Small Forest Timber Owner Blog for WA

Task force to study dying trees in Eastern Washington

2011-11-28T21:21:00.001-08:00

Over the next 15 years, state projections indicate that elevated tree mortality could occur across 2.8 million acres of Eastern Washington, or roughly one-third of the landscape.

Washington State is convening a committee of foresters, scientists and other experts in an effort to contain this pending forest health epidemic east of the Cascades. The task force was convened under the state’s forest health law, which allows the Department of Natural Resources to ask other landowners to take voluntary actions to reduce the spread of insects and disease and to provide technical assistance from the state.

"The combination of the projections and the actual mortality we're seeing causes us alarm," said Aaron Everett, Washington's State Forester. "It's certainly compounded by what we anticipate will be a warmer climate."

Spruce budworm damage mostly affects the emerging new growth on infested trees.

In August 2011, WA DNR and the USDA Forest Service announced they were monitoring the Western spruce budworm to see how many acres of Washington's forests have been defoliated by the insect. Drivers crossing Blewett Pass in summer can see expanses of evergreens damaged or killed by the budworm.

DNR’s Forest Health Program and Washington State University’s Forestry Extension program conduct workshops across the state to educate citizens about western spruce budworm and other forest health conditions. (More on 2011 workshops.)

Enhancing Bird Habitat with Nesting Structures

2011-10-27T22:01:00.000-07:00

To go with the cabin we're building for ourselves, the NRCS EQIP program is supporting our addition of 45 bird "cabins" throughout our 20 acres between now and 2013. I built the first 25 this year.

Our plans came from Spokane Audubon Society. They're very easy to follow, and one bird house plan is suitable for several different species by making the entry hole a specific size and height for the desired species. I used 1x6" cedar boards 8' long, so I could get two bird boxes (for wren, chickadee, nuthatch) from each board. Except for the tops, which came from 1x8" cedar boards. I omitted the optional reinforcing plate across the entry hole for most of them.

Drawing a line across the back piece near the bottom gives me a baseline to align the sides and front as I assemble the bird house.

A brad nailer makes the mass-production of bird boxes go much faster than swinging a hammer or twisting screws. I still used a 6d nail to hold the hinged side closed. The side nail isn't hammered in flush, so I can get a claw on it easily. A bench drill press with hole saw made the openings.

A mark across the top of the left side helps to align the two nails or brads that will form the hinge on the side wall. One nail from the front and one from the back form the hinge.

One evening's assembly work. I precut all components in one morning at the property, then brought them back to my garage where I have a bench, air tools, and heat. Once I got the pattern down, assembly went quickly.

Wren et al house, 15 inches tall. The bird cabins are hung about 7' off the ground. The trees are pruned up to 12'-16' so there are no limbs near the nests. The box shown here was made from some rough milled true 1" thick cedar, a gift from Shaun Brender in Peshastin WA. 20 boxes were made from store-bought one-by lumber (planed to 3/4" thick).

I'm hanging the finished nesting structures from galvanized nails through holes in the upper portion of the back plates. Plenty of nail shank is exposed so the growing tree won't push the bird cabin off the nail. Each cabin is numbered with a stamped aluminum disc attached to the tree using an aluminum nail, both from Forestry Suppliers.

I use a GPS to track each location by number. If I later come across a box that needs attention, all I need is the number to go back to that location with tools or a repaired cabin.

The bird boxes are designed to open on the side for inspection and clean-out. The top could be removed in the field if necessary. Or the whole cabin can be taken in for repair.

Flicker house, 30 inches tall. 23 boxes are of one basic size (like te photo earlier in this post), and two like this one are about twice that size for flickers and downy woodpeckers. Those two are hung in pine stands, where these woodpeckers can feast on newly hatched pine bark beetles every spring.

Habitat Restoration through EQIP

2011-10-17T18:22:00.000-07:00

One concern when thinning trees and mitigating slash is the reduction of cover and habitat for little creatures.

NRCS, through the EQIP program we participate in, provides for the construction of wildlife piles to restore protective cover for squirrels, rabbits, songbirds, even turkeys. These end up looking like 10'x10' slash piles 6' high, but under all that slash the piles are specially constructed according to NRCS specifications to provide lasting, versatile habitat for wildlife.

About 8 logs, 6" to 10" diameter and 10' long, are laid parallel to form the base of the wildlife pile. We just this year thinned the neighboring stand, so plenty of fir logs were available and close by for this project. We used about 12 Douglas fir, apx 12" DBH.

A second layer of similar logs are laid at 90 degrees to form a crisscross structure. The space between the logs is about equal to their widths. The chambers create critter condos, where small animals are safe from predators.

Slash is added on top of this base. Linda gathered nearby limbs from trees we cut this year.

Curt added slash the easy way -- he grabbed 3 nearby slash piles and moved them onto the wildlife pile with the backhoe.

Linda kept adding limbs until the pile reached about 7' high. This will settle to 6' or less over the winter.

Here's the finished wildlife pile, just over 10' square.

EQIP pays about $85 per pile. We're obligated to maintain the pile for several years, which basically means adding some slash to it in a few years after it settles down below 4' high. About that time we'll be ready to do a brush release in this stand, which will provide plenty of material.

Snap the Leaf, Know the Tree

2011-09-01T15:16:00.000-07:00

Leafsnap is the first in a series of electronic field guides being developed by researchers from Columbia University, the University of Maryland, and the Smithsonian Institution. This free mobile app uses visual recognition software to help identify tree species from photographs of their leaves.

Leafsnap at iTunes

Dual Certification in FSC and ATFS for Small Forest Owners?

2011-07-21T14:51:00.000-07:00

The Wisconsin Woodland Owners Association published an article explaining how Forest Stewardship Council and American Tree Farm System certification programs can offer complementary services to small family forest owners.

The author had managed FSC, Sustainable Forest Initiative, and ATFS certification for six million acres of Wisconsin DNR forestry programs. He says the dual FSC-Tree Farm certification can be highly effective. The two programs have different missions.FSC certification offers the most compelling market benefits, while Tree Farm engages landowners with outreach and education.

Read the article "Tree Farm and FSC: Family Forests' Dynamic Duo"

This is Laminated Root Rot

2011-06-13T22:06:00.000-07:00

We have our share of Phellinus (Poria) weirii -- Laminated root rot.

Laminated root rot is the cause of the high percentage of dead fir snags in a few small areas of our property.

This tree fell during the winter and I discovered it in the spring. Notice how small the root wad is, compared to what a healthy blow-down would have. Another tree fell about 50 feet away.

Leaning fir trees often indicate weak roots. Butt rot is obvious here: the fir is slowly uprooting and has already lost its top. It's surrounded by fir snags and large living fir trees with weeping trunks.

This is considered to be the most damaging root disease in the Pacific Northwest, as it kills the greatest concentrations of trees in the areas where it is present. Sometimes called butt rot, this disease is most tragic because it kills all Douglas Fir in a growing radius and makes it impossible to grow that species again in that location.

Root rot is most obvious where there is a patch of jack-straw trees, snags and leaning trees. Look more closely for weeping fir tree butts, fading fir crowns and firs that fall by uprooting (particularly if the root wad appears unusually small for the tree).

The disease is spread by root contact between an infected tree and healthy ones. The disease kills susceptible hosts by either predisposing them to windthrow by rotting the major roots, or by destroying their ability to take up water and nutrients. Saplings and small poles are usually killed quickly, while older trees may confine the fungus to a small number of roots or to the butt log and survive for many years.

The fungus may remain viable in stumps for 50 years and thus infect regeneration, although it typically takes 10 to 15 years for root contact with the new trees to be established.

There is no treatment for root rot. The only recourse is to cut all trees of that species in the infected area, and one more tree's width around the circumference of that area to be sure. Sadly, this sometimes involves clear-cutting a sizeable area. If we postpone action, the area only gets larger.

In one area we cut about an acre of infected fir trees, but we were able to leave several very tall, healthy Ponderosa Pines.

Started Logging for the 2011 Season

2011-06-08T10:06:00.001-07:00

My first realization, as I marched into the woods with my saw, tools and safety gear, was that all my skiing over the winter didn't keep me in shape for this. My second realization was that my aim is rusty.

Two weeks ago, we turned our attention to cutting trees from 3.5 acres in the north end of our property. It's been several years since a crew thinned this stand from below, cutting everything under 7 inches dbh and pruning the marked leave trees up 12 feet.

This summer we need to remove about half the remaining trees, predominantly Douglas Fir, mostly from 8 to 20 inches dbh. Our final density will be about 110 trees per acre. At the end of the summer a crew will prune the leave trees up to 16 feet. This is all part of our NRCS EQIP contract.

So last week I donned boots and hardhat, fueled up my Stihl 440 chainsaw, strapped on my tool belt, and climbed through thick brush up a draw. Once I caught my breath, I felled the first couple of trees with no problem. Then they started falling a few degrees off where I wanted them to fall. This led to trees hung in the branches of other trees, which gets complicated. I can't work under that hung tree, lest it suddenly falls of its own accord. We could cut the tree it's hung in, but often there's a blue mark indicating it's a carefully selected leave tree.

The safest way to drop the hung tree is to winch the butt out from under it. We did this with 2 trees the first day. Only 10 trees made it to the ground that day.

This week, with a freshly sharpened chain, I was able to hang more trees more efficiently in less time. Getting frustrated and creative led to another problem: a tee-pee of trees. When I hung the first tree of the day, I saw that I could fell another tree that would hit the hung tree, bringing both to the ground like dominoes. Instead, it hung, too. In my brilliance I added a third tree to the structure. Now it was unsafe to approach within 1/2 mile of this mess.

The only solution was to stop work and get the tractor to winch the trees down. The first two came down easily. As we stood in the woods discussing our strategy for winching the third tree, it came crashing down. It was a close-up reminder that it can happen any time, without warning.

Sayonara, Slash!

2011-05-16T09:32:00.000-07:00

This pile had flames around 20' high, which is not uncommon. We burned 91 piles like this in March-April.

Pruning trees reduces fire risk. The limbs become slash on the ground. Slash becomes piles. Piles become fire.

Firewise practices include reducing "ladder fuels" by pruning trees up above the level of a ground fire Through the NRCS EQIP program we're pruning trees up to 16 feet.

Some debris can stay on the ground to rot and return nutrients to the soil. Too much debris is a fire risk. To reduce that risk, some of the wood can be piled to be burned when the ground is wet or snow-covered.

We do a combination of practices, piling small-diameter limbs and tops, leaving wood larger than 4" diameter as ground wood.

The amount of pruning waste is impressive. The lower limbs of one mature tree produces enough slash to make a pile 4' x 6' and 3' or 4' high. Most piles are 4x6x8' and include the bucked stems of small trees removed during understory thinning.

We come back around in early March, when there's still snow on the ground, and torch the piles. A propane flame thrower works efficiently.

We burned 91 piles in the spring of 2011, and it's a lot of work. Usually we had 2-3 people working their own areas. We worked 4 weekends this spring, actively tending fires for most of the day.

Working my way across a slope I lit the pile in the far distance, then the nearer piles, and I'm waiting for this pile to grow to its maximum size before I move on to the piles upwind of me on this slope.

We torch one pile at a time per person, and tend that pile until its flames subside. That can take 10 minutes, or 45 minutes, depending on the pile.

Then we move on to another pile. Throughout the day we circle back to all piles and "throw in the bones" that have escaped the flames. We use a "fire rake" for this, but a stiff yard rake or hoe is sufficient. As the ground dries we start carrying a water pack with a sprayer.

That's it 'til fall. It's now too dry to do this -- the fire crawls across the slope through the duff, creating more work for us just to contain the spreading fire.

Counting old-growth tree rings

2011-05-09T09:30:00.000-07:00

A healthy Ponderosa Pine blew down this winter. We cut the log loose from its stump and saw some interesting ring patterns we hadn't noticed in other trees. There were long periods of drought when the tree was young, but no apparent fire damage. That puzzled us.

This tree had rings so tight at times it required a magnifier to count them.

We decided to count the rings. We fetched a magnifier, marker and push-pins, and started at the outermost ring.

When this tree was alive it was leaning, slightly bent, not very tall or large, probably of no commercial value -- that's what saved it from the saw over the decades, even when this canyon was last logged in the 1970s.

The tree turned out to be approximately 170 years old. That means it sprouted in about 1841. In that year Lieutenant Charles F. Wilkes led a U.S. Naval expedition of the Pacific Northwest. Oregon was not yet an organized territory. A group of pioneers led by John Bidwell set off on the Oregon Trail, sparking the Great Migration. The Homestead Act and the American Civil War were still 20 years away. WA became a state in 1889, when this tree was almost 50 years old.

This was an attractive tree, one that we left even though it shaded our solar array for an hour on winter days. It had the characteristic reddish bark found only on certain old PPs. Its slant and curve gave it a Bonsai look. It stood in the open, one of two pines on a minor ridge.

This relatively small Ponderosa Pine was about 170 years old. It sprouted before the Civil War.

Its rings tell a story of survival. It lived through at least two major droughts of a decade or longer -- one in the 1920s, when we believe a forest fire swept aross this canyon. Embedded knots terminate about that time, perhaps burned off by a passing ground fire that otherwise spared this tree. The other major drought was in the 1950s.

When the stump dries out I want to cut a slab from it and get it over to our friend Dick S., who is an expert on forest fire ecology in our region. Maybe he can pinpoint the precise year of the fire.

Field Trip!

2011-05-05T14:13:00.000-07:00

Summer's approaching and it's time to plan ahead for forest field trips. The ones I've attended have been very informative on many levels. I heard from knowledgable people about forestry, botany, wildlife etc. I met people with properties like mine. And I saw how other people maintain their stands. Plus it's a day off from logging, skidding, or whatever else is on my to-do list that weekend.

E. WA Forest and Range Owners Field Day, June 18, 2011, White Salmon WA
Brochure & registration form, web site

Tri-State (ID-MT-WA) Forest Owners Field Day, July 9, 2011, Mullan ID
Contact Kirk David, Idaho Forest Owners Assn, 208-262-1371, kirkdavid at earthlink dot net

W. WA Forest Field Day, August 20, 2011, in Jefferson County, near Chimacum WA
web site

"The First 10 Years" virtual tour for the Coached Planning course

2011-04-13T17:59:00.000-07:00

I spoke last night to a classroom full of family forest owners starting their forest stewardship course aka "Coached Planning" thru WSU Extension Forestry.

I did a 20-minute slide show and story of our first 10 years as forest owners, and what we got out of the class they're taking now. The lead instructor figures they've taught over a thousand families to be sustainable forest owners.

If you're the owner or manager of a small (under 1000 acres) forested parcel, and you're not already a trained professional forester, please consider taking this course.

You're making decisions every year that have long-range implications. You need the knowledge to make those decisions. You don't get a do-over for letting butt rot take all of your Fir, or for destroying a fragile habitat. Not knowing is not an excuse.

The class is fun and informative. You'll meet instructors who want to serve as resources to you after the class is over. And you'll get to know other students who are in your situation. Plus there's the added bonus of seeing my slide show!

At the end of the course you'll have a completed Forest Management Plan. Our plan has qualified us for state and federal grants upward of $10k, got us into the Designated Forest Land class that cut our property taxes in half, and helped earn our land its ATFS certification as a source of sustainably harvested timber.

Forest Planning Rule - Public Meeting in Seattle

2011-03-22T16:39:00.000-07:00

The Forest Service will be holding a public roundtable on Wednesday, March 23, 2011, at the Sheraton Hotel in Seattle (1400 Sixth Avenue, Seattle WA 98101) from 1:00 - 5:00 pm to provide information and answer questions about the proposed forest planning rule. This is the only public meeting scheduled in WA on this matter. The comment deadline on the draft rule ends May 16.

Background:

The federal government's National Forest management rules proposal is being developed under the National Forest Management Act (NFMA), the law that governs most Forest Service activity. The proposal would replace current NFMA rules originally developed in 1982 and would apply to 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands in 44 states.

In 2005 and again in 2008, the Bush administration tried to rewrite these regulations, lifting the requirement that the Forest Service manage its lands so that all native species can remain viable. Defenders of Wildlife challenged the Bush administration’s proposals in the courts.

Ultimately, the court found that the Forest Service violated the National Environment Policy Act by approving the new regulations based on a faulty environmental impact statement that failed to analyze adequately the environmental impacts of the new regulations, and that it had violated the Endangered Species Act by failing to examine the effects of eliminating wildlife protection standards on protected species.

