New Firewood Scrounging:

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Just sent out some ads to local tree service companies/guys for tree removal pick up or drop off at my site.
Hope I get some bites.
How do you all do it ?
$$$$$ just kidding but what you have done sounds like a good idea. if you do get calls to go pick up they may want you there pretty quick. i had one tree service call me several times and said hey we just dropped some oak trees do you want the wood? some i got and some i couldn't. good luck
 
It has to be easy for the tree company. I get questions all the time "what do you do with all the wood? You can drop it off at my place. Just call me a couple of days ahead of time so I can meet you there. Sometimes it gets wet where I want you to dump it. Now you aren't going to rut up my yard when dumping it are you? Can you plywood in? Just leave the wood I'll come out Saturday and get it." Ain't going to happen. It's got to be EASY for me or I will take it to my regular spot and let it rot.
 
What Oldmaple said. When we were in business we had a Farm Market we passed to and from work, we sold him truck loads for $50. That was an F 600 with 12' bed and six foot high sides. We could put 3 cords on it, but seldom loaded it that heavy. His market was about half way between our shop and most of our work. He took anything we would bring him, paved lot, in and out in minutes, that's what a tree guy needs. If we weren't able to dump once, you never heard from us again. A six pack or case of beer means nothing when you tie up a truck on one end and have a crew standing around the chipper on the other end waiting for it to get back. At $85 a man hour the customer doesn't want to hear "well, we waited for an hour and a half and the guy never showed up. So, we had to run all the way out to the shop to dump". If you showed up on the job our guys loaded it for you. They did it all day, knew how to stack so the load didn't shift, and were fast. You would just get in the way. We had to get cleaned up and move on. People are in business to make money, bottom line. Can't have the customer calling making you come back with a whole crew just to rake up the saw dust that was under the log. If you can save the tree guy time and money, he'll be your friend, Joe.
 
Joe is spot on, time is money.
My buddy, Billy the logger says "anything under 16" goes into the chipper. Don't have time to dickwith the small stuff. Saw logs and pealers go to the mill, the rest we chip."
I got a load from XY tree service because it was too big for his chipper and he would have to pay dump fees to get rid of it. My grandson knows the owner and hooked me up.
I don't know how they loaded it into the chip truck, some pieces were 44" across and 29" long.
I don't care, back down the drive and dump it, I'll turn it into firewood and save you dump fees.
The driver wasn't here more than five min and saved him $50.
Next time that tree service is in the area and needs a place to dunp, I'll get another load.
Other than that, you have to scout out blow down and wind falls.
Hey mister, you want that wood? I can make it disapear, if you don't.
 
Fully agree my sister in law had 6 trees taken down a month ago I showed up with my v10 a double axle trailer and tow straps. When I was waved in I backed the truck up they craned the wood onto the trailer and when it was loaded I pulled off to the side to strap up. After I strapped my first load up and was getting ready to leave the ground leader said... you'll be back in 30 minutes right...Your saving me money on running my trucks. I took 4 more loads out that afternoon it pays to make it quick and easy.
 
For the last few years, I have been letting a power line crew dump their chips on my property. I have told them several times I would take any wood they needed to haul off too. I seldom get any wood, maybe a chunk here and there. I compost the chips and then use it for mulch. I'll sell a load of mulch every now and then. Right now, I probably have 100-200 loads of chips and my wife can find more uses for it that I thought imaginable. Spent yesterday evening and this morning hauling scoops to put around the trees, the fence, the flower beds. Now she wants me to underbrush the patch of woods behind the house and mulch all of it. I may have to cut the chipper truck off because I have enough to mulch the whole damn place and I think my wife intends for me to do so.
 
001.JPG I will be finishing a good wood run soon, leftovers from a logging co. job. Is it not worth it for them to take some of the shorter or limb stuff out? I was not there when it was logged. They are coming back to log near me again and I thought of asking if the would sell their scraps dropped off from the truck. Wide open area for them to drop and I have no requests or "instructions for them. Pics are the area I am working and the wood I have so far.001.JPG
 
To answer your question, no it’s not worth it for them. Unless there’s a biomass plant nearby, it’s cheaper for them to leave it in the woods.

To you or I a cord of 100” logs is worth $100 bucks, give or take. To them, if there’s a couple cords sitting there it’s not worth the time to haul it out if it’s less than a full semi load.
 
I get a lot of stuff from a local father son tree crew. First time I picked up from them was just back in and load up locust and mulberry. But if gotten calls to clean up stuff others didn't have enough saw or work ethic to finish. And I do it cause the next call will likely be back up to the pile and load up and leave. 20180427_143903.jpg Most of the time it's already cut to 16-18" when I get there.
 
To answer your question, no it’s not worth it for them. Unless there’s a biomass plant nearby, it’s cheaper for them to leave it in the woods.

To you or I a cord of 100” logs is worth $100 bucks, give or take. To them, if there’s a couple cords sitting there it’s not worth the time to haul it out if it’s less than a full semi load.

Yea I think that they were after the lumber grade wood. I will still ask and see that they say, I think I will be over 10 cord on this run. A load of log length around here is $750 to $850, but thats nice large straight stuff. I'm thinking it would be better to talk to the guys working and not the office.
 
All I ever got were some old barn beams for free mixed in with a bunch of other bs wood. I'm sure it was cheaper to dump it in my front yard than take a full size tractor trailer load to the dump. I see ads for it all the time on cl. I never see tree companies advertising free wood though. And as mentioned when they leave a tree cut up on someone's front yard anything log size I would want is chipped away.

