Waste ratio

[BP in ME]

I was talking to a forester about harvesting my woodlot and he was telling me there's a relatively new market for spruce/fir "logs" 10.5' long with 4" diameter tops. That used to be a stick of pulpwood (except it had to be 12') before most of our paper mills shut down. All they can get from it is a single 2x4 and a 1x3 piece of strapping. By the time you square it up there's no way you're using even half of the log. I guess the rest goes to bio fuel.

[weiglein4]

Seems like a lot of labor for one 2x4; but again the price of wood has fluctuated drastically here. At one point a basic 2x4 was near $8.. now back to normal $3 for standard 8'er

[yetti462]

I know 0 about the soft wood market. Pines here in Indiana are pretty much worthless, some of it goes to crating, some amish mills saw it for lumber. Most loggers won't even cut the junk. 8" is the minimum the pallet mill in the area will take. We pride ourselves with quality hardwoods, grade lumber, veneer and stave markets. I had one landowner that planted a bunch of pine in the 60's, he thought he had a fortune. I helped him get rid of it with a hardwoods sale, the logger paid him $3/ton and had a pet bedding pine shaving market.

[mean_dean]

Very little waste with timber, boards get made, leftovers get pulped to make paper products, some of it gets used as fuel at the papermills to heat the pulp, some of the "waste" gets sent to other places that can use it. I used to work for a paper company and toured a few of our mills over the years I worked there, pretty impressive operations.

[BP in ME]

I know 0 about the soft wood market. Pines here in Indiana are pretty much worthless, some of it goes to crating, some amish mills saw it for lumber. Most loggers won't even cut the junk. 8" is the minimum the pallet mill in the area will take. We pride ourselves with quality hardwoods, grade lumber, veneer and stave markets. I had one landowner that planted a bunch of pine in the 60's, he thought he had a fortune. I helped him get rid of it with a hardwoods sale, the logger paid him $3/ton and had a pet bedding pine shaving market.

We used to be able to sell high-grade fir and spruce pulp to paper mills for what worked out to around $100 a cord delivered. And that's like 2005 money, when a dollar still bought a cheeseburger. Even low-grade pulp would net the landowner around $15/ton. If a 2x4 only retails for $3-$4 you can imagine what the landowner gets. I don't know how loggers even find lots to cut. I'd just as soon let the softwood die on the stump than do a harvest at these prices.

I live here in "the Pine Tree State" but if I go to Lowes or HD a lot of the lumber comes from the west coast or is stamped "Product of Norway"

[rednecktech]

Pine timber prices for the landowner have been very low in this area for a few years now. Back in the early 80's the practice of cutting all the hardwoods, we call it clear-cut, and replanting with pines began and that has continued up till present. Seems to have slowed some, but it's too late. Everywhere you go you see an abundance of pines. The market is flooded which has driven the prices down.

Edited to add, buddy of mine had his pines cut during Covid when liumber prices were sky high, and he got very low bucks for it. Somebody was making money then but it wasn't the landowner

[Rangerdeepv]

Sounds like farming..........the person who does all the work and sweats gets pennies a bushel and a box of cereal costs 5 bucks.

[BP in ME]

Pine timber prices for the landowner have been very low in this area for a few years now. Back in the early 80's the practice of cutting all the hardwoods, we call it clear-cut, and replanting with pines began and that has continued up till present. Seems to have slowed some, but it's too late. Everywhere you go you see an abundance of pines. The market is flooded which has driven the prices down.

Edited to add, buddy of mine had his pines cut during Covid when liumber prices were sky high, and he got very low bucks for it. Somebody was making money then but it wasn't the landowner

Stumpage prices have been terrible for too long now. It stinks. I assume you're talking about yellow pine? We have mainly white pine here. I haven't sold any pine sawlogs for awhile so I don't know what they're paying. White pine doesn't just spring up into logs overnight so a good log might take 100 years or so. They sure don't give away the lumber though.

During COVID, several of the big lumber producers had record profits and stumpage was at record lows but it was a little more complicated than simple greed. When the demand is high, they often have to lower the prices because if loggers are making too much money, many (esp. independent guys) will work fewer hours. If they can make as much on 10 loads today as they could on 12 loads last month, why bust your azz for the other two loads? As long as their bills are covered, many of them are content to call it a day. To really motivate some of the loggers, they lower the prices to where they need to cut 12 loads to bring home the same pay as they made on 10 before.