Anybody contract with a mill?

[Wood Cutter]

Anybody ever cut jobs for a mill where the tumber was already bought? All you did was cut and skid? Looking for some input on this, thanks

 

[possumtrapper]

Yep only one load of Cyprus Lucy. It was a sample load of random length we did while on the way out of a bigger job. Hourly rate work as we hadn't harvested Lucy before but knew it was hard to delimb and heavy branching. They had a self loader pick up some time after we left.

 

[bitzer]

I've sub-contract cut and skid for Algoma Lumber for the past four years. You are going to need your own workers comp and liabilty to cut for a mill. As far as I know its all sub. Going rate is 110-120/ per thousand bf statewide. Pulp arrangements vary greatly. I've got a good one, but I've talked to other mills with bad ones.

 

[Wood Cutter]

Bitzer who picks up the tab for the trucking?

 

[bitzer]

The mill hauls their own logs and usually I can get them to deliver my pulp. I sell it as firewood locally. I pay them per hour for pulp hauling. The logs are theirs so they take care of that. I just cut em, buck em, land em.

 

[Wood Cutter]

Ok. I was offered 135 a thousand to cut and skid. Split the trucking, pulp is mine, they can truck it for me. Ok deal? Never done anything like this before, want to make sure I don't get suckered into anything lol

 

[bitzer]

Ok. I was offered 135 a thousand to cut and skid. Split the trucking, pulp is mine, they can truck it for me. Ok deal? Never done anything like this before, want to make sure I don't get suckered into anything lol

Split the trucking on the logs too? Which mill is it? I know yer area was historically full of big white pine, but whats timber like up there now? If yer handcutting and yer pulp volume estimates outnumber the footage then its tough to make money. Like say you've got a 50 mbf job. 50 cords is all I would want to take out with it. Whats your average timber size? 200bf or less or more per tree? What machine you using? Lots of variables to think about.

 

[Wood Cutter]

Well I miss understood him on the trucking, they pay for the trucking of the logs. All the cutting I've done is all hardwood, never cut a white pine yet lol, all the jobs I've been on specify white pine left. A lot of what we cut goes to tie logs with Stella jones being down in Bangor. I will be hand cutting and using a cable skidder to pull to the landing.

 

[ChoppyChoppy]

Just curious... you mention Bangor. What part of Maine are you cutting in?

Sorry if it's mentioned, "location" doesn't load on my phone.

 

[Wood Cutter]

Sorry, Bangor Wi. Not to far from the Mississippi river

 

[Gypo Logger]

Selling to a mill on quote is fine situation if you dont mind falling and skidding for 60 bucks a cord.
Mills smell stupid loggers a mile away.
The money is in the butt logs as veneer.
Screw the mill, be your own man. Find out who the mill is selling your high grade to.
Everybody needs to make a buck, but the money is made on the landing not at the mill.

 

[bitzer]

Selling to a mill on quote is fine situation if you dont mind falling and skidding for 60 bucks a cord.
Mills smell stupid loggers a mile away.
The money is in the butt logs as veneer.
Screw the mill, be your own man. Find out who the mill is selling your high grade to.
Everybody needs to make a buck, but the money is made on the landing not at the mill.

Yeah thats all well and good, but getting started buying your own jobs is a tough way to go. Keeping wood in front of you everyday keeps money coming in.

 

[northmanlogging]

I wish I could contract with a mill...

They don't really work that way out here, for the big acreage jobs they do, but the smaller stuff where I fit in currently its everyone for themselves...

 

[Gypo Logger]

It's easy to get out on your own. In my prime I was cutting 365 trees a year instead of 365 hundred.
Buying your own wood on the stump is about as independant as your gonna get.
Im talking hardwood and the Great Lake States.
Money is just as good in your pocket as it is in the middleman's

 

[bitzer]

It's easy to get out on your own. In my prime I was cutting 365 trees a year instead of 365 hundred.
Buying your own wood on the stump is about as independant as your gonna get.
Im talking hardwood and the Great Lake States.
Money is just as good in your pocket as it is in the middleman's

Really? That easy huh? How did you get jobs lined up? Unless you're high grading I don't see how you could be cutting veneer all the time. Not around here anyway. The high graders usually get chased out. Landowners talk.

 

[bitzer]

I'd really like to know your real story John although I'm sure I will never get it. Sometimes you make sense and sometimes I can tell you're full of ****.

 

[1270d]

If you were cutting that few trees and making it, must have been birds eye.

 

[bitzer]

If you were cutting that few trees and making it, must have been birds eye.

Walnut? Curly walnut? I wonder if its so easy why isn't he still at it.

 

[Gypo Logger]

No, my stihl husky dealer also sold farm equipment so I had an in with farmers who usually have timber. Plus I had the added advantage of being able to smell the stuff a mile away.
Call me a high grader if you like, but I took only 4-5 ripe pumpkins per acre. That allowed me to go back every five to ten years. I never overcut, and I cleaned up the tops and had a very good reputation in my area as paying top dollar and not making the bush look like a bad haircut.
I left when saw timber really dropped in price, but that was just an excuse to come north because timber tramps also suffer from itchy feet.
I will go back though, because all those bush's I cut are getting ripe again, but I have to put in my time up here first.
John

 

[Gypo Logger]

Rock maple sky rocketed around 95, but it wasnt until about 98 that I new what veneer meant and I was paying 500$ on the stump/tree average. I never used my own money, but 10,000 dollars is a magic figure to most farmers for a 10,000bf truck load plus whatever it veneers out to be. I was way to generous, but I could sleep at night and I never found myself bushless.
High graders always hide behind the low grade.