According to the Sierra Club, citing a recent U.S. Department of Agriculture report, national forests and grasslands sustain 223,000 jobs in rural areas and contribute $14.5 billion annually to the U.S. economy. National forests are the source of drinking water for about 124 million Americans in 900 U.S. cities.

For more information on the forest planning rule and how it could be strengthened visit http://www.wawild.org/

Animated map of insect pest spread

2011-02-16T09:04:00.000-08:00

The Forest Service has animated maps showing annual observations of insect activity as detected during aerial surveys of Washington and Oregon.

I'm not sure why someone would choose green as the color to indicate trees defoilated by mountain pine beetle or western spruce budworm, and gray to show unaffected regions. You just have to use your imagination -- and you might not have imagined the extent of damage from these pests! Click the map below.

Click the map to go to the USFS web page and see animated sequences
of maps showing the spread of budworm and beetle over the course
of 24-28 years. Source: USDA Forest Service.

Maps will automatically advance every 2 seconds (or every 4 seconds for the slow versions) until the final cumulative map is reached. To restart the animation, click on the "refresh" icon at the top of your browser.

These maps are based on cooperative aerial surveys conducted by Forest Health Protection staffs of the Oregon Department of Forestry, Washington Department of Natural Resources, and the USDA Forest Service Pacific Northwest Region.

Aerial survey data for 1980-2009 are available in both .e00 and shapefile formats. If you have a use for those, you probably already knew that.

Farmland Succession Planning workshop for attorneys

2011-01-28T10:12:00.000-08:00

On February 4th, 2011, the Office of Farmland Preservation offers a Continuing Education opportunity for attorneys focused on succession planning training for farm families in our state.
This complimentary one day conference will be held in Everett, WA at the Union Bank headquarters auditorium from 8am until 1:30 pm. Registration begins at 7:30 am. A locally prepared, locally sourced lunch will be provided.
Participants will hear from estate planning experts that specialize in working with farm families, tax specialists giving us a state of the farming community, and much more.
Attorneys earn CE credits at no cost. To register or ask questions, contact Amy Ward with Union Bank at amy.ward@unionbank.com

Rethinking Forests Video Explains Why Management Is Important

2011-01-27T10:34:00.000-08:00

This is a good introductory video (7 minutes) to help people understand the importance of managing forests to help the environment, rather than at the expense of the environment.

A century of deplorable timber harvest practices led to public outcry and ultimately ended logging in National Forests. That leaves public agencies with a growing job: fighting forest fires.

Responsible forest stewardship is a way to reduce the threat of fires, make our forests healthy, and give us public lands we can enjoy for generations.

Rethinking Forests Video

Thanks to Andy P, without whom I wouldn't find half the cool stuff I share on this blog.

2011 Brings Back WSU's Family Forest Newsletter

2011-01-26T12:02:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year, fellow forest stewards.

"Notes" is back. WSU once printed and distributed a newsletter to over 20,000 family forest landowners. They cut the program in 2005 due to funding shortages. WSU has resumed publication of an electronic-only version of Forest Stewardship Notes, to better serve the more than 215,000 families and individuals that control over 3.2 million acres of private forestland in Washington state.

Subscribe free by following the link in the newsletter.
First 2011 issue

I'm not confident that link will work forever. You might need to go to the WSU Extension Forestry web site, scroll down and find the newsletter there. Washington State Department of Natural Resources contributes to the publication.

Tiny Invaders, Big News

2010-12-22T19:41:00.000-08:00

The NRCS approved our Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Plan a few weeks ago. In that exercise I learned a lot about the invasive species that threaten what we love about our property. Information came mostly from government and university web sites. With the '10s resurgence of environmentalism, why aren't bug-and-blight threats in the news more often?

The Society of Environmental Journalists offers these tips to reporters who are bugged by the invasive insect problem...

Hundreds of species of tiny, sometimes invisible insect and microbial predators are among the hordes of invasive species that cost billions of dollars to fight each year, and that continue to cause major environmental disruption despite such efforts.

The nemeses often come into the country while hitchhiking on some of the billions of pieces of goods imported each year, such as shipping containers, plant material, and wooden handicrafts, or through processes such as ballast water discharges. They spread by flying, floating in the wind, attached to products such as ships, nursery plants, or wood products, and in other ways.

Some of the latest knowledge about these invaders has been unveiled in two recent studies. One looked at problems in urban and natural forests, and the other focused on microbial pests in various settings.

-- "Historical Accumulation of Nonindigenous Forest Pests in the Continental United States," BioScience, December 2010, Juliann E. Aukema, et al.; Dec. 6, 2010, American Institute of Biological Sciences press release, "Forest Pests Accumulating Despite Regulations": link (through early January 2011, contains link to full study).

-- "Invisible Invaders: Non-Pathogenic Invasive Microbes in Aquatic and Terrestrial Ecosystems," Ecology Letters, December 2010, by Elena Litchman; Dec. 7, 2010, Michigan State University press release, "Invisible Invasive Species Altering Ecosystems" link (includes link to full study).

In natural and urban forests all over the country, there have been at least 470 invading insect and pathogen species over the past century and a half, and major new nemeses continue to turn up at the rate of one every two years or so. Recent examples include emerald ash borer, Asian gypsy moth, Asian longhorned beetle, laurel wilt disease, and sudden oak death. The authors say that, until this study, no one had comprehensively investigated the temporal patterns for invading forest pests. The authors found numerous distinct patterns that may provide insights for efforts to mitigate and prevent problems.

Current procedures and regulations used by the Dept. of Homeland Security and US Dept. of Agriculture have failed to stop the problems, the authors say. One primary recommendation of the study is to improve prevention efforts at points of importation (including shippers and travelers), since eradication of problems seems to be nearly impossible once the invaders gain a toehold.

The study was funded by the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (which is supported in part by the National Science Foundation) and The Nature Conservancy. The researchers are from the US Forest Service, Univ. of California, Santa Barbara, Michigan State Univ., and Univ. of Central Florida.

For two examples of media coverage, see:

-- "Bugs, Beetles, and Borers Put U.S. Forests at Risk," Washington Post, Dec. 13, 2010, by Brian Vastag: link.

-- "Ravenous Foreign Pests Threaten National Treasures," Ascribe Newswire, Dec. 6, 2010: link.

In her review of even less-visible invaders, Michigan State Univ. associate professor Elena Litchman (269-671-2338, link) focused on culprits such as viruses, bacteria, fungi, and genetically modified microbes, including recent problematic examples such as blue-green algae, diatoms, and destructive soil microorganisms.

She says that very little is known about the problems that these pests can cause, though numerous hints of their destructive power exist. She speculates that problems could become even worse with climate change and accompanying extreme weather events, since those can provide additional avenues for invasion. Her review of this issue provides numerous hooks for delving into specific problems and general angles.

Webinar: Making Google Earth Work for Land Management

2010-12-21T10:05:00.000-08:00

If you haven't looked up your property on Google Earth, stop right now and do it. Keep this page open, and I'll see you in an hour or two. (Don't drool on your keyboard.)

Here's a shot of part of our property. Much higher zoom levels are possible:

Google Earth is a powerful tool that helps landowners see their land and understand it better. This leads to improved land management decision making and information sharing.

NC State University is hosting a webinar that will discuss and demonstrate basic Google Earth setup, exploration, navigation, menus, data creation, and production. The outcome is that participants should be able to use Earth in making land management decisions.

This is directed at Land managers, natural resource professionals, government agency professionals, and landowners.

Time & Date: January 19, 2011, from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM (Eastern).

To participate, visit forestrywebinar.net on the day of the webinar. Click on Upcoming Webinars to find the session.

Sign in early so you can download the webinar client software and work out any kinks before the webinar starts.

Questions: Please contact Bill Hubbard whubbard@uga.edu, 706-340-5070.

Thanks to Andy at WSU for passing along the information for me to share with you.

Forest Stewardship Coached Planning Program in Riverside WA

2010-12-10T07:39:00.000-08:00

In short, this is a priceless education for $75. I took this course a few years ago, and I highly recommend it for anyone who cares for a land parcel with trees. In the 2-month course you'll write a complete forest stewardship plan. Our plan qualified us for much lower property taxes, and thousands in funding from USDA and DNR. You can read more about that here on the Small Forest Timber Owner Blog.

WSU Extension Forestry will offer the course in Riverside in 2011. Classes meet once a week starting January 25, 2011. Here's their description:

This 8-session practical, hands-on course will help forest landowners prepare their own forest stewardship plan with guidance and coaching from natural resource professionals.

Open to all, this program is designed to help forest landowners develop customized management solutions to meet their own unique objectives. Whether you own 5, 50, or 500 acres of forest, if you want to expand your knowledge and gain confidence for managing your forest, this course is for you!

Why should I attend?

• To learn about keeping your forest healthy and productive for generations to come.

• To learn how to identify and implement practical steps to meet your individual ownership objectives.

• To write a plan that may qualify your forestland for property tax reduction.

Information:

Emily Burt
Extension Educator
@: emburt (a) wsu.edu
tel: (509) 775-5235 x1114
http://ferry.wsu.edu/

Ice coating protects evergreen seedlings from freezing

2010-11-29T15:28:00.000-08:00

Ice-covered seedlings in WA nursery

I enjoyed these surreal photos of seedlings covered with ice.

For 34 hours in late November 2010, cold temperatures descended on Washington state's lowest elevations. At times it dropped to 13F.

Sweeping sprinklers gently showered acres of tender seedlings coating and recoating them with water that froze in layers of protection.

Crews worked day and night to keep sprinklers form freezing. They continued until 1:30 AM November 24th. Two shifts of crews did the continuous 24-hour job.

More backstory:

Icing protects trees at Webster Forest Nursery

and a great photo gallery:

Flickr gallery

Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) information

2010-11-24T10:53:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving! Below is a note forwarded to me from NRCS about their CSP funding program.

This is a relatively modest program in terms of payments, and not the same as the more generous EQIP program that we're participating in, but perhaps CSP is a good introduction to NRCS for family forest owners.

You must have your application in before the cut-off date for the upcoming year's funding -- January 7, 2011. There's a fact sheet/FAQ at http://www.wa.nrcs.usda.gov/

Dear private forest landowner:

If you’re a private, non-industrial forest landowner who would like to address natural resource management concerns by implementing additional conservation practices on your land and if you’d like to improve or maintain existing stewardship practices, you may be eligible for financial and technical assistance to do so.

The Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) is administered by USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) which provides financial and technical assistance to help identify, plan and implement stewardship practices that will help conserve and enhance soil, water, air, plant, wildlife habitat and related natural resources on your land.

Private forest landowners may be eligible to receive average payments of approximately $10 per acre for five-years depending on enhancements implemented and (or) stewardship practices maintained.

In short, CSP encourages non-industrial private forest landowners to improve conservation systems by undertaking additional conservation activities and improving, maintaining, and managing existing conservation activities and the program will pay you for these stewardship activities.

I have attached a Question and Answer fact sheet regarding CSP for your information. I encourage you to consider this opportunity to help keep your forest healthy. Please contact your local USDA-Natural Resources Conservation Service office today for more information.

The application ranking cut-off date for this year’s funding is January 7, 2011 so don’t delay.

We look forward to serving you in the future.

Sincerely,

CARRI GAINES, NRCS State Forester
Carri.gaines at wa.usda dot gov

Speaking to a forest stewardship class about our experiences

2010-11-13T12:23:00.000-08:00

The lead instructor of WSU's forest stewardship extension courses in Everett WA invited me to speak, as a two-course alumnus, to his current class.

Slash pile, one of many we've created from thinning and
pruning our stands to make them healthier, safer in case
of forest fire, more attractive to wildlife, and
more aesthetically pleasing.

I put together a slide show that serves as a virtual tour of our property, starting with pictures of the thick woods when we bought it, through today's thinned and pruned stands.

I told 20 minutes' worth of stories about our experiences, lessons learned, and advice for those starting out with private timber land.

It was genuinely fun to go back through photos to build the deck of 65 slides (they go fast), and even more fun to present it to the adult students and take their many, interesting questions.

Feedback from the audience was positive, which is always a nice ecouragement for me to speak again if the opportunity arises. The instructor, Kevin Zobrist, has asked me to record the presentation so other instructors can use it. Of course I will, but that does take the fun out of it for me.

The courses are Coached Planning for people writing their forest management plans, and Advanced Planning for people implementing their plans on their own. The first course is rich in information and well taught. I highly recommend it. The advanced course is unfortunately no longer offered. Both are the product of Washington State University Extension Forestry.

Fall 2010, the end of forest stewardship operations for the winter

2010-11-13T12:09:00.000-08:00

When autumn descends on this place, the light and air are different. I always enjoy being outside, getting the place ready for winter.

When the sun hits the big-leaf maple trees deep in the evergreen forest, the golden leaves seem to be brilliantly backlit.

We're done with logging work for the winter. All we have to do until spring is burn piles of slash. And there are many of those, perhaps a hundred or more.

EQIP approvals for our 2010 forest improvement work

2010-11-13T11:39:00.000-08:00

NRCS has inspected the last of our on-the-ground work for this season, and approved it for payment.

Greentree Reforestation crew prunes trees on our
property up 16' as part of our EQIP-funded project.

That's a big milestone for us, because this is our first year of a 5-year EQIP agreement for thinning, pruning, and slash disposal.

We use Greentree Reforestation, a crew referred to us by our friend Doyle Burke in 2001. Greentree does very good work on understory thinning, tree pruning, and slash piling.

By "good work" I mean the limbs are cut within a couple of inches of the trunk, without otherwise damaging the tree. No long stubs, no stripped bark, no stray cuts.

Their piles are regulation 4x6x6 foot neatly stacked slash piles that burn very thoroughly. I'm most impressed with how they build a pile on a steep slope so it not only stays put, but it doesn't send burning logs rolling downhill.

Power pole saws work well on large
Ponderosa Pine limbs like this.
But for Douglas Fir, a simple pole
saw works better.

In one unit, 2 acres, we had the crew "lop and scatter" the slash for a more natural aesthetic and to supply nutrients to the soil. There are specific tolerances for how much debris can be on the ground, in tons per acre and in its height off the ground. The slash has to be pulled back from the base of each tree without creating an unduly large ring of fuel around it.

Pruning contractors in north central WA:
Greentree Reforestation (509) 882-2900
Dick Schellhaas (509) 630-6486
Jim Jack (509) 548-1290

Thinning and Pruning Workshop

2010-10-27T16:14:00.000-07:00

Thinning and pruning are two of the best tools available to enhance the health, beauty, and habitat that your forest provides. Join WSU Extension for a hands-on workshop where you will learn how to thin and prune properly and safely.

The class will be taught by DNR Stewardship Forester Mike Nystrom and WSU Extension Forester Kevin "May the forest be with you" Zobrist.

Registration is $15 per individual or family, and includes one set of materials.

http://snohomish.wsu.edu/forestry/thinprune2010.htm

Saturday, November 6, 2010

10:30 AM - 3 PM
Sedro Woolley, WA

Topics will include:

Why thin and prune
Types of thinning
When, how much, and how often to thin
When and how to prune
Tools of the trade

■Register by mail: Print out the Registration Form and mail in with your payment.
■Register online: https://ocrs.wsu.edu/Signup/?eventid=660

For questions or additional information, please contact Tamara Neuffer, WSU Extension Forest Stewardship Program Assistant, at 425-357-6017 or tneuffer at wsu dot edu.

Conservation Cost Sharing Workshop - Snoqualmie WA

2010-10-22T20:08:00.000-07:00

If you've wondered about the subsidies you read about on this blog, like FLEP and EQIP, check out this free workshop offered by WSU Extension for rural landowners.

6:30-8:30 pm
Weds 11/10/10
Snoqualmie Library
Snoqualmie WA

Cost-share programs are there to help you fight invasive species, thin forests, plant trees, and enhance wildlife habitat.

Register on the WSU web site. Or call 425-357-6017 or e-mail TNeuffer at wsu dot edu.

Web Site about Tax Treatment of Timber

2010-10-11T11:06:00.000-07:00

Very few sections of the Internal Revenue Code are written specifically for timber. This means there is a considerable amount of interpretation involved.

