suggestions for plantation thinning

[dafunk]

Hey all, my family has around 40000 trees that were planted 16 years ago and are due for their thinning. it's an even combination of white pine , white spruce and tamarack. the tamaracks on average have a dbh of 1 ft and stay that thick for about 15 ft, the white pines at most are 10 inches and the spruce about the same. just wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what can be done with it besides pulp and paper. Also any info on the value of the different trees, if it's worth the time to take off the lower limbs of the sprce and tamarack, The pines have all been raised up.

 

[371groundie]

just from your description i would suggest removing the tamarack. the spruce would come in another 15 or 20 years. and the white pine would be my childrens retirement fund.

however, information you get for free on the internet is worth exactly what you pay for it. (somone here has this in thier sig, if i remembered who i would give credit)

seek the advice of a forester. whether through a state agency or a private consultant. they will take everything in consideration and give you a reccomendation. they can also help in the execution of a timber harvest.

if you do have a harvest post some pics!

 

[minknency]

The goal of most tree farmers is to grow a stand of high quality crop trees to be harvested sometime in the future. Some crops should not be thinned for different reasons.You need to establish how well your crop is performing to enable you to put a management plan in place.Crops can be damaged by contractors using unsuitable heavy harvesting machines.

 

[slowp]

Are you sure you are measuring diameter (distance across) and not circumference (distance around)?

 

[floyd]

Maybe he is using a regular not dbh tape? to measure.

Otherwise he has some damn good ground to put a foot on at dbh in 15yr.

 

[dafunk]

yeah those were the measurements, just the biggest ones though, it wasnt many of the trees that were that size, just the peak ones. One of my teachers (taking forestry) suggested looking into contacting campgrounds to see if theyd be interested in a firewood contract. Any of you guys ever done anything like that? The long term goal will to have high quality trees that any kids I have or their kids would be able to harvest to pay for the property tax or at least a portion of it, keeping heavy machinery off the property would be preferable, but I know eventually it would probably be unavoidable.