Looking for advice re: cutting trees.

Robert2012

Hi, I have approx 10 acres of various types of Christmas trees on my land. They were planted before I bought the land in 1998, and there has been no replanting or harvesting since, so most of the trees are pretty large now, both in height and diameter, some up to 30/40 feet high and 1.5 to 2 feet in diameter. They have never been thinned, and the forest is very dense.

I would like to cut and sell some of these to a sawmill. I do not want to clearfell any acreage, and I only plan on cutting the larger trees, which are spread out sporadically over the acreage. This would probably amount to about 150 trees in total.

I intend felling the trees with my neighbour, and transporting them to the sawmill using his trailer, etc.

Do I need any documentation for the trees when I get them to the sawmill, i.e to prove ownership?

Does anyone have any idea of what price I should be getting for the trees?

Should I cut into lengths, e.g sawlogs, before transporting?

Any other advice that anyone could offer would be greatly appreciated.

Oldtree

Before you syart have you a felling licence?

Legal requirements:

http://www.agriculture.gov.ie/forestservice/treefelling/legalrequirementsfortreefelling/

Felling application forms:

http://www.agriculture.gov.ie/forestservice/treefelling/treefelling/

After getting a felling licence you would firstly need to talk to your local sawmill pre felling to see if they are interested in your wood or knot and what their specific requirements are. You will need to know exactly what you have.

Does your neighbour have insurance to transport the wood?
Do you have insurance to cover your neighbour doing this type of work on your land should he be hurt?
Have you done any felling before?
Has your neighbour?
Do you have a skidder to help with the extraction of the sellectivly felled?
Would it be a better financial option to take out smaller tree to favor the larger ones to get a better return in the future?

If sawmill not interested then if you could to dry and process it yourself, then sell it as firewood.

Robert2012

Thanks for that advice Oldtree, very helpful.

Reindeer

And before you start, consider the long term health of the wood/trees. You would actually have healthier wood if you instead culled the smaller struggling trees right now for the mills and allowed the larger, stronger trees to further develop for harvesting later. Later on you can harvest much larger and healthier trees as well as have a better established, more aesthetically pleasing woods. From there you can cull once again without clear-cutting.

greenfingers89

Reindeer wrote: »

. You would actually have healthier wood if you instead culled the smaller struggling trees right now .

sometimes in smaller unthinned sites in particular a crown thinning is a better method, hard to know definitivly in this situation but if the larger trees are of a size in or around .7-.8 m3 then crown thinning might suit better

Oldtree

It may well be worth getting some professional advice as to your best option.