This website was developed to be used by timberland owners, as well as a reference source for accountants, attorneys, consulting foresters and other professionals who work with timberland owners by answering specific questions regarding the tax treatment of timber related activities.

http://www.timbertax.org/

The site appears to be independent and has USFS endorsement.

NRCS extends CSP deadline for conservation funds applicants

2010-10-08T09:29:00.000-07:00

USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) announced Oct. 8, 2010 that the ranking period cut-off date for producer applications in the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) has been extended to January 7, 2011.

Authorized in the 2008 Farm Bill, CSP offers payments to producers who maintain a high level of conservation on their land and who agree to adopt higher levels of stewardship. Non-industrial forestland is eligible.

CSP is offered in all 50 states, District of Columbia, and the Pacific and Caribbean areas through continuous sign-ups with announced cut-off dates for ranking periods. The program provides many conservation benefits including improvement of water and soil quality, wildlife habitat enhancement and adoption of conservation activities that address the effects of climate change.

http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/programs/new_csp/csp.html

Horse Logging in Western WA

2010-09-28T08:17:00.000-07:00

I did a lot of riding in my youth. Years later, I considered horse skidding, back when we decided to log our property ourselves. The practice got a passing mention in one of my WSU sustainable forestry courses. I know someone who did this for bug-kill removal in Idaho's Sawtooths. But we didn't try it, in part because we didn't know who had horses and rigging for the job.

"King County turns to horses to move logs through delicate site" (Seattle Times 9/22/10) describes a county biologist's use of horses to move logs into sensitive creekbeds. She was rebuilding fish habitat, so heavy equipment would be counter-productive.

WSU's Forestry Extension presented a horse logging workshop several years ago, and organized a field day featuring horse logger Wes Gustufson. The process is slow. Skidding with horses (and dragging logs rather than grappling) still creates some impact. Road apples distribute the seeds of noxious and invasive weed species, unless horsemen are very careful with feed and grazing.

If you're really interested in learning about horse logging so you can use it on your place, contact Andy Perleberg at WSU -- or find Wes at his company, Wood'n Horse.

Rancher's Plan to Stop Pine Beetles

2010-09-07T22:15:00.000-07:00

At the Cleantech Open I usually focus on the energy-related contestants. But this semifinalist's story in Planet Profit Report caught my eye today for another reason.

DenDroCo has a molecule that disables a beetle's sense of smell. Without smell, the beetle can't follow others to mass-attack a weak pine tree. Without mass attacks, the beetles can't kill trees.

The emotion Ray Prill expresses at the loss of his trees hits very close to home for us. He almost chokes up in his interview.

Here's a rancher who stepped out of his element, found a discarded discovery from the 1980s, helped get the researcher a grant, and is now in the limelight and writing a business plan. We wish him luck.

NRCS to inspect our 2010 forest thinning work this week

2010-09-06T20:42:00.000-07:00

After 3 solid days of skidding, we're finally down to the last few logs to remove from the 4 acres in this year's plan.

We've worked every weekend lately to finish thinning and decking. A crew is coming in to prune trees, and another outfit will bring in a loader and trucks to take away the logs. There are probably about 60 tons of logs waiting to be loaded out.

All of that needs to happen before the rains come. And the rains are coming. It's starting to rain as I write this. When it rains for a few days, everything, especially roads, gets dangerously slick and stay that way until it snows. Then it's impassible.

Two of the acres we thinned this year are within view of the house site, and along the uphill side of a level road. That was fairly easy work, altough we paid extra attention to the impact on our view.

The other two acres are on the north property line, on a very steep slope. This is a remote area where we're doing additional thinning to create a fire break along a ridgetop.

The extra logging, steep slope, and lack of road made this a very difficult piece of land to log. Several of the logs were 200-300 feet from the winch point. I had to pull about 300 lbs of cable up the slope to each log. It was very slow work -- but the world's best thigh workout.

Fires are a reminder we need more often (the Chainsaw Paradox)

2010-08-09T08:01:00.000-07:00

Fire visible from our property consumed "only" 3 acres.

Summer fires remind us of the importance of sticking to our plan for thinning the woods around our future house site. By spring, the fires are a distant memory and we soften our resolve to thin as much as we planned.

We certainly don't need more fires, but we somehow need more frequent reminders.

July and August are forest fire season in this part of WA. It's also when thinning slows down because of restrictions on forest chainsaw use (because of the related fire hazard). By now, we've done most of the cutting for the season. Here and there we've been "lenient" and left trees that were supposed to be cut.

Watching the news about local fires makes us want to go in and thin a little more -- take out those nice clumps of trees we left alone, increase spacing near fire breaks (roads), clear a little farther from the house site.

Just a week ago we had a lightning fire in our canyon, on a ridge about a mile from our property. It started in a previous burn, where trees were thin, so it was a ground fire, not a crown fire. Winds were light, the brush was green, and it rained. A USFS fire crew responded quickly. Neighbors were ready to help try to protect a home nestled in trees 1,000 ft down a steep slope from the fire. The fire burned less than 3 acres.

There were 32 fire starts from that thuderstorm. One of them burned nearly 2,000 acres in Nahahum (nuh -Hom, rhymes with "the mom") Canyon several miles away. I took a tour of the burn on Saturday. Homes were protected, but other property was lost.

Our goal is to protect not only our home, but the habitat on the surrounding 20 acres. We also want to help protect the homes of our neighbors in a canyon-wide strategy. If we're ever evacuated because of a fire that threatens our place, we want to be confident that we'll return to a house and trees, not charcoal and grief.

Signs of Sustainable Forest Stewards

2010-06-28T10:48:00.000-07:00

We have been honored in recent years with two certifications for sustainable forest stewardship. So we have two signs we're very proud of, that we plan to post in a few years, after the heavy work on our property subsides.

The "Stewardship Forest" sign on the left was awarded to us in 2007 after we completed a 9-week course offered by the Washington State University Forestry Extension. The culmination of that course was a Forest Stewardship Plan, approved and signed by our Washington Department of Natural Resources forester. Andy Perleberg of WSU, and John Keller of DNR, led the instruction. (We went on to complete the Advanced Stewardship Course with lead instructor Kevin Zobrist of WSU.)

The "Family Forest" sign on the right indicates that our property has been certified as a sustainable forest by the American Forest Foundation (AFF) American Tree Farm System (ATFS). Wood products from an ATFS certified forest are stamped so the end user knows the wood was grown and harvested sustainably. Andy Perleberg at WSU oversaw the process of applying for certification in 2009. Having a written management plan was a prerequisite.

Rather than risk having the signs damaged by heavy equipment or falling trees, we'll keep them in a safe place for now. This is a web exclusive sneak preview for our blog readers.

Small-Scale Logging: Moving Slash

2010-06-27T07:12:00.000-07:00

(Click the video to see a larger version in a new browser window.)

We're logging hilly terrain, where level landing space is scarce. We winch logs out of the woods using a small tractor and a logging winch blade. We prefer to bring them out with the limbs and tops -- guts feathers and all, as they say.

We skid a few at a time to the landing. Then we limb them on the landing before we buck and deck them.

That process creates a big slash pile in a hurry, and that takes up space and makes it hard to maneuver equipment the way we need to.

So we started piling slash in a small utility trailer, and hauling it to another, unused landing, where we can burn it this winter.

Now, it's enough work to hand-pile slash into a trailer. We didn't cherish the idea of unloading it by hand.

So we came up with this idea. (Look under your trailer before you try this at home; see note below.)

Over time we'll have to develop a better, safer technique, but this is how we did it the first time:

Hook one log fork under the hitch, lift the front enf off the ground, and make a dump truck bed out of the trailer. The slash slides right out onto the ground, in a perfect 4 by 8 foot pile, ready to burn. Note the wheels of the trailer come completely off the ground, which is necessary to get the slash to slide.

One problem is the trailer's tendency to jump off the fork and roll away (possibly a later video?). We started hooking through the hitch's safety chains for better control.

The trailer is a light-duty snowmobile trailer with a tilt bed. However the bed doesn't tilt far enough to dump the contents. The design of the trailer is such that the rear underside can touch the ground without breaking or bending anything.

Please be careful. This is definitely not an OSHA-approved maneuver.

Solstice weekend work mostly rained out

2010-06-21T21:13:00.000-07:00

This is the wettest spring I can remember in 9 years of working this property. In the past 2 weeks we've had rain storms that reversed all the drying we've had. Even the rocked roads get slick and tricky to drive, especially down the canyon. The clay logging roads and trails get too soft to operate on.

They dry up in a day or two of no rain. Saturday we got some logs yarded out of the woods near our north line, which is on a ridge. We worked until 6, it being still very bright out. Around the Summer Solstice it's light until nearly 10:00. Unfortunately it was too chilly to dine outdoors, something we typically enjoy doing this time of year.

Then that night it rained steadily, and continued drizzling through lunch on Sunday. I got some indoor projects done -- repairing the plumbing in the RV we call the "instant cabin," checking the water in our solar power battery bank, and taking photos of a generator we later sold on Craigslist. (We're in the market for a solid-running 5kW diesel genset, if you know of one.)

When it cleared up, we pulled noxious weeds along the lower part of the shared road. I wish other people would tend to their own weeds, as we do with ours. Knapweed blooms down there, and the seeds travel onto everyone's properties in the mud in our tire treads. The only way to control invasive species like this on our property is to slow them down at the source.

USGBC LEED should recognize ATFS certified wood products

2010-06-21T10:53:00.000-07:00

Last week, the US Green Building Council (USGBC) released for public comment a fourth round of draft benchmarks to evaluate forest certification programs in the LEED green building rating system.

The LEED green building rating system gives points to builders who use sustainably grown and harvested wood products certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).

As an ATFS certified forest owner, I'm in favor of USGBC recognizing more standards, rather than exclusively FSC. Eastside Washington mills use ATFS, not FSC. The USGBC decision limits the market for green-building materials from central and eastern Washington state.

If adopted, the benchmarks would result in continued exclusion of independent forest certification standards in widespread use in North America, including the world’s largest certification standard, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative. The bottom line is that three quarters of the certified fiber in North America may not be recognized by LEED’s certified wood credit.

Tom Martin, President & CEO of the American Forest Foundation (AFF) and parent organization of the American Tree Farm System (ATFS), wrote: "After almost 10 years of discussion with the forest community, USGBC continues to discourage the use of wood products in green buildings, and perpetuates their preference against wood products from family-owned forests certified by ATFS. Even though USGBC claims they are developing benchmarks to open up their green building standards to more certified wood products, all you need to do is look at the benchmarks to see that they continue to skew their standards toward one wood certification only."

Nine U.S. governors have written letters and more than 5,700 forestry experts, architects and builders have signed a petition.

SFI has a short video about green building and forest certification, at http://sfiprogram.org/leed.

Sign a petition:
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/leed/

Tweet your support:
http://act.ly/1th

Vote if you're a USGBC member:
https://www.usgbc.org/Login.aspx?REFERRER=%2fDisplayPage.aspx%3fCMSPageID%3d2070

DNR Inspection for FLEP

2010-06-10T11:32:00.000-07:00

DNR Forester Bart Ausland visited our property yesterday to inspect work we performed under our Forestland Enhancement Program (FLEP) cost-share agreement that will expire on June 30.

He said the thinning and pruning we've done all look good, in line with the specifications for those practices. He told us what additional work we need to complete before we can receive the full amount of the agreement.

Washington's Department of Natural Resources was hit by a state budget crisis a couple of years ago, and most of the Stewardship Forester positions were eliminated. That put small forest landowners at a disadvantage. We rely on those experts for guidance.

Thankfully, some people at DNR still find the time to perform the services of a Stewardship Forester. Among those services is the administration of FLEP, in which federal funds are distributed by state agencies. (This is somewhat akin to how ARRA energy stimulus funds were administered by State Energy Programs.)

FLEP supports landowners who want to manage healthy stands and prevent destructive forest fires, but are faced with the harsh economic realities of small parcels and sub-merchantable trees. FLEP pays 50%, up to a modest limit per acre, of the cost of pre-commercial thinning, pruning, and slash disposal.

Twin Fawns

2010-06-09T11:32:00.000-07:00

On the way up to the property today,
I saw 4 deer in the driveway.

One pretty muledeer doe
had twin newborn fawns in tow.

Instead of bolting from the road (the banks were steep),
she and the little ones trotted ahead of my Jeep.

As she led the fawns on a mile-long uphill run,
I kept a good distance and had some fun --
taking cell phone photos out the windshield,
like this one when we reached a green field.

The fawns are barely 20 lbs, all fluff.
Exercise like this will make them tough --
and ready to deal with the summer heat.
When we parted paths, the fawns looked beat.

Another of the does had a fawn with her.
The fawns force the does to travel slow.

They're clumbsy, all legs and fur,
which makes them entertaining to follow.

Logging is in full swing

2010-06-01T21:31:00.000-07:00

I thinned 3 acres thus far this summer, and I hope to thin 2 more. We're working on the north line of our property, which is along a ridgetop.

On the other side of the ridge is an unmanaged, overstocked Douglas Fir stand on a steep slope. If a fire approached from that direction, it would move swiftly onto our property. We would want such a fire to slow and drop to the ground, rather than rushing through the canopy toward our cabin. The ridge can be a line of defense.

Our strategy is to go for some extra spacing in the trees right along the line, creating a "shaded fuel break" about 40 or 50 feet wide for the full width of our property. Then over the course of 200 feet the trees "feather in" to a more dense spacing, reaching the standard 20 foot stem spacing.

Along with that strategy is an overall preference for Ponderosa Pine, which is more fire tolerant than Douglas Fir, and has a better chance of surviving a ground fire.

I'm an amateur at felling trees, and always will be. Thinning on a moderate slope seems to take me about 20-25 hours per acre. That's including time for hung trees, teepees, bound saws, thrown chains, sharpening, and bushwhacking around the hillside from tree to tree. I try to get started early and get in at least 6 hours a day. I can fell anywhere from 10 to 25 trees in that time.

Burning slash piles with a fire truck standing by

2010-05-09T22:30:00.000-07:00

We've resumed thinning trees, which means very soon we'll be cramped for space again. Slash piles take up a lot of useful area, and get in the way of skidding logs out of the woods.

It's still wet enough on our property to burn those piles of slash. They're not large by logging standards, mostly limbs from pruning, and logs up to 7" diameter. But they are as much as 8 years old, and dry. The flames can reach easily 20-25 feet high when the piles really get going.

We burned 9 piles Saturday that were not that old, but nonetheless very dry and among trees we plan to keep. So we borrowed a neighbor's fire truck. Yes, you read right. Actually he has two. This is the smaller one, a brush truck. It's compact, for logging roads, so we can get it back into the property.

The fires themselves were not much to look at -- especially after a few hours, when they were reduced to a 12' diameter circle of white ash. So here's another photo of the brush truck.

We had family up to the mountains for Mother's Day on Sunday. Our two-year-old granddaughter enjoyed seeing the fire truck, along with playing in the mud. She's also developing a liking for tractors, which could come in handy someday when I need a helper. For now, we all had a great time picnicking in the sun and walking among the wildflowers.

Once everyone had left, it was time to burn more piles. The fires were very well behaved, so we had no actual necessity of the truck, other than it being extremely handy for dousing the ashes before we left the place for the week. It was good practice starting the water pump and climbing a hill pulling 50 feet of fire hose and nozzle. I hope never to need to do it in a hurry.

Spring, time to start logging again

2010-04-19T06:50:00.000-07:00

It was a very pleasant weekend, the first time we've spent outside in shirt sleeves. The ground is just starting to firm up enough to operate machinery off the rocked roads.

It was nice to work on the property when the pine grass is greening up, bushes budding, sun shining. We skidded logs and piled slash both days, and enjoyed a small slash-pile bonfire Saturday night with our neighbors.

It's time to start logging again. Our goal this summer is to thin 3-5 more acres out of our 20. The minimum this year will be 3 for our NRCS EQIP contract, and we have a few acres left on our DNR FLEP matching grant for thinning and slash abatement. Both programs have been a considerable financial help to us in accomplishing what we need to do on our land.

Spring, snow, and smoke

2010-04-05T18:33:00.000-07:00

A late blast of spring snow makes for an interesting weekend here. Four inches fell late in the week. It melted fast, but there are enough remnants of snow on green grass for some nice photos of wildflowers and such.

