turned into a post…

We’re working in a red oak piece that has some cherry too. It has pretty much been destroyed by forty years of cattle running in it. The mortality or number of dead trees were sad. Lots of hardwood firewood for training the young horses. We will fence it off from livestock and hope for some good regeneration in the future.

These attached photos show what we did last week. We saw some of it and sell some of it.

Beautiful working space Carl has there too.

~