Yep. You'd be surprised how often it happens. Either the woodlot is not valuable enough as saw log or pulp (once harvesting and transport costs are met) to justify the disruption, and costs of building truck access, or the owner might have been let down by others in the past and unwilling to trust any assertion the ground won't get wrecked. If dry enough, they'll accept a wheeled machine over the paddocks to the nearest farm race/track, but they aren't going to get track building machinery in nor spend a cent upgrading their existing tracks.
There might only be 100 trees in a stand, but there may be multiple stands of the same age around the farm. Some of it on ground worth turning back to pasture or where the shading from the trees is adversely impacting other pasture.
But so far I haven't met a farmer who when they take this stance, don't realise they are pretty much consigning the wood to being felled and burned rather than used. I hope to find and prove a better alternative. I can buy a loader, build or buy a small but strong trailer, and wheel logs out, but it then means travelling to the nearest place a truck and trailer can get to and turn around that has enough space to hold at least a t&t of logs, then unloading the trailer, then having the loader or a digger with grapple available to load out the t&t's.
By that stage, there's not much $ left in it. If there was a way to mill where it drops, and a buyer for the lumber, then the loader/digger isn't needed and what I'm hoping to find out is whether the wood that rolls out the farm gate is actually high enough up the value chain compared to logs that it is actually worth doing.
The trouble with Pine here is that there might be a very good use for it on-farm thus not having to even bother with trucking, but it rots easily unless treated, so it's of little value to a farmer. If I could come up with a mobile treating chamber, get the necessary permits and pass the needed unit standards/tests for chemical wood preservation, then there's far more likelihood of selling treated lumber to the farmer or surrounding farmers and avoiding the transport and loader/digger costs. There are also many stands that are only good for posts, which farmers need, but only if treated.
So, I'm trying to work out if it's worth the hassle, and would create a high enough value product - lumber or treated lumber, to save the wood from a burn pile. Jury is still out on that though.