The snow also gave us a couple more weeks to burn slash piles. The ground is wet, the breeze is mild, so we dragged out the arson gear and torched 4 small piles Saturday. The wood is so wet that the fuel mixture is difficult to light, and it takes 3 or 4 tries before the pile takes off in flame. I used 1/2 gallon to 1 gallon per pile to get them started!

My favorite part of burning piles is going around late at night and tending them. Tonight is starry and cold -- barely above freezing -- but it's warm by the large piles of coals. I rake the charred stubs from the outer perimeter into the pile, heaping it as high as I can, so there will be nothing but ash in the morning.

Addendum: Early this morning I made the rounds through frost-trimmed wildflowers and snow patches. I stirred the fires, now the size of small campfires.

I saw 8 deer and a red-tailed hawk today.

Spring 2010 damage assessment & wildflower report

2010-03-22T09:51:00.001-07:00

The snow is gone (mostly). We finally made it up to the property last weekend to do our spring damage assessment and to open up the cabin (RV).

(Photo: False Hellebore sprouts are coming up in the usual, damp, shady spots. Actual height is less than 12".)

Our cants have developed some black mildew-like spots, and that concerns us. We're researching what we need to treat them with -- and how. It's possible we'll have to submerge each of 120 cants (20 to 40 feet long) in a purpose-built vat of chemicals. The handling, time and chemical issues aren't appealing, but neither is permanent damage to our building materials.

We had surprisingly few broken trees this winter. It was a mild winter without a lot of heavy snowfall. It's good that the leave trees have had an extra season to strengthen their root systems. Years of over-protection from wind by an overgrown stand typically results in a lot of snags after thinning.

The forest is open and visible this time of year. With no leaves on the brush, we can see logs we missed last year. There will be some unplanned skidding to do, as soon as the ground dries up. It's still very moist, which makes it a good time to repair some of our access roads and let them solidify before they take heavy use.

It's also a good time of year to appreciate the beauty of the place. The grass is sprouting green. Tiny wildflowers are coming up, and the balsam is just putting out buds on the sunniest south-facing open slopes.

(Image: Life springs eternal. Wildflowers emerge from the duff and plant debris laid flat by 2-3 feet of snow.)

2009: Fire to Ice

2009-12-27T10:38:00.000-08:00

2009 was a busy, productive year.

A forest fire near our property reminded us that we need to keep working until we finish our fire stewardship work.

In terms of timber, we thinned some stands, doing all of the work ourselves. A new acquisition -- the logging winch -- made a big difference. We had a dozen dump truck loads of slash removed (instead of burning it in place) and it will end up as mulch for sale from Chelan County.

We finally received formal certification from ATFS as a Sustainable Forest. We even got a steel sign to post on the property.

As for the home, we're two steps closer to construction. We got our logs milled! They're stacked neatly in a storage yard, under a huge tarp. The 30 centimeter (7.25") square "cants" will form the walls, rafters and posts of our home.

And our septic system installation turned out to be quite a project, not to mention more expensive than we had planned. But without an approved septic, we wouldn't be able to get a building permit for the house. Now we have plans, cants, a building platform, driveways, water, septic, and phone. The next steps are a foundation and, alas, grid power.

On the financial front, we were approved for funding through the USDA's EQIP program. It adds up to about $1,000 per acre over 4 years, for various fire and timber health practices we need to do. Our current DNR FLEP matching grant expires soon.

With the budget issues in WA, it's no surprise I got practically no response to my proposed program to help small forest owners. Maybe next year.

Now the property is under a foot of snow (more coming soon). The access road is closed to wheeled vehicles until April, and everything is frozen solid. We can travel that last mile by snowmobile or snowshoes, and we're planning to do that on New Year's weekend, weather permitting. But no logging until spring.

Study Quantifies the Economic Impact of Private Working Forests in the U.S.

2009-12-17T16:00:00.000-08:00

http://www.forest2market.com/f2m/us/f2m1/pressroom/releases/NAFO

"On average, [privately-owned forests] generate $277,000 in state GDP per 1,000 acres, while public forests generate just $41,000.

"The study also concludes that every 1,000 acres of private, working forest creates on average 8 jobs, $270,000 in annual payroll, $9,850 in annual state taxes (income and severance taxes only) and $733,000 in annual sales."

Fall Colors in North Central Washington

2009-10-12T21:17:00.000-07:00

This time of year is magical. The berry bushes and slide alder on Stevens Pass, 2000 feet higher than our property, are bright red and orange. The big-leaf maples on our place range from green to full-on gold. Aspens haven't turned, but there is that promise in their color when the sun hits them just right in the breeze. The winding road to our property is lined (and sometimes covered) with fallen colors.

Big-leaf maple by our driveway.

Brush across US2 from Yodelin on Stevens Pass WA.

Tripp Canyon Fire, Cashmere WA

2009-10-11T21:08:00.000-07:00

Could this be it? We wonder each time a fire breaks out near our property. This fire is within 3 miles of our property, and upwind. The last two have been even closer.

We're not ready -- we won't be, for another 3 or 4 years of thinning and pruning. We could lose everything, even after all of our work to make our property less susceptible to a devastating crown fire.

Tripp Canyon fire about 1/2 hour after it started today.

The Tripp Canyon fire began at about 11 a.m. today (10/11/09, see updates below) when a debris-pile burn at a home got out of control. I drove out US Highway 2 at about 11:30 to see what the smoke was about. It was a thick brown column of smoke typical of a hot forest fire, but it looked very small. Fire trucks passed, headed that way. The heliport in Cashmere was empty of their large, fire-fighting choppers.

I've wondered, lately, what goes into setting the Industrial Fire Precaution Level. For the past month the IFPL has been I, its lowest danger level. Any type of logging activity is permitted, and there is no burn ban. But the ground is dry, dry, dry. There has been precious little rain. Dry leaves are falling, and days are increasingly windy. This is when man-made fires get away from people.

Tripp Canyon fire location on Sky Meadows Road near Cashmere WA. (Google Maps)

By 2:00 the smoke had turned white, and looked about the same size, so I breathed a sigh of relief assuming it was under control. Then a friend called my mobile at 5:30 to say the neighboring Brisky Canyon was under an evacuation advisory. Smoke hung over Blewett Pass at sunset, and the air smelled of wood smoke.

As of 7:45 pm, it reportedly was still actively burning in brush and timber. About 50 firefighters were working the fire this afternoon. Three helicopters dropped water on the blaze.

The rocky, dry grass and brushlands around Cashmere quickly transition to dense forests of fir and pine as you go west -- the direction of the wind on Sunday. ([more photos] Wenatchee World photo by Kathryn Stevens.)

The Sheriff's Office told reporters the cause of this fire (a burning debris pile) is being investigated by DNR officials -- "but the fire appears to have been legal since the county-wide, open-burning ban was lifted earlier this month."

I must have burned a hundred large piles of debris just in the past 7 years, and I would not dare light a pile until there's snow on the ground. "Fuels and dryness are a huge indication that we’re going to have fire season until we get some snow," a Sheriff's Office spokesperson cautioned last Monday, less than a week before this fire.

Why can't people wait to burn their leaves and debris after the fall rains drench everything? It's only a week or two away. Folks here complain about burn bans. Today is evidence that, in the absence of rules and fines, a few people will not exercise common sense.

Fire status

SUNDAY -- The local newspaper says the fire is burning on state Department of Natural Resources land. Firefighters from Cashmere, Dryden, Monitor, Peshastin, Entiat and the Department of Natural Resources responded to the fire. The Chelan County Sheriff's office says about 135 firefighters from multiple agencies will be assigned to the fire starting early Monday, and the three helicopters will be back dropping water. DNR was not quoted in the update. A local radio report said the fire was at 100 acres and still uncontained at the end of the day.

MONDAY -- Spread from 300 acres this morning to 400 acres this evening. Evacuation advisories have not changed for 30+ families; no one has been evacuated, and roads are open. DNR blog post offers limited info. Local news says crews are hoping that snow and rain forecast for this evening and Tuesday will help contain the fire. On the other hand, if winds shift, the fire could rush toward homes -- including ours.

TUESDAY -- 450 acres/10% contained this morning with "minimal fire activity." Calm winds and a cool night helped, but firefighters still haven't got the fire under control. Local news reports said officials were hoping snow would. Chance of light snow was in the forecast for this morning, but didn't materialize. By mid-day the fire grew to 525 acres/60% contained. This evening, officials assured residents that the evacuation advisory will be downgraded by dawn tomorrow if mop-up progresses at its current pace.

WEDNESDAY -- Snow. The fire is no longer a threat, firefighters are going home, and the fire starter has been acquitted. The fire charred 525 acres, endangered 28 families' homes, cost thousands in helicopter time, and brought in 180 firefighters from all over the state. The Sheriff's Office has acted swiftly to exonerate the individual whose carelessness started the fire: “It looks like the homeowner did everything right.”

Well, maybe not everything.

ATFS Certified Sustainable Forest

2009-10-06T21:56:00.000-07:00

We received the certificate today for our certified sustainble forest. The American Tree Farm System certification is the central Washington companion to FSC (popular in western WA).

The forest has been managed according to ATFS standards for the past 8 years, and we got our "Sustainble Forest" sign a few years ago. It was not until a couple of years ago that we learned how easily we could attain certification for our wood products. The process took a while, since those who needed to sign the paperwork had moved on to other jobs. But the paperwork evenually went through, and we got a certificate and letter in today's mail.

We'll receive an ATFS sign, intended to accompany the Sustainable Forest sign, in a few weeks.

When you buy wood or paper with a "FSC" or "ATFS" symbol, it means the wood that it came from was farmed without undue harm to the Earth it came from. ATFS certifies that any wood products that are obtained from our land are grown and harvested in a sustainable way. We would give a copy of our certificate to a sawmill or pulp mill, and they would pass along the certificates with the lumber or pulp goods they produce.

Yarding & Skidding Logs, High-Volume Style

2009-10-06T21:45:00.000-07:00

We're making good progress getting logs out of the woods this month. Our neighbor Curt came over to help with skidding, which means either setting choker or running the winch while I hook logs. He loaded his small trailer to capacity with firewood logs a couple of times. He heats with wood, and isn't particular about the species, diameter, or straightness of the logs he uses. Unfortunately the trailer doesn't hold very much weight.

Shaun Brender also came by with his friend Zak to check out the "new" logging winch. Before we got the winch, Shaun had offered to dozer-skid logs for a small fee plus the wood. Shaun ran down our steepest slope with the choker and line about a dozen times within an hour and a half. We just kept winching until we had 15 logs piled up at the roadside.

Collecting so many logs in one location actually complicated the process of skidding them to the landing. We would have preferred to skid tree-length logs and buck them at the landing. But the roadside pile made it necessary to buck logs in place and skid shorter logs to the deck. Luckily, the skid distance was short.

One tough log
Curt and I tackled one more log before dark, a big fir that fell downhill and straddled the bottom of the draw. Its butt was stuck into the hillside and lodged below its own stump. It took us about 45 minutes, but we got the full-length log out.

We used a block on the log with stationary anchor points to double the winching power. Once we got the log moving uphill, we had to add another block. The photo shows the setup, which gives us 3X the 6,000 lb power of the winch. The log wouldn't budge without a block, and hardly moved with one block, but slid like butter with two blocks. That's the power of a block and tackle.

Winch and two snatch blocks on a log.

Close-up of the log end. Choker at left, winch cable at right.

Winch operator's perspective.

More about Block & Tackle:
- Good luck understanding the physics professor version at Wikipedia.
- "How Stuff Works" was once a great resource, but they've gotten desperate with the advertising.

The next day, Linda and I skidded another dozen logs in 2 hours. That includes skidding them a short distance to the landing, bucking and decking them. I hooked logs on the steep slope, and she ran the winch. Linda endured all of my previous experiments with winches and other methods of yarding logs. After watching a few logs effortlessly ascend the wall of the ravine toward her, she declared the new winch the best $2k we've spent.

Dwarf Mistletoe on Ponderosa Pine

2009-10-01T20:47:00.000-07:00

Dwarf Mistletoe -- Arceuthobium -- is one of the parasites we deal with on our Ponderosa Pine stands. I found this specimen while pruning some young pines last July. Note how the limb is swollen and contorted under the mistletoe infection.

Dwarf mistletoe has seeds, stems, flowers, and roots like other plants, but it depends on its host for water and nutrients. All major conifer species are infected by a mistletoe species specific to that confier (Douglas fir dwarf mistletoe lives only on Douglas fir) although Larch dwarf mistletoe sometimes infects other trees.

This mistletoe is showy, but some are quite small. You're more likely to identify mistletoe by looking at the tree from a distance. The presence of "witches'’ brooms" (abnormal branch clumping) is a fairly certain sign of mistletoe. Mistletoe infects nearby trees, and can kill younger understory trees. A large ponderosa pine mistletoe plant can spread its seeds up to 50 feet.

Unfortunately, thinning can exascerbate mistletoe growth. Shady, overcrowded stands deprive mistletoe of light and water. Cutting trees helps the remaining trees in many ways, but it also leads to a mistletoe growth spurt. Mistletoe might not kill the trees, but it weakens them and makes them susceptible to other parasites, such as bark beatles.

Even more unfortunate is the prognosis for an infected stand like ours. We're not cutting enough trees to require replanting; if we planted, the understory trees would likely become infected and not survive. That means, someday, when the pine here begins to die of old age, this stand will need to have all remaining mature pine removed and be replanted.

Here are some good resources about mistletoe for central Washington tree farmers:

Forest Health Notes: Dwarf Mistletoe - Washington State University Cooperative Extension - with advice on managing an infected stand.

Dwarf Mistletoe Biology and Management in Southeast Region - Washington Department of Natural Resources - 5 pages of detail plus 3 pages of photographs very useful in identifying mistletoe.

To locate more information about mistletoe, google "mistletoe" together with your particular tree species name.

Volunteer weekend on the logging operation

2009-09-29T19:33:00.000-07:00

Friends came out to help with work this weekend. It's invaluable to have extra hands on jobs like skidding and decking logs. Even with just one other person, the work seems to flow faster and get done more smoothly than when Linda and I are working as a pair.

John skids logs into the landing area, while Mara waits to pile slash.

John and I worked on hooking, winching and skidding logs out of the woods to the landing. Linda and Mara processed incoming logs -- Linda limbed and bucked; Mara measured for the buck, and then piled the slash. Then I decked the logs and headed back to the woods, where John had the next turn of logs ready to winch out.

John unhooks his logs from the tractor.

Thanks for your help! You're welcome back any time.

Farmi logging winch blade

2009-09-21T18:45:00.000-07:00

We bought a used Farmi logging winch blade this month. It's hard to describe, so I shot some quick video this weekend.

This winch attaches to the 3-point hitch on a small tractor. It's powered by the PTO driveline from the tractor. The housing has a winch inside, a blade on the bottom, and a block on the top that acts like an arch. The winch has a 160' wire rope (3/8" galvanized cable) with a grab hook.

You pull a rope to engage the winch, and stand back. It develops quite a bit of pull from the PTO of a 34 horse tractor. All of the winching in this video is done with the tractor at idle. Running the tractor faster will run the winch faster, but there's a limit. I've already had the experience of seeing the front tires of the tractor rise off the ground, and it would be easy to tip the tractor if you're not diligent.

I included a good example of the tractor and winch combination in action. When our roads get churned up it can be so loose that it's difficult to skid a turn of logs up steep sections. Instead of churning the road more, I positioned the tractor at the top of a steep bank, where I could winch the logs out of a pile and along the road, up the bank, to the tractor.

After I pull a couple more logs up, I hook the chain chokers into notches in the winch blade, lift the blade to raise the butts off the ground, and start skidding the logs toward the landing.

I position the logs in front of the decks, unhook the choker chains, buck the logs to length, and I'm ready to deck them using the log forks on the tractor's loader bucket.

I included another example, this time using a snatch block. We had some logs that were digging their butts into the road bank instead of riding up onto the road. When the load hangs up, the blade digs in, the logs tear up the road bank, and the winch eventually stops. We set up a snatch block to extract these logs without damaging the road.

We've tried a few other methods of yarding logs out of the woods and to the tractor for skidding, and this one holds the most promise. I'm looking forward to posting more of my success stories and pictures of the winch next season.

Logging winch blade purchase

2009-08-13T13:27:00.001-07:00

Today we bought a new tool for our small-scale logging operation: a Farmi logger winch blade for our tractor.