I would love a load of logs for free.
 
I am almost done with my big scrounge from down the road. The owner of the land came out and saw all the wood and regrets not having the loggers pull it out. I would have paid for it dropped off. He said the logger had a contract to pull the mill grade and 70 cord of firewood and might have stopped when he had his quota. I still think that he pulled the processor grade wood and left the tops,001.JPG crotch and twisted stuff.
 
If those are less than 8’ sections they are legitimate tops. But looks like there’s some smaller sections in there that definitely could have gone out as firewood.

Logger practices vary. The slobs that cut up behind me last year left at least 25 cords of scrap on the landings for a 120 acre cut. The operation working down the road right currently is cutting 60 acres. Their upper landing is already empty and there’s not more than 2 cords of cut offs.
 
Lots of the wood in the picture I had cut short to get out of tight areas with the tractor skid forks but lots of it was careless waste. The same company is coming back to log out another property near me. I'll keep an eye out to see what they are doing and scrounge if I can.
 
I have scored a couple of free wood loads off of Facebook Marketplace, but you generally have to be fast to get the free stuff. My biggest score was when my neighbor had her place logged. There were more tops they left back there that I could have burned in a lifetime. But it was rough terrain and my '85 Toyota 4x4 was the only truck I could get back there in. Between trying to keep the old truck running, fighting the weather, and working long hours on the job I only got about 8 cords before the trails in there got too grown up.
Another score came from a guy at church with the same deal. Logged off tops left but it was a 10 mile drive and I only had a small trailer to pull behind my Jeep. I am currently working on a tree that the power company took down in a lady from church's yard. There are plenty of free wood deals to be had in my area if you keep you ears open and are willing to work for it.
P.S. muddstopper, depending on where you are in NC I may be able to help you get rid of some wood chips. I was only able to get one load of chips while they were cleaning the power lines on my road.

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Took a break from the Canadian Beauty, The Farmsaw 2 arrived yesterday so just been cleaning out stuff to make room for the new ??? saw.
However I placed a CL ad for blowdowns for firewood. First guy about 25 miles away had some oak and some big pine pushed up in piles , bunch of dirt in it from how it was pushed up. It was a all or nothing deal. Told him I really couldn't ( and didn't wanna do anything with pine especially that size). He said he has a buddy with a mill that might take the pine,
About the time I got back got another email. Fellow said he has lots of blow down. Only problem this is 38 miles from the house , But what the devil so I take off just to look, well gotta throw a saw or three in the truck no sense driving 80 miles for nothing.
Get there , turns out its a tree farm and most of it is a year or two old, some of it he has already cut into 16" or 32" blocks. He takes me and my boy on his UTV out onto his 60 acre tree farm showing me downed White oak, red oak and several big wild cherry trees, said ," yeah I can hook to the tractor and drag it when you can get to it better" . Normally I wouldn't wanna drive that far but the wood is so pretty and the old fellow is so nice. Oh after we got that little ( started raining) load split and stacked had another email about some oak and ( shiver) pine. Guess I will call them tomorrow. Cut Safe and Burn more wood:chainsaw:Matthew a working Red Oak.jpg
 
The best way is personal contact, not just a phone call or email. When you see a crew working, stop and ask for the lead man, ask to talk to the owner directly in person. Explain what you are looking for and be specific about what your looking for and what areas they are working in. I contacted at least a dozen or more before I found a tree guy that is located just 2 miles from me. Over time and a lot of talking he now puts all the wood in one truck and chips in another. It cost him time and money to chip everything so anything he does not have to chip saves him time and wear and tear on his chipper. So or him it's cheaper to load chips in one truck and wood in another. Another plus for me is there is a mulch yard 2 miles past my place where he pays to dump chips. So I get loads of just wood with no chips and that saves him time and money because those loads are closer to cheaper to drop at my place because I'm closer and he can dump for free. All he has to pay to dump is the chips witch is 2 miles farther down the road. I get clean loads of logs that he dumps for free and he saves money just dumping chips only at the mulch yard.
It took time and a lot of stopping and asking but it finally paid off for both of us.
Plus a few times he stopped to dump and was having trouble with his truck hydraulics so I fixed his truck several times so now his truck dumps great now every time.
We talk a lot and he has offered me a job several times because he knows I ran a tree spade for 30 years and he knows how hard I work. We have been helping each other for about 8 years now. Sometimes he has a mixed load of chips and wood in one truck and will call me to come to his yard and he will dump the load at his yard and use his loader to load my trailer with wood so all he has to do is pay to dump the chips over at the mulch yard.When he calls for me to come get a load, I never turn him down and always show up on time.
You want to find a company that has dumpers and are not looking for pull offs. Many of them don't have dumpers so the need a pull off and they wont come here because I have no equipment to pull a load off a trailer so they go the the mulch yard where they can get the load pulled off and not have to unload by hand. Just keep stopping and asking, sooner or later you may find what your looking for. I even tried sitting at the mulch yard and every time a truck came in, I stopped them and gave them my card. It took a long time to find the right guy, but I now have all the free wood I can handle, delivered and dumped on my place for free.
And if I get a load with some chips or junk wood, I don't complain, I just say thank you and deal with it. The last thing I want to do is ***** about a few chips or junk wood and ruin a good thing.
I'll sometimes bust up the junk wood and give it away to campers that just want cheap or free wood for bon fires and that gets rid of the junk I don't want and keeps me from having to haul it off. I even burn it myself when we want an outside fire for weekend party's. That way I don't have to burn my good sellin wood.
 

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