The blade is like a small dozer blade, but without the tilt and angle controls. Inside the blade is a PTO winch with 165 feet of wire rope.

The whole thing mounts on the three-point hitch of our Kubota tractor. The tractor's PTO drives the winch to pull logs to the tractor.

The blade sits on the ground during winching, to keep the tension from pulling the tractor backward.

Once the log is yarded up to the blade, we raise the 3-point to lift butt of the the log(s) off the ground, so they'll skid without tearing up the ground or roads. The blade keeps the log from banging against the back of the tractor.

We bought it used from two brothers in Kent. We found them on Craigslist by posting a "wanted" ad.

Logging PTO winch design failures

2009-07-21T08:35:00.001-07:00

I made a logging winch out of a Ramsey 9000 lb drum PTO winch and it didn't work out. That winch was not up to the punishment of tractor logging. I tore up 2, and spent nearly $1,000 and coutless hours welding, before giving up on this idea.

Problem #1 -- The winch 0.75" drive shaft is too light for this kind of work. They break off in the PTO driveline yoke. The drive shaft is cast into the worm gear, so it's impossible to replace without replacing the worm gear, $275, a couple hours of labor, and a week of down time.
Problem #2 -- This is a slow winch with no power-out. It pulls at less than 1 fps at 1800 RPM. That's mighty slow when rewinding 100' of empty cable. I have a live PTO but no reverse, so I was always slacking off the cable by backing the tractor, just to get the winch clutch out. Sometimes the winching had pulled the tractor back against a tree or stump, trapping it there. Tractor skidding is slow enough already.
Problem #3 -- The frame I made doesn't work for lifting and skidding logs. Using the winch hook for skidding puts too much strain on the winch frame and toplink. It affects steering and traction because it throws the log's weight back on the tractor like a hoist arch would. Dropping the winch to skid logs is too much repeated hassle. Plowing logs through the dirt is land-damaging and slow.

What I would do differently--
1. Use a winch that's meant for heavier work. Recovering a 1,000 lb wheeled Jeep is not the same as yarding a 3,000 lb log uphill through slash and stumps. Make sure it's bidirectional or has a manual driveline clutch. Get a 2-speed if possible.
2. Redesign the frame. This is tricky because you need room for the PTO driveline. The log's weight needs to be on the lift bar, not aft of it. There needs to be a low arch that keeps the load close to the tractor.
3. Build it so there's some protection for the winch and tractor against the log slamming it. Logs like to lunge forward, or get into the rear tires, when skidding downhill.

One nice thing about the winch is having a variable-length cable always with you, even if you use blocks and the drive-away method instead of winching.

The winch model I used is like towtruck-wreckers use, although mine were salvaged out of 1960's military Jeeps. $400 for both. Each had something broken, but together they made a working winch and left me parts to repair it. I got them at a 4X4 salvage yard.
This winch has a 3/4" round drive shaft with a keyway. I ordered a special yoke for the PTO driveline, and had a machine shop put the keyway into it. $260 for the driveline, $15 for the keyway.
I built a 3-point frame using flat and angle steel. The first one wasn't heavy enough and collapsed under the stress. The second one would withstand a cannon attack. The frame design wraps around the winch, so the winch bolts in from front and back, like it did in the Jeep bumper. This is mandatory. A pair of parallel vertical posts go up to the top link. The main cross member is 3/8" steel angle with ends welded in, and holes in the ends for the pins. The rear cross member has the roller fairlead mounted below it.
Note: I tried hooking up my newer Ramsey 12V 9000 lb winch off my Jeep onto the tractor. I used a 2" receiver-to-3 point hitch adapter ($60) and modified a pair of jumper cables ($35). I burned up one winch motor (&#%!!) and got very frustrated with the slow speed before abandoning that idea within a few days.
Our tractor is a 2008 Kubota L3400, 34HP, 4wd.
Now I'm looking for a good gas-powered winch, or a "logging blade."

Program Spec to Help Small Forest Owners

2009-07-20T11:33:00.001-07:00

**This is the program I'd like to see... what could be your role in helping to make it happen?**

Small family forests constitute a large portion of forest lands in Washington state. Most of those forests are overstocked and unmanaged, which creates a fire hazard to the homes and businesses on and near those properties. Logging on small properties is barely economically viable, if at all, and lately is a money-losing operation.

The resources are there to help families manage their forests, but it's not easy to find and coordinate those resources.

This program helps us as owners of small forests (up to 40? acres) to make our land healthy and fire safe. The program brings together existing resources for owners, straightening and shortening the path to a well-managed forest.

Here's what the program would do, and the resources it would connect us with...

Education & advice -- Inform us about the program and about managing our forests, especially the risk of losing our trees (and our homes) to fire. Consult with us and guide us through the steps of the program.
Government agencies -- Find funding we qualify for, through existing grant and copay programs such as FLEP and EQIP. Counties can get our neighbors to join the program as a group, placing contiguous land into the program and reducing overhead for operations. NGOs are another potential source of funds and related programs for conservation.

Consulting foresters -- Locate a forester who knows our region and can (a) write a forest management/stewardship plan specific to our property; (b) perform sample plots and cruises as needed for timber practices; (c) manage any thinning and harvesting operations, including the permit process and taxes.

Biologists -- Put us in touch with someone who can advise us about attracting wildlife, protecting riparian, preventing tree disease and eliminating noxious weeds.

Logging operators -- Match our property with a logger who knows the program, is equipped to work on small properties, and is prepared to abide by our goals for the land and forest.

Landscapers -- Connect us with people who have crews and equipment to prune trees, pile slash, haul away or burn debris, and remove brush.

Bank -- Create affordable financing products to help us cover the portion of work for which we are not reimbursed by government/grant funding. Make us aware of the program when we borrow to buy bare land or to build on it. Give us the option of adding a land-equity line of credit specifically for forest stewardship, at time of purchase. Find government programs that provide low-interest, interest-free, or guaranteed loans for ecology practices.

Realtors -- Tell us, as we look at forested parcels to buy, that there is a program available to help us get overgrown properties under control without giving up the beauty we seek. Hand us a flyer on the program, or point us to the web site. Suggest that we ask the bank about the program when we apply for a mortgage or construction loan. Follow up with us about it -- someday you'll be selling the neighboring properties.

Insurance company -- Give us a break on our premiums when we have a stewardship plan and follow through with it under the program. When you do a site visit and see thick trees, tell us about the program and the premiums we can save by doing it.

University/community college forestry extension -- Offer your students credit for a project in which they help the Forester, thus creating an upcoming pool of Foresters for the program, and reducing the cost to the each of us.

Landowners -- Those who have been through a process similar to the program (and eventually those who have completed the program) have a formal process to become supporters by speaking to neighborhood groups, hosting field trips, and taking calls when prospective participants have questions.

Are you with the program? Do you have ideas or useful contacts?

Let's start this program in a county and blueprint it for others to replicate. I'm in Chelan County and I'm ready to meet. Leave a comment.

7/29/09 Chris e-mailed:

"WOW, this is a large and serious undertaking, impressive. It’s the sort of thing that Kirk Hanson, with DNR’s SFLO Office, was on his way to accomplishing before he left. It is definitely needed and the toughest part, from my experience, is the maintenance and up-keep after a few years. The only comment I have is work closely with the small landowner groups such as Farm-Forestry, Cooperative Extension, NW Pine Assoc., and maybe SAF (to name a few). They may be able to help with information, updates and up-keep."

Spring work party

2009-06-29T14:34:00.001-07:00

The weather in June is at its absolute best here this time of year. Everything is still very green. Temperatures are in the 60s when we get up in the morning, and reach the high 70s by mid afternoon. It's light by 5:00 AM and stays light until 9:30 PM. Blue skies and cool mountain breezes leave us nothing to complain about.

I felled 13 trees on Friday afternoon and another 30 on Saturday morning before our guests arrived. They're mostly 7-12" dbh pine, with a tendency to hang up in other trees as they fall. I had a 3-tree domino, a fun thing to watch from a safe distance.

Our good friends John and Mara came up this weekend to visit and work. They brought their tricked-out VW camper bus, the same one they use every year for the Burning Man festival.

We cleaned up about 1/2 acre where we've finished thinning and pruning. Now, that area is ready to recover. We gathered slash into burn piles, moved other piles into better locations for winter burning, dragged longer logs out of the area, and left 3 ground logs behind. The pine grass and brush will take over and it will be all green by this time next year. Other than having about 2/3 fewer trees, it will look as natural as before.

The work goes pretty fast with a 4-person crew. Nonetheless, it's easy to see how slash control alone could take 20 to 30 man-hours per acre.

We had a great dinner outside by the summer evening light -- we kept talking and drinking quite late. Suffice it to say, we had less appetite for hard work the next morning. We all had a leisurely breakfast and went for a walk around the property before our friends headed back to Seattle.

Portable sawmill work to begin next week

2009-06-25T10:07:00.001-07:00

I'm very excited to say that the on-site milling of our building logs is scheduled to begin next week. It's supposed to take a week or maybe two.

We cut our 120 Douglas Fir house logs last summer, from our 20 acres. The logs are all about 10" d. at the small end, and run as long as 60 feet. They'll be milled into 7x7 inch "cants," which are basically square beams ranging from 10' to 25' long. Those will be stacked to dry and, in some later year (2012?), we'll build a house with them.

I italicize scheduled because this work is an imprecise business at best. We had to find a sawyer with the right equipment (which we did). The sawyer has to get his mill on site (it's here) and tuned up (almost done). The log truck needs to load the logs and park them beside the mill for easy transfer. And there needs to be someone, in addition to yours truly, who can support the sawyer by loading logs onto the mill and stacking cants after they're milled, using a front loader with log forks.

If I forget to post photos, someone remind me. This should be interesting!

'Tis the Season for Felling Ponderosa Pine

2009-06-24T16:02:00.000-07:00

Now that the Summer Solstice has passed, we're comfortable cutting pine. We've been cutting fir so far this year, and there has been plenty of it in this year's target stands.

This is part of our continuing thinning from below to reduce fuels and improve forest health. We avoided cutting pine this season until now, because fresh pine slash is like catnip to those pesky little Ips pine bark beetles. In 1991 the western pine beetle was responsible for the death of 21,679 trees over 28,159 acres resulting in a loss of 1.267 million cubic feet of lumber -- and it's been getting worse ever since. Even so, it's tragic to see even one tree, a feature of my favorite view for years, suddenly turn brown. We've lost dozens of trees to beetles, often in clusters.

Advice varies as to when it's "safe" to create slash by felling pines. Starting dates range from June 1 to August 1, depending on whom you ask. We've often heard mid-June or late June, so we picked the Solstice and planned accordingly.

Now it looks like we'll be busy milling for a week or two, so the pine beetle will have until early July to pick someone else's trees.

Western Washington Forest Owners Field Day July 31-August 1, 2009

2009-06-08T09:27:00.001-07:00

This is the largest such event of the year, aimed at 1) helping landowners understand fundamental management techniques and emerging issues, and 2) uniting family forest owners with goods and services (such as consulting foresters) that will help them successfully accomplish personal objects.

Official Field Day website http://snohomish.wsu.edu/forestry/2009FieldDay.htm

Brochure http://snohomish.wsu.edu/forestry/documents/09WWFieldDayBrochure.pdf

Activity schedule http://snohomish.wsu.edu/forestry/documents/WWA_FD_2009_Event_Schedule.pdf

WA DNR Cuts Stewardship Foresters

2009-06-04T22:25:00.001-07:00

Western WA stewardship foresters are due to lose their positions as of June 30, 2009. Not affecting us in central WA yet, but it certainly could... if forest owners don't speak up soon.

Washington Department of Natural Resources has decided to eliminate stewardship foresters west of the Cascades. They're being quiet about it, and many small forest owners are unaware of the impending cuts. State employees are forbidden to discuss some aspects of the decision publicly.

Stewardship foresters are the people who work with small timber landowners to manage stands sustainably and advise us on reducing fire hazards. They make site visits and approve forest stewardship plans. They co-teach the coached planning class, and the advanced stewardship class I'm taking now, in partnership with Washington University Extension.

The elimination of these positions is purportedly due to state budget cuts. The westside foresters being cut are the least numerous and most burdened -- there are more family forests on the west side than on the east, and fewer foresters to cover more counties.

If stewardship foresters are cut on the east side as well, thousands of families here will lose a major source of help. We've benefited from those services in our effort to eliminate fuels, reduce forest fire hazard, fight bugs and disease, and fund necessary activities that are uneconomical on a small property.

WA DNR should restore those westside foresters' posts, rather than lose the many years of experience and territory familiarity they possess. I hope DNR doesn't cut eastside stewardship foresters next. So I'm e-mailing the WA Land Commissioner and my state legislators. You should, too.

Find your legislator's name and contact info using your address

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/

Office of the Commissioner of Public Lands

1111 Washington St. SE

PO Box 47001

Olympia WA 98504-7001

cpl@dnr.wa.gov

360-902-1004

Fax 360-902-1775

The Washington Farm Forestry Association's lobbyists might also be able to help more if they hear from private forest owners. www.wafarmforestry.com

Eastern WA Cost share programs from DNR & USDA NRCS

2009-05-28T21:11:00.000-07:00

Federal cost-share funds from the Washington Department of Natural Resources, USDA Forest Service and Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) may be available to help you pay for projects to improve the health of your forest.

We're benefiting from our third DNR "FLEP" grant and applying for a NRCS "EQIP" incentive. These programs can make it financially possible to take management action on small private forest holdings at times like this, when timber prices are low.

Here's some information to get you started...

Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)

• Provides funds for a variety of conservation projects on forest lands

• Contact local USDA-NRCS offices for details.

• Applications are funded annually.

• Apply by July 15, 2009 to be considered for federal fiscal year 2010 funding.

• More information at http://wa.nrcs.usda.gov

Eastern Washington Forestry Cost-Share Program

• Provides funds for

o Forest Stewardship Plan development

o Wildfire/bark beetle hazard reduction projects

• For details and application form:

www.dnr.wa.gov (type “Eastern Washington Cost Share” in search box) or call 1-888-783-9548 to have an

application mailed to you. Applications are funded continuously year around when adequate funds are available.

Additional web sites of Interest

Educational Programs and Materials (WA and

neighboring states)

• http://ext.wsu.edu/forestry

• www.cnr.uidaho/edu/extforest/

• www.cof.orst.edu/extended/extserv

• www.cfc.umt.edu/extensionforestry/

• www.woodlandfishandwildlife.org

Family Forest Owners Organizations

• www.wafarmforestry.com

• www.familyforestfoundation.org

Forest Certification Programs

• www.treefarmsystem.org

• www.watreefarm.org

• www.nnrg.org

Directory of Private Consulting Foresters

• http://ext.wsu.edu/forestry – click on “Consulting Foresters Directory” – bottom of page

Forest Stewardship Coached Planning Course, Fall City, coming Fall 2009

2009-05-28T14:22:00.000-07:00

Some preliminary dates have been set for this course with more details to come. This is a great multi-week course covering several forest and wildlife management topics that will culminate with you writing your own Stewardship Plan. WSU Extension and Washington DNR present these programs statewide with the help of several other partners. Detailed information about the Forest Stewardship Program is available at: http://ext.wsu.edu/forestry/stewardship.htm. While you’re there, spend some time exploring the new WSU Forestry Extension site.

Small Forest Landowner Newsletter May 09

Driveway or truck road construction

2009-05-19T22:07:00.001-07:00

A neighbor just built a new driveway about 100 feet to a spot where he plans to park a 25' camper trailer. The new road has very little grade and crosses two seasonal streams.

If you build a dirt road in central Washington, you'll quickly find that the combination of rainwater and clay can stop any vehicle.

It's best not to put off installing culverts. Get it done before mid September if you can. Once it starts raining, the heavy equipment work itself is almost as damaging as having your road wash out. Your first few springs you'll have a lot of silt. Get at least 12" culvert so you can get a shovel or hoe into it to clean it out. Near Wenatchee: United Pipe, 509-662-7128, or Tumwater Drilling, 509-548-5361.

Crushed rock is a very good idea. A 4" base course of "1 1/4 inch minus" rock will give you a good, solid road surface year-round. My neighbor might want to put a load of smaller "5/8 inch minus" under the camper trailer and in the area immediately around it, where he won't drive but will want to walk and have a patio area. A load gets you about 10 feet of one-lane roadway. Bergrund Construction in Peshastin has a small dump truck that can maneuver in tight spaces. He spreads the rock evenly, so you don't need to do any smoothing or grading. Dan Dietrich, 509-669-7908.

This driveway was simple in design, but difficult to plan and to construct due to the many constraints -- side slope, varied geology, overstocked trees, property lines and rights of way. If you want to know more about road design, the WA DNR or UW Extension/Forestry have handbooks that are cheap or free.

"Got Wildlife?" WSU Extension workshop

2009-05-18T13:34:00.000-07:00

Free WSU workshop helps you learn how to attract furred and
feathered friends to your woodland property.

The presence of wildlife can be one of the highlights of owning forested property. But many factors can make your property less desirable to forest fauna. Learn what you can do to increase the diversity of your forest backyard.

Washington State University Snohomish County Extension is offering a free ‘Healthy Forests for Fish and Wildlife’ workshop for small woodland owners. The workshop will be held on Thursday June 4, 2009 from 6:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m., at the Loyal Heights Community Club in the Bryant area just north of Arlington: 4305 269th Pl NE Arlington, WA 98223.

This class will teach forest landowners practical steps to attract more wildlife and biodiversity to their property. Participants will learn about different types of habitat, how to enhance streamside areas for salmon, grant and cost-share programs available to help landowners improve habitat on their property, and where to find assistance with forestry and wildlife issues, including free on-site consultations from a forester or wildlife biologist.

The workshop will feature speakers from Washington State University, WA Department of Natural Resources, WA Department of Fish and Wildlife, Snohomish Conservation District, and the Sno-Stilly Fisheries Enhancement Task Force.

There is no cost to attend this workshop, but space is limited and pre-registration will assure your spot. Register online at http://snohomish.wsu.edu/forestry/wildlifeworkshop.htm or by contacting Kevin Zobrist, WSU Area Extension Educator:

Kevin Zobrist – (425) 357-6017 (Work)

kzobrist@wsu.edu – (425) 299-6403 (Mobile)

Tractor Damage Slows Slash-Burning

2009-05-14T16:47:00.001-07:00

Pushing a burn pile around with the Kubota front loader earlier this month, I got a long pine stick between two parts and saw hydraulic oil start spewing.

It bent a hydraulic rod, broke a cylinder cap and ruined a set of seals. Must be more careful with debris. Having the tractor out of commission now isn't good. The burn ban starts in 3 weeks, and we have a lot of fire-hazard debris to get rid of while the forest is still wet.

The seals were the least expensive part to replace, under $50. They're special rubber O-rings that you fit into their respective places. The steel cap was more like $150.

Two tractor mechanics advised against reinstalling a bent hydraulic rod because it would just damage the cylinder. A new rod would have been $400. Swiftwater Tractor directed me to a place that straightens them. The bend wasn't bad, and there was no polishing required on the mirror-like surface. Cost: $30 instead of $400. The place is Western Metals in Ellensburg. Valley Tractor called around for me to try to find someplace similar in Wenatchee, with no luck.

Shipping the rod to the shop, and driving out of my way to pick it up, was nothing compared to the hassle of fitting 2 of those little seals into the new cap. I tried several times, then boiled the seals to soften them (but it didn't), then finally found a way to fold it like a taco, then double it back over itself, then jam it into the cap with a rubberized pliers handle.

Back in business -- and not a drop.

April Showers, May Flowers

2009-05-04T22:57:00.000-07:00

Photo: Arrowleaf Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagittata) in bloom, mid May.

This is the time of year that keeps us coming back to this place. The wildflowers are in their full glory, with every open meadow and hillside covered with gold blossoms.

The weather is beautiful, most of the time, but schizophrenic. Out of the past three weekends we've had blue skies and warm weather, moderate temps with overcast, and chilly with showers, in that order.

We managed to burn some slash piles while the duff is still quite wet. It's mostly boring, hot work, but it's so nice to be rid of large heaps of dry wood debris! I also managed to bend a hydraulic rod on the tractor, pushing a burn pile around. It's turning out to be quite an expensive mistake, and takes the loader out of commission for a few weeks.

I sharpened the chain on my larger saw, fueled up the two Stihls, and felled 12-14 trees in 2 weekends. One fell against its favor to land on the deck, right where I aimed it, so I haven't completely lost my touch.

Forest Stewardship: Timber Values

2009-05-04T22:52:00.000-07:00

Advanced forest stewardship course, day 4: Timber Values

Tonight's class focused on values -- the value of timber, calculating the value of a future harvest, and looking at the big picture beyond cash flows.

Will Miller of Miller Shingle talked for over an hour about timber prices, types and mills. His charts were depressing -- timber prices are at dismal lows, and mill closures are disheartening. I learned some new terminology, so now I know the difference between J sort and K sort, between hook and sweep, and between a knot and a spike knot. I know how to pronounce Buse and Oeser without sounding like the tenderfoot I am. (Buse sounds like busey and Oeser rhymes with closure.)

Will handed out a spreadsheet of timber prices for the current month, organized by species and log size or type. All of his information was for west side timber, so he had no information about Ponderosas, nor for mills east of the Cascades.

Take-away: Don't harvest now, prices are too low, but the outlook for price recovery is gloomy.

The rest of the evening was on forest finance. The course's lead instructor (MBA in forest economics) talked us through various financial calculations. We started with the simple ones, like present value and future value. We worked through net present value (NPV), perpetual periodic series, and converting nominal figures to inflation-adjusted numbers. All of this led up to learning the Soil Expectation Value (also known as the Land Expectation Value).

SEV is NPV expressed as a perpetual periodic series. I never learned this one in business school. It takes into account the cost of the land, any existing timber at time of purchase, and all of the aspects included in a NPV calculation. SEV is specific to one situation and land use, i.e., forestry.

Take-aways:

Calculations like these are useful tools for comparing timber management options. Should I buy an available piece of forest land? Should I harvest it now or wait for the market to improve? How does that change if the existing timber is in decline? What species should I choose after harvest? What if excise tax rates change?

Calculations are not as useful for the non-market factors in timber management. What are my goals for land ownership? What value do we (or another organization) place on wildlife habitat? Aesthetics? Fire safety? When calculating the monetary output of a chunk of mud and mbf, It's important to keep the big picture in mind. If it were only mud and mbf, we wouldn't own ours; timber farming is a terrible business to be in now, strictly economically speaking.

Garbage in, garbage out. Assumptions are the key to any of these calculations. Some assumptions boil down to guesswork. The better the guess, the better the accuracy of the outcome. Many calcs are good only for comparisons; in that case, be sure you're comparing apples to apples. For example, try to use real numbers and real interest rates (not nominal, and certainly not a mix).

Note: Tonight's class follows two weeks (class days 2 and 3) of training on the Landscape Management System (LMS) software. LMS performs a wide variety of complex calculations and 3D visualizations on timber stands, and could be very useful to a part-time timber grower. The software is technically a kludge, one that crashed my PC twice and had to be removed each time. It can be downloaded from the WSU Extension. The class also took a field trip to practice taking inventory with sample plots.

Another blogger logger

2009-04-29T22:07:00.001-07:00

Jen Pennington writes about becoming a sustainable forest owner on her blog, "Ecozome Journal."

Welcome to the club, Jen.

Burning land to stay ahead of wildfire threat

2009-04-29T21:38:00.000-07:00

Where we removed trees from densely overstocked stands last summer, we now see spring grasses coming up as more light reaches the forest floor.

In some areas, though, the forest duff is so thick and compacted that the grass doesn't have a chance of penetrating it. The ground under the duff is moist and bare, but no light or seeds make it through.

This TV news story talks about prescribed burns (Rx fires). Northwest Management forester Brian Vrablick explains the process of burning to eliminate that thick carpet of fir needles and fine sticks.

It's scary to think about igniting that dry duff around fire-intolerant fir trees. The story doesn't talk about the prep work before the Rx fire, that of removing the flash fuels around the stems. If the ground fire is too hot it could kill some trees we selected to leave -- the biggest and healthiest of them all -- because the heat scorches the stems (trunks).

Totally natural fire ecology would eliminate the duff with fires every 10 years or so. Those same fires would eliminate the fir and leave an open stand of Ponderosa Pine.

We're not prepared to go that far (i.e., clearcut) to return to PP in 50 years. We have PP stands on half the property. And we're working hard to keep fire from doing any clearcutting for us.

Living with Forests in Wildfire Country - seminar 4/30/09

2009-04-29T21:34:00.000-07:00

This program is taught by forest owners, so there will be ample information based on real life experiences. Sorry for the short notice. Phone included if you'd like to inquire about repeats.

On Thursday, April 30, 2009, at 7-9 PM, in Leavenworth WA, the Barn Beach Trust will present “Living with Forests in Wildfire Country,” a seminar to help people prepare for the approaching fire season. The seminar will take place in the Barn at Barn Beach Reserve, located at 347 Division Street.

With fire season coming, it’s a great time for forest landowners to learn what they can do to protect their property and give themselves peace of mind. Whether you are a forest land owner, or your home is located in the forest, or you just live in a community on the east side of the Cascades with forests nearby, it’s important to understand what it means to live with forests in wildfire country.

The seminar will be presented by Leavenworth area forest landowners Tom Davies and Ross Frank, both of whom have extensive forest land management experience and expertise.
Topics to be covered at the seminar include:
v Forest ecology
v Forest health
v The role of fire in forests
v How property owners can assess wildfire risks to their land and structures
v What property owners can do reduce these risks.

For more information, please contact Jeff Parsons, (509) 548-0181

Tom Davies and his wife, Cynthia Neely, own forested land near Leavenworth. Tom’s credentials include a Masters Degree in Forest Science and a Ph.D. in Biology, both from Yale University. He serves on the Leavenworth Neighbors Fire Education-Fuels Reduction steering committee and is actively working to restore his family’s 120-acre ponderosa pine forest. He is past-President of the Barn Beach Trust.

Ross Frank and his wife, Marianne, own Red-Tail Canyon Farm, a draft horse ranch and a registered tree farm. Ross is a graduate of the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources. He currently chairs the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition and serves on the Board of Directors of the Barn Beach Trust. He is a past board member and chairperson of the Chelan County Conservation District.

NRCS EQIP forestry funding rates as of March 2009

2009-04-23T07:50:00.000-07:00

Considering an Environmental Quality Incentive Program application for funding by USDA's NRCS, here's what NRCS offered.

Thinning $150/acre

Pruning $75/acre

Slash disposal (landowner's preferred method) $187.50/acre

Nesting structures (bird houses, bat boxes) $37.50 each

Wildlife habitat management (structures and plantings) $500 one-time payment

Pest management plan (a combination of documentation and field observations) $1,000 one-time payment

NRCS has well-defined standards for each practice available online. There are many other fundable practices for forest, land, fire and waterway care that I have not listed here.

Keywords: eqip equip sustainable stewardship

DNR FLEP cost share rates thru Sept 2009

2009-04-21T15:55:00.000-07:00

Looking back at the 2008-09 Eastern Washington Forest Landowner Cost-Share Information and Application document, here's what DNR is paying on a cost-share basis.

(The dollar amounts represent the limits of their half, owners pay the rest)

Forest Stewardship Plan writing, $500 for 20-100 acres

Thinning $120 to $230/acre (higher rates apply for heavily overstocked stands)

Pruning $0.20 per foot pruned (100 trees per acre, 16' pruning, 10' bare stem, $120/acre)

Prescribed under-burn $150/acre

Slash disposal (piling, lop/scatter, shred) $350/acre

Here's the contact info to find out more or to apply:

Please contact the DNR Region Forest Stewardship Program Coordinator who serves the area where your land is located:

For land in Okanogan, Ferry, Stevens, Pend Oreille, Lincoln, and Spokane counties:

· Cliff Thresher, WA DNR, P.O. Box 190, 225 S. Silke Rd., Colville, WA 99114-0190.

(509) 684-7474. FAX: (509) 7484. cliff.thresher@dnr.wa.gov

For land in Chelan, Douglas, Kittitas, Yakima, Klickitat, Walla Walla, Columbia, Garfield, Asotin, Whitman, and eastern Skamania counties:

· WA DNR, 713 E. Bowers Rd., Ellensburg, WA 98926-9341. (509) 925-8510. FAX: (509) 925-8522.

Statewide Forest Stewardship Program Manager

· Steve Gibbs, WA DNR, P.O. Box 47012, Olympia, WA 98504-7012. (360) 902-1706. FAX: (360) 902-1428. steve.gibbs@dnr.wa.gov

Carbon trading for forest owners - Webinar

2009-04-21T15:36:00.000-07:00

My family still owns 80 acres of our great-grandfather's homestead farm in east Texas. Last year we started the process of selling the carbon credits from that heavily wooded acreage.

Texas has been progressive in rolling out carbon programs that have been working in other states. (Yes, I used "Texas" and "progressive" in the same sentence.) Under the TX program we would receive payments in return for maintaining at least a certain number of trees per acre. We could harvest the excess during the contract, and at the end of the we'd no longer be bound (e.g., we could harvest, or sell more CO2 credits).

If this is something that interests you, this webinar might be worth watching:

http://www.forestrywebinar.net/webinars/carbon-trading-101

April 30, 2009 at 9:00 AM Pacific Time.

EQIP and FLEP

2009-04-21T11:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I walked the woods with a team of USDA foresters & wildlife biologists who authorize "EQIP" federal grants for sustainable forest management.

The Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) is run by NRCS, the Natural Resources Conservation Service of USDA. These guys drove up from Okanogan WA, then spent 2 hours touring our stands and explaining their grant program.

They say we're likely to be approved for a 5-year contract with grants to cover a variety of activities, including thinning, pruning, slash disposal, pest management and wildlife habitat.

Meanwhile, we have time left on our FLEP grant issued by the WA DNR. We'll spend this summer doing work under that program. FLEP pays 50% of the cost of approved practices, up to a modest limit per acre. The co-pay caps are roughly equivalent to EQIP rates.

EQIP is not a matching grant, the payment amount is fixed per practice, per acre.

For pre-commercial thinning, for example, FLEP pays us half of actual cost up to $220 (FLEP will pay up to $110) per acre. EQIP will pay actual cost up to $180 per acre. Both payment types are reported to the IRS as income and are taxable.

The two programs can be "stacked" for the same acreage. They have stops in place to prevent us from being reimbursed more than the cost of a practice -- which is unlikely in any event given the cost of this kind of work. (Using the above example, actual cost of thinning an acre can exceed $1,000 if the stand is dense.)

Program home pages:

Forestland Enhancement Program (FLEP)
Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)

FPA/N expired

2009-04-21T10:46:00.000-07:00

A milestone has passed. Our 2-year Forest Practices permit expired yesterday. We sold exactly 0 board feet of timber.

I admit, I resent the amount of time and money that went into getting that permit, only to see it expire unused. We couldn't have known then what was coming.

Timber prices continue to fall, fuel prices rising, local sawmill closed. For our small parcel a commercial sale is practically impossible, even though we're logging it ourselves.

Free firewood, bring log truck / jammer

2009-04-16T17:59:00.000-07:00

UPDATE Fall '09: All wood for 2009 has been hauled off. We'll post here and Craigslist if/when more is available.

Last summer we pulled 2-3 log truck loads out of our woods in southern Chelan County WA.

It's mostly DF with PP mixed, various lengths, clean and decked.

That was just the wood we needed to get out of the way for falling and hauling our house logs. We'll bring out more this summer, and next, and...

NOTE - If you do not have the equipment* and manpower to remove (load and haul) at least 40 logs 22 feet long (roughly 5 tons) in a single trip, please do not inquire. You also must be able to designate us as named insured on your insurance/bond or otherwise indemnify us prior to bringing equipment onto the property.

* Due to bridge height constraints, a full-sized log loader cannot enter the canyon.

Advanced forest stewardship course, day 1: Taking stock

2009-04-15T22:14:00.000-07:00

This first session was mostly administrivia and review of the Coached Planning course I took 2 years ago. I was reminded how much we covered back then, and how quickly 24 people can consume a big box of chocolate chip cookies. And I saw some familiar faces from the first course.

We did get into inventorying techniques. This is not the technique that a professional forester would use for appraisal or sale, as their statistical standards are much higher. It's a functional estimating technique. We learned about it in theory in class, and the next field trip will be a chance to practice it.

Five steps for creating a forest inventory:

Create a map. NRCS, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft Live are potential sources.
Determine plot locations. The less opportunity for bias, the better. Typically 1/20th acre circle.
Locate plots in the field. If your spot is e.g. on a cliff, you might have to adjust.
Measure trees in the plots. This takes some tools, and some practice. Record the DBH, age, height, and count of trees in the plot area.
Plug the measurements into the computer.

It takes a minimum of 3 plots per stand (our parcel has two distinct stands) or 1 plot per 10 acres, whichever is greater. A 1/20th acre circle has a radius of 26.3 feet.

We spent much of the remaining time learning about converting map scales and the use of a compass, diameter tape, cruising stick, and clinometer.

We'll have a computer lab class in which we input and crunch the data.

Denis

My Advanced Forest Stewardship Series starts next week

2009-04-07T15:22:00.001-07:00

Spring is here, the snow has receded from most of our property (still plenty of mud, though) and it's time to start work again. This weekend we get to pull the tarps off the equipment, fix a flat on the tractor, and oil up the chainsaws. The trees are safe for a little while longer.

Last summer we cut many trees, most notably 120 large fir trees we'll use for building a house. This summer we tackle the heavily overstocked stands to reduce the risk of fire and infestation.

That's why I'm excited to be taking another course in forest stewardship from WSU Extension. This one builds on the 2007 "Coached Planning" course we took. The "Advanced Forest Stewardship" course runs from April into June, with weekly classroom lectures and 2 field trips.

We completed our Forest Land Stewardship Plan a few years ago and got it signed off by the WA Department of Natural Resources. The plan was a prerequisite for grant funds we received from DNR. The "Coached Planning" course helped us better understand the detail behind each part of the plan. The "Advanced" course will deepen our knowledge of forest practices.

Here's the syllabus for the advanced course:

Apr. 13 Introduction and Review (Kevin Zobrist, WSU)

Introduction to Forest Inventory (Zobrist)

Apr 18 Field Day #1 (Zobrist/Keller)

Apr. 20 LMS Lab 1 (Zobrist)

Apr 27 Advanced Silviculture and Hardwood Management (Zobrist)

May 4 Forest Finance (Zobrist)

Log markets/grades/sorts (Will Miller, Miller Shingle)

May 11 LMS Lab 2

May 18 Logging equipment and Forest Roads (Frank Greulich, UW College of

Forest Resources)

May 25 LMS Lab 3 (Zobrist)

June 1 Federal Timber Taxes (Chuck Lorenz, IRS - retired)

State Timber Taxes (Chris Westwood, DOR)

June 8 Managing a Timber Sale (John Keller, DNR; Ron Munro, Consultant)

June (TBD) Field Day #2 (TBD)

Program Coordinator: Kevin Zobrist 425-357-6017 or kzobrist@wsu.edu

Woodsman, spare that tree.or maybe not

2008-11-15T07:01:00.001-08:00

WSU Extension Bugs and Blights series

Learn to recognize conifer decline in the landscape, determine the cause, and take proper action.

EVERETT, Wash. –Threats to our backyard and neighborhood forests can come from insects, diseases, the environment, and more. Often, it’s only after the tree comes down that homeowners learn the roots were full of rot, destined to topple in the next good breeze. Unfortunately, the symptoms may be subtle and mimic other less serious problems, or be missed altogether. The last Bugs & Blights session for 2008 will focus on the multiple causes of conifer decline, a common problem throughout the Pacific Northwest.

In this two-hour workshop you’ll learn to recognize the symptoms of a broad variety of conifer health issues along with a host of corrective measures and next steps. The class is offered three times on Wed. Nov. 19th at 10 a.m., 1 p.m., and 6:30 p.m. Location is WSU Snohomish County Extension, Cougar Auditorium, 600 – 128^th St SE, Everett, WA 98208.

Topics covered will include the distinction between foliage diseases and general decline with samples and diagnostic tools. Both needle- and scale-type trees will be covered. The forest surrounding Extension’s McCollum Park offices provide living and dying examples in the hands-on lab portion of the class.

Cost is $20 per person or $10 for active Master Gardeners. To register call (425) 338-2400, e-mail klchristen.cahnrs-wsu-edu or download the form at www.snohomish.wsu.edu/ag/workshops/registrationform.pdf and mail with your check. WSDA pesticide recertification credits as well as WSNLA CPH credits are available.

For more information, contact Sharon Collman, collmans-wsu-edu, (425) 357-6025.

About the teachers:

Sharon Collman leads Snohomish County’s horticulture education program, including assistance to Master Gardeners and garden writers, as well as production, marketing and pest management to the nursery and landscape industries in Snohomish County. She also provides expertise in plant problem diagnosis, beneficial insects, entomology networking, and backyard biodiversity.

Dave Pehling has been studying and teaching about insects for WSU Snohomish County Extension since 1978. Special interests include beekeeping, insect pest management, and pollinators. In addition to entomological work, Dave teaches vertebrate pest management for the WSU Master Gardener and Livestock Advisor programs in several Western Washington counties.

Small Log Conference - Mar. 25-27, 2009

2008-10-14T14:52:00.000-07:00

Small Log Conference

Living Locally, Surviving Globally

Mar. 25-27, 2009

Coeur d’Alene Resort, Idaho

Topics Include

Identifying Opportunities / Profitable Products

Forest Land Ownership / Timber Supply

Emerging Markets for Small Logs

Forest Health Crisis – Solutions & Opportunities

Globalization / Competitiveness

Biomass / Bioenergy / Biofuels

Networking with industry leaders & colleagues

http://www.timberbuysell.com/slc/Information/Speakers.htm.

2009 DNR Eastern WA Forest Landowner Cost-Share Changes

2008-10-14T14:50:00.000-07:00

The new DNR E WA cost-share application packet, effective October 1, 2008, changes include:

1) Increase in thinning and slash disposal rates.

2) Elimination of planting and seedling protection practices (per direction from FS).

3) Eligibility of non-federal public lands...

4) All of Skamania county is now included in the geographic area covered by the program.

5) Additional text re: other programs, including EQIP, FFFPP, and FREP.

DNR will continue to accept any applications submitted on forms from previous years.

Establishing Basis to Reduce Taxes

2008-10-14T14:47:00.000-07:00

CORVALLIS, Ore. - A multimedia guide for establishing “basis” on forestland, produced by Oregon State University Forestry Extension, can help reduce federal tax liabilities for forestland owners.

“Establishing ‘basis’ is one of the fundamental topics in forestland taxation,” said Extension forester Bob Parker, who created the guide with Norman Elwood, Extension forestry specialist emeritus. “It represents the maximum amount the IRS allows to be deducted over time when making timber

sales.”

The step-by-step guide shows how to establish “basis,” the financial starting point for calculating a forestland owner’s tax liability on income from timber sales.

“Although it’s easiest to establish ‘basis’ when property is purchased,” Parker said, “the guide also explains how to do retroactive ‘basis’ calculations any time after the purchase.”

The guide package includes a CD containing a 47-minute audiovisual presentation, lecture notes and a Basis allocation worksheet. It runs on PCs using Windows NT 4.0 or later, Windows 98 or Windows XP; with Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 or later.

Called “Forestland Taxes: The Importance of Establishing BASIS,” the guide can be purchased for $19.95 (plus shipping and handling) by going to the OSU Extension Service’s online catalog:

http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/abstract.php?seriesno=EM+8941

Forest field trip - visit to a commercial thinning, one year later

2008-10-06T17:04:00.000-07:00

We spent the day on a field trip organized by the Washington State University Extension. We visited a 120-acre thinning that was done last year. The object was to observe the condition of the stand today, and learn about their low-impact logging and options for post-treatment.

The owner of 240 acres wanted to clear out old skid trails and thin about half of their property. Their neighbors each own 20 acres, and each wanted to thin about 10 acres. John Malone, a local consulting forester, worked with the three owners. They hired a local logging company with equipment for skyline logging, although most of the job was done with ground skidding.

Photos:

Top - Wildlife biologist Jim Bodoff with WSU's Andy Perleberg and forester John Malone.

Below - Forest fire ecology expert Dick Schellhaas.

The property looked pretty good for a logging operation. We walked past some slash piles (re-piled because they didn’t burn well the first time) and stood in a stand of mixed P-Pine and D-Fir. There was very little slash on the ground, and no evidence there of excessive damage along skid routes. Fir limbs were scattered everywhere, sometimes collected on the uphill sides of trees. Some tops and snags remained. The stand was about 250 trees per acre, and what we saw was about 100 TPA (although the forester said it was 80).

The density wasn’t as notable as the stem size: John believes in leaving the best trees and harvesting the rest. The trees remaining in this stand were spaced at 20-25 feet and almost everything was 14-20 inches dbh.

Logging operation

John explained how the loggers contracted what he calls a “hot saw” to cut the trees. We considered using a feller-buncher on our property, but it didn’t work out. This is a large machine – either a rubber-tired or excavator-like tracked machine -- that has a grapple head and saw combined. The machine grabs a tree (sometimes 2 smaller ones) and cuts them off low. Then it can lay the trees down in any direction. Essentially it creates small decks as it moves through the woods.

A grapple skidder picked up each deck and skidded it out to the landing, “guts, feathers and all.” The limbs and tops were piled at the landing, which made for some huge burn piles. The logs were sorted into Pine, Fir and pulp.

That method reduced the forest slash enough that the owners avoided a clean-up operation afterward. There was very little damage to standing trees from skidding, and practically no damage from falling trees. The stumps were very low, too.

Saw logs around here go to Sierra Pacific in Mount Vernon, Hampton in Darrington, or Boise-Cascade in Idaho. All are long hauls that quickly eat up the revenue. Closer-in mills pay so low that foresters won’t consider using them. This project started when Fir was at $580/mbf (Darrington). Then it dropped to $480, but they switched to Idaho mill and got the higher price for the remainder of their product. John says the owners made money on the harvest, but won’t say how much.

A light thinning “from below” (taking the smallest trees) typically renders about 2 MBF/acre, John said. The 10-acre cuts produced 8-10 MBF each.

Disposing of slash

We had a debate about whether mulching or chipping was a good idea. Several people have recommended it to us – we get a lot of free advice around here, and it usually begins with “why don’t you just…” – but we’re burning our piles this winter.

Wildlife proponents want the piles left for habitat. Clean air advocates want them chipped. Wildfire experts want them burned in the middle of the next winter. There was no conclusion.

Someone said wood chips make good road surfacing: I hadn’t heard this idea before, and I had my doubts. Others concurred that it didn’t sound like a great idea, especially if the road is a fire line. Chips would carry the fire across the line. Wood debris takes decades to turn into dust. They would tend to float to the surface in wet conditions. Deep chips are hard to drive in.

There are markets for chips. Avista, an energy utility with plants on the Washington-Idaho border, buys chips and there people who will come onto your property and do the chipping and hauling. (The person didn’t say what Avista pays, but said they’re importing chips from Canada and paying the cost of $2-$4/ton to haul).

Re-seeding

We talked about seed mixes. Native seeds are expensive. We’ve been ordering comparables from Western Seed, and found it affordable enough to compensate for the shipping (we order about 150 lbs at a time and have it shipped UPS). Everyone agreed that you have to seed disturbed areas after logging. These owners had not done it, and John relegated that responsibility to them. We saw plenty of noxious weeds on our walk through this stand, especially in the roads. Seeding an aggressive native or foraging mix helps get ahead of weeds and prevent erosion.

Lumber production hits decade low, even with weak dollar boosting exports

2008-09-23T16:39:00.001-07:00

Portland Business Journal, September 19, 2008---Thanks to the flagging housing market, lumber production at Western sawmills in 2007 plummeted to the lowest annual volume in more than a decade.

Data released Thursday by the Portland-based Western Wood Products Association show that mills in 12 Western states produced 16.32 billion board feet of softwood lumber in 2007, down 9.3 percent from the previous year.

Since reaching an all-time record of 64.3 billion board feet in 2005, lumber demand has dropped by 12 billion board feet — equivalent to the annual production in Oregon, Washington and California.

...the article doesn't mention exports, but this earlier story did...the US is both an importer and exporter of lumber...

Northwest lumber exports jump from weaker dollar

Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle), May 23, 2008 -- The weak dollar and soft U.S. housing market are strengthening Northwest lumber exports.

In contrast, slow U.S. housing starts and the falling demand for structural wood are throttling Northwest lumber mills, with many of them closing or curtailing operations.

The weak dollar helps U.S. lumber exports become more competitive against lumber from other sources, because the U.S. lumber costs less.

These are excerpts. Follow the links to the full stories.

Compost from wood

2008-09-15T18:46:00.000-07:00

Dr. Henry has done research and consulting on the use of compost created from chipping of trees that have been thinned for the purposes of fuels reduction and forest health.

“To Waste or Not to Waste”

Dr. Chuck Henry, a University of Washington lecturer and environmental engineer specializing in soils and sustainability, will be speaking in the Barn at Barn Beach Reserve [in Leavenworth] on Friday, September 19 at 7 pm about waste reduction, recycling, composting and resource conservation. This program will be of interest to anyone concerned about the patchwork of recycling programs in the Wenatchee Valley, the impact of the municipal burn ban; managing your yard waste, the challenge of forest land fuel reduction; or clean air and clear skies.

For more information:

Jeff Parsons

Executive Director

Barn Beach Trust

Mailing address: PO Box 2073

Leavenworth, Washington 98826

Location: 347 Division, Leavenworth, WA

Business Phone: (509) 548-0181

Mobile Phone: (509) 264-4905

Web Site: www.barnbeachreserve.org

Wildfire TV special "In the Line of Duty" from DNR

2008-09-15T18:32:00.000-07:00

The Washington State Department of Natural Resources (DNR) aired a 30-minute television special, In the Line of Duty, which takes viewers on a journey into the charred aftermath of a wildfire start. This television special joins a DNR wildfire investigator as he follows up on an earlier 911 call. DNR investigates wildland fires to locate and understand the point of origin, cause, and, when necessary, locate and identify the person(s) responsible.

The show will be available to fire prevention staff for fire prevention outreach and education.

Most human-caused fire starts are unintentional and caused by carelessness. In Washington State, debris burning is the leading human-caused source of wildfire starts, followed by recreation-related causes. DNR issues citations with fines when it determines a fire was caused by negligence.

“In the Line of Duty” aired on Northwest Cable News Sunday, September 7 and KXLY & KXMN Spokane / Coeur d’Alene Sunday, September 14

For more information on burning, go to DNR’s website at www.dnr.wa.gov. Click on ‘Fire Information & Prevention’ and go to ‘Wildfire Related Maps’ or call 800-323-BURN. For tips on how to reduce the risk of wildfire to communities, homes and families, log on to www.firewise.org.

DNR is responsible for preventing and fighting wildfires on 12.7 million acres of private and state-owned forestland. DNR is the state’s largest on-call fire department, with hundreds of people trained and available to be dispatched to fires when needed. During fire season, this includes several hundred DNR employees who have other permanent jobs with the agency, about 375 seasonal workers, and about 500 Department of Corrections’ inmates who also participate in suppressing wildfires. DNR also participates in Washington’s interagency approach to wildland firefighting and relies on private sector contractors for certain firefighting resources.

Class in Milling & Manufacturing for FSC Markets

2008-09-10T07:27:00.000-07:00

Our forest is certified sustainable by "the other FSC," namely ATFS (American Tree Farm System from American Forest Foundation). Green building is catching on in the NW. There's not a FSC or ATFS mill anywhere near our land, but this market could make sense for some timberland owners -- even getting into small-scale milling as a family operation. Here's a copy of the invitation from NW Natural Resource Group:

Date: Sept. 17,2008

Time: 1:00 – 5:00

Location: Tumwater, WA

For more info. and to register, 360-379-9421 or visit: http://www.nnrg.org/news-events/events/9-17-milling-manufacturing-for-fsc-markets/

You’re invited to attend:

Milling & Manufacturing for FSC Markets

A primer for wood manufacturing businesses

Date: Wednesday, Sept. 17^th, 2008

Tumwater, WA

Seminar description:

Demand for Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified wood products is quickly growing in the Pacific Northwest and throughout the country. Driven primarily by the residential and commercial green building industry, homeowners, architects and builders are increasingly specifying locally produced and FSC-certified wood products.

This afternoon technical session will highlight current and emerging markets for certified wood products and provide an introduction to FSC chain-of-custody (CoC) certification for wood manufacturing businesses. FSC certified business owners will discuss their experiences with chain-of-custody certification and the certified marketplace.

This session will provide an ideal networking opportunity for businesses interested in marketing FSC wood products. Attendees will include: FSC certified landowners, wood manufacturers, mill operators, wholesale distributors, retail lumber yards and other companies and organizations who participate in the FSC chain-of-custody network in the Pacific Northwest. During a post-conference social hour, participants will have an opportunity to network while enjoying hors devours.

If you are interested in capitalizing on a quickly growing niche market, this seminar is for you!

Topics will include:

• FSC chain-of-custody 101

• Green building programs in WA

• FSC markets: regional, national & interntl.

• What FSC products are in demand

• How to find FSC timber & lumber

• Growth trends in FSC markets

• FSC certified companies in the Pacific NW

• FSC marketing strategies

Once trees fall, they're hard to get back up

2008-09-08T18:06:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I feel like I should name a log and keep track of where it goes in the house, so I can tell the story of harvesting it.

<<This photo: The last of 16 logs parked at the edge of the canyon.

We found about 16 excellent house logs in a dense stand of fir on the very steep east wall of a ravine we call "the canyon." I cut them, sometimes perched on the most tenuous footholds in the dirt while I sawed. Climbing up out of the canyon with a chainsaw was a workout. The next chore was to get the logs out of the canyon and onto flat ground. This was not so easy, either.

Imagine a beautiful August day, sun, a slight breeze. In most cases, the log's butt is on one side of the ravine, and the top is on the other, spanning the gap like a footbridge. At mid-span the log is 10-20' off the ground.

150' of winch cable barely reaches the first log we try to pull. Sitting on the tractor looking down over the edge, my partner can't see me or the log. With 2-way radios we signal when it's safe for her to pull with the winch, or for me to re-approach the log to see why the winch doesn't budge it. Our efforts merely pull the 3,000+ lb tractor closer to the edge of the brushy abyss. We try creating a block and tackle with one block, then two, then three. We get nowhere, and finally go elsewhere on the property to skid some easier logs, rather than make the day a complete loss.

There were 16 straight, sturdy logs on the ground down there, and we were determined to get them. Times like this call for heavier equipment. Our neighbor happens to have some.

Enter the 1950's-era Caterpillar D-2 with double winches. Apparently this is a real novelty -- what's even more novel is that it still runs -- and within a few days we had it parked on the rim of the canyon. For safety, it was chained to a second Caterpillar. When this much diesel smoke is flying, heavy things tend to get moving.

Heavy things did indeed move -- the two Cats were dragged to the edge, while the log sat stationary. I cut the top 20-30' off the tree. With both winches pulling, and an hour of trial and error, the first log finally made the trip to the top. 15 to go. All had to be topped in the canyon.

<< This photo: Caterpillar D-2 with double winches. Some trees took both winches, often pulling from different angles, to recover.

In the first day we got 6 logs, and things started going much better. The second day we got another 6. The third day we got the remaining 4. It was a marvelous thing, to stand by and watch a 60-80' log make the trip to the top in under a minute. It was like watching a train go by.

Each log we winched individually to the edge, then hooked to the larger Cat and dragged it onto the level deck. Once on deck, we manufactured each log -- cut off the limbs and stubs of broken limbs, cut off any swollen butts or "pistol butts," cut off sections with extreme sweep. We sometimes cut long logs into manageable lengths. One log was 74' long, longer than the house, and that log made a 42' and a 32'. Then we dragged them behind the tractor to the house-log deck, where they will stay until the sawmill arrives.

Thank goodness our neighbor had the equipment, and was willing to devote the time to help us get these logs out of the canyon! It was another of those episodes that make this project the experience of a lifetime for us.

Photos from do-it-yourself logging operation

2008-08-12T14:38:00.001-07:00

Here's my helper holding one end of the tape while I measure a 50-foot house log. We have to keep an inventory so we know when to stop cutting down our big trees. This is our house log deck, where we keep the prime-quality logs for building. Other decks, for firewood and pine logs, aren't so neatly stacked.

This is a hillside where we've cut trees and now are in the process of yarding them out of the forest. The near end of the 120' cable is attached to a 4WD tractor on a road. The other end is attached to the log that is pointing at the camera. Other logs are staged here to be bundled and skidded to the deck.

In the background are many acres of trees yet to be thinned. You can see the leaning firs, indicating root system instability -- usually a form of butt rot, which travels from fir to fir. We have 3 major pockets of laminated root rot, which is unfortunate. The only remedy is to cut all fir in the pockets, then replant with pine. In our case, each pocket will become part of a fire/fuel break to help protect our home.

Forest Land Stewardship Plan coached writing classes

2008-08-06T13:57:00.000-07:00

Small forest landowners in the Northwest are holding off on their timber harvests for a while as they wait for the timber market to improve. Some foresters say to be prepared to wait as long as 10 years.

It's a good time to focus more on planning future management activities. We have a Forest Land Stewardship Plan that outlines our goals for this property, and our plans for managing our forest in a safe, healthy, sustainable way. It takes time to write, and lots of research.

Last year I took an 8-week class offered by WSU Extension and WA DNR. The class is called "Coached Planning" because each week it focuses on a different chapter of the Forest Management Plan. Owner/participants wrote a chapter a week and presented plans at the end. The instructors are available to help with individual plans, and they sign off on the plans when they're done.

The class was a terrific education -- in forest health, fire, harvesting and sale, even cultural considerations -- for me as a small forest landowner. Getting so much help in one place, and a plan written in 2 months, is a great opportunity. If something like it is offered in your region, I strongly urge you to sign up.

Having a Plan has helped us to qualify for government cost-sharing programs that have been worth thousands of dollars to us, so far. The Plan helped us get the land into a much lower property tax class. It also helped our property qualify for American Tree Farm System (our local FSC equivalent) status as a sustainably managed forest.

WA Class Info:

Washington DNR and Washington State University Extension are offering Forest Stewardship Coached Planning Courses around the state in fall and winter 2008-09. These coached planning events are hands-on, practical classes that help landowners to prepare their own forest stewardship plan with guidance from natural resource professionals. Regardless of your ownership size, large or small, this 6 to 9 week course will equip you with tools to feel confident in managing your forestland. The plan you create may help you to qualify for cost-share programs and reduce your property tax rates. Below is a list of scheduled courses, and this list is certain to grow before the fall arrives. Please visit http://ext.nrs.wsu.edu/newsevents/forststewardship.htm for further information and to learn about other courses as they are scheduled.

September 9 – October 23, 2008, Colville, WA, contact Janean Creighton, e-mail jcreighton (a) spokanecounty * org

September 17 – November 5, 2008, Mercer Island, WA, contact Amy Grotta, amy.grotta ( a) kingcounty *gov

February 24 – April 21, 2009, Everett, WA, contact Kevin Zobrist, kzobrist (a ) wsu* edu

Long-Term Forest Practices Applications (15-year logging permit)

2008-08-06T13:37:00.001-07:00

We took out a permit two years ago in anticipation of a commercial thinning operation on our parcel. The commercial operation never came to be, for various reasons, so the permit isn't actually being used. However, its 2-year maximum term and impending expiration pressured us to make certain decisions when we would rather have waited.

Effective 2008, Washington now offers a Long-Term Forest Practices Application to small forest owners. Long-Term permits are valid for 3 to 15 years once they’re approved, and the landowner chooses the timeframe.

The main benefit for forests is that small landowners are encouraged to do some longer-term planning. With short-term permits, landowners tended to harvest once per generation, and they over-harvest as a result. I've watched my neighbors do it, and I understand the pressure they're under.

A long-term permit doesn't reduce the overhead costs of logging, but it allows small-scale harvesting or an ongoing operation if the landowner is in a position to do it that way. If a severe winter leaves loads of blow-down or snags, an owner can respond -- without the paperwork and waiting period of a short-term application. If pulp markets rise, an owner can quickly harvest poles. Than he can wait several years if necessary for the saw log or house log market to improve, before cutting larger timber. It makes sense.

What we need now are more options for getting small-scale logging done. Loggers won't return calls if you have fewer than 40 acres, or if you don't want to cut for the maximum allowable immediate yield. Their financial model requires (a) cutting large, profitable, Fir saw logs, and (b) hauling out enough timber to leave a profit after the cost of move-in and move-out. We need some loggers who are set up to do small harvests profitably.

Completing a Long-Term Application can be more work than filing a standard application, but once you have one, you’re able to go out and implement your plan whenever the timing is right for you. Currently, the Small Forest Landowner Office has Jeff Galleher (program manager) and Jenni Dykstra (Fish and Wildlife Biologist) available to assist landowners and DNR field foresters with Long-Term Applications. To get started, call your local DNR stewardship forester.

Logging forks for a front loader tractor

2008-07-21T07:11:00.001-07:00

We've been pushing logs around with the bucket of our Kubota L3400, waiting to find the right implement for lifting and handling logs. Today, with the help of a neighbor, we made some simple but effective forks that mount onto the bucket.

The two forks are 18" long, tapering from the tip to 2" high at the edge of the bucket, and 3/4" thick steel. Each tapered fork widens into a piece 10" long and 5" high that bolts to the sidewall of the bucket with 2 @ 5/8" bolts. Pictures if anyone wants them. The tapered shape shields the sharp cutting plate on each end of the bucket lip, and keeps those from scarring our house logs.

After some practice, I can drive up to a log on the ground, fork under it, roll the bucket back, pick up the log, and set it on top of a log deck.

It's not practical to carry 30' logs around the property this way. Imagine walking with a fishing rod sideways in your mouth. And there are large logs that it won't lift because they weigh more than the 1,000 lb lifting capacity of the bucket. For most of our work, though, this is a good setup.

I have to be squarely facing the log when I start, or it ends up on just one fork and causes problems if I try to drag it around like that. Uneven ground complicates the operation -- one fork goes into the ground before the other gets under the log. And it's tricky to judge the center of balance of a log, and misjudging will result in a spilled log (and sometimes a tippy tractor).

I looked at "logger forks" for sale online (Paynes, $460) and a simple cutting tooth bar for the bucket ($340). Palette-length forks were too long to be practical, and the teeth were too short. The Paynes forks had a nice safety feature, which I have yet to design into our forks: bars that prevent the log from rolling back toward the operator. It is easier than you might think to get the bucket high and tilted back too far. One error could be deadly.

Do-It-Yourself Logging

2008-07-21T06:47:00.001-07:00

Another successful 3-day stint of logging. We cut more fir from a fuel break along our down-slope boundary line, on a bank above a log landing. Three are suitable for house logs. This was our most productive morning. The trees conveniently* fell into the landing, so minimal skidding was involved. However, it was like crawling around in a giant game of Pick-Up-Sticks while we limbed and bucked the logs -- and a puzzle figuring out how to work around them with the tractor-loader.

*One small tree set back on my saw and eventually fell the adverse direction. It's been a while since I had one of those, but in the beginning they were routine. I bent two saw bars earlier this year, learning how to avoid stuck saws. Before we got the tractor, we were hooking up a come-along to a nearby tree and working for 20 minutes to bring down hung trees. We hooked the tractor to the butt of this one and pulled it down in a minute while we watched from the safe end of a 30' cable.

We spent the better part of a day finishing off a quarter-acre stand on the opposite corner of the property. We had cut everything weeks ago, so we just needed to skid everything out and pile up the slash. Now the stand is neat and nicely spaced. It's in a corner of our driveway and one of the first things we see when driving in, so it's good to have that done. Now the stands on both sides of our gate are finished.

Background: We're logging our 20-acre stand because a commercial harvest is uneconomical. The parcel is too small, there's a height-restricted bridge, we're far from a mill, and we're keeping the best logs for building. Ours is a certified sustainable forest, managed to a plan we wrote 3 years ago with help from many experts. Thinning is necessary because of forest fire danger. We're getting modest but meaningful financial help from Washington state government funds targeted to reduce forest fuels and improve timber health.

Kubota Tractor for our Logging Operation

2008-07-16T16:37:00.000-07:00

We've been using a neighbor's small bulldozer for building skid roads, and a borrowed Ford 2000 tractor for skidding logs. A 2wd tractor isn't really suitable for our steep terrain, and skidding logs with the dozer disturbs soils much more than we would like.

So we went shopping for used 4wd tractors. The ideal for our budget was a 30-40 HP diesel tractor with a front loader and a 3-point hitch, in good condition with less than 3,000 hours on it. Here in Washington those are rare. Tractors we found were either high priced ($15k+) or high hours (6,500+).

After a few weeks of searching, we checked into new tractors and found that they were not that much more expensive. $15k gets you a nice new tractor with a warranty. $17k gets you a hydrostatic transmission, sun shade, tire upgrade, ballast in the rear tires, and delivery. Kubota was offering $0 down and 0% financing for 42 months. It doesn't get much easier.

PHOTO: We bought a Kubota L3400 (35 HP, 4wd) with a front loader. It's a small farm tractor, very popular with orchardists in this area. My brother makes the tractor look even smaller than it is: He's 6'8" tall without his hardhat.

The tractor has enough power for about 90% of our logs, and usually we can buck the big logs that make up the other 10%, or use a block and tackle, to make them skiddable. Its light weight is an issue in the soft dry soils where we're working. The machine routinely loses traction, but in 4wd with the differential lock engaged, it's more likely to stall than to spin out all 4 tires.

We attach 1 to 3 logs to the lift bar using short chains and grab hooks, or sometimes a small grapple. Lifting the bar raises the butts of the logs off the ground, so skidding doesn't disturb the forest floor and tear up roads as much as it otherwise would. (There's still a lot of impact.)

PHOTO: Looking down from the tractor seat while my brother loops a chain around a log. The chain has a slip hook on one end, to connect tightly around the log. The other end goes into a grab hook connected to the tractor's lift bar. We carry two of these setups on the lift bar, plus a little grapple that I can sometimes drop onto a log without dismounting the tractor. The grapple tends to release unexpectedly en route, but at the end of the trip it rarely comes off the log without my help.

Logging becomes a family affair

2008-07-16T16:09:00.000-07:00

Do-it-yourself logging is not for the faint of heart. With help from the family, we're starting to make progress. I was glad to already be in decent physical condition!

PHOTO: My brother carrying a choker cable, helping to skid logs out of some challenging locations.

We started several weeks ago, and initially spent much of our time developing the infrastructure necessary to carry out the logging operation. We needed skid roads, landings, deck areas, and a good place to store house logs. Each of these took a long time to build, but then we got down to logging.

Once we got the hang of the process (and got better with a chain saw) it was relatively easy for two of us to spend a morning and fell 10-15 trees, limb them, and skid them out of the woods, and land them on a log deck. That's allowing for the tree that hangs in the crown of another, or whatever.

My brother thought logging sounded like great manly fun, so he flew up from Austin to help for 4 days. He was a tremendous help. If he was dreaming of a new career in logging, he probably has reconsidered!

Together we cut a few trees and mostly pulled logs out of a deep ravine. We used a snatch block and 150' of steel cable to reach the choker and pulled the logs up the steep slope one at a time. Radios were extremely useful, because the tractor operator couldn't see the other person, or the logs, at all.

We took the hot afternoons off from logging to do other chores. We built a spool for the tractor's 3-point connector. It's not a winch -- they're thousands of dollars -- it's just for cable storage. It feeds out and takes up choker line in a very simple, non-powered way, but it does the job to keep long wire ropes from getting tangled. More on that and photos if anyone's interested.

To date we've cut almost 200 of the approximately 1,000 trees we need to harvest.

Oregon Small Woodlands Association

2008-07-07T09:11:00.000-07:00

Source of information if you're in Oregon:

Oregon Small Woodlands Association

1775 32 Place Suite C

Salem, OR 97303

503 588 1813

http://www.oswa.org

Contact:

Mike Gaudern, Director 503 588 1813

Counties:

Baker, Benton, Clackamas, Clatsop, Columbia, Coos, Crook, Curry, Deschutes, Douglas, Gilliam, Grant, Harney, Hood River, Jackson, Jefferson, Josephine, Klamath, Lake, Lane, Lincoln, Linn, Malheur, Marion, Morrow, Multnomah, Polk, Sherman, Tillamook, Umatilla, Union, Wallowa, Wasco, Washington, Wheeler, Yamhill, Other (CA, ID, WA)