Urban logging. Anyone do it?

[beastmaster]

I know theres a milling forum, But I'm wondering if any tree service owners harvest the lumber from take downs. Seems to me lot of potential money is cut up for firewood or hauled to the dump or chipped. I had to buy a few pieces
of oak trim for a project. It was insanely expensive. We have a massive piece of oak at our yard. We also recently did a removal at an arboretum of a large walnut. It had many straight leaders and was already dried to perfection. We cut it up for firewood. Some artist took one chunk to make a bowl. You see my point. I keep thinking lot of valuable wood is being wasted, but what do I know. So anybody harvests their wood or I'm I way off base? Thanks

 

[capetrees]

I get a request for that kind of stuff once in a while but not a big market. Keep a list of potential people that want the logs or pieces and you can make it piecemeal. Big market, I don't think so.

 

[BRCCArborist]

I think it could be ok if you could cut enough timber at a time to make it worthwhile. one or two trees probably is just a waste of time. Also urban timber has a high possibility of nails and whatnot.

 

[treeman82]

Check around in your area to see if there are smaller sawmills that will cut your timber for a certain rate or percentage. If you have a project in mind for your wood that's one thing, but to try to sell it to consumers... that's something else.

I too hate sending beautiful logs to the firewood pile, but honestly, firewood is an easier turn around, and unless you are talking about high end woods, you are gonna see more value in the logs as firewood.

 

[Mike Van]

An old saying in the sawlog market "above the first major crotch is firewood" I've found this to be true more often than not. The most stable lumber will come from the ground up, once a tree forks & the limbs are no longer plumb to the ground, you get reaction wood. Trying to make lumber from this stuff is a waste of time, as most all of it will warp & twist so bad it's unusable. So a tree with "many straight leaders" is pretty much firewood. The tramp metal is always an issue too, not so much for bandmill or csm owners, but no big mill will buy logs from yards, fencelines, etc. I've got a can full of stuff I've sawn off, nails, lags, & so forth. Most yard trees are heavily branched [here anyway] and 6" dia knots make poor lumber. Matt, how you been?

 

[tree md]

I used to get the pulp wood guys to come out on jobs where I had many pines back when I worked in GA. If we had good logs up to 16' with no limbs or knots they wanted us to leave them in 16' lengths. Not sure what they were using them for but they brought more money than the 4' pulp wood. You would have to have a pretty good load for them to come out though. I think the least amount I ever called them for was 12 pines. They had to come a long distance and I would usually tip them $50 just for coming out. They didn't make much money and did me a big favor hauling the saw logs away.

 

[newsawtooth]

Urban logging

I would add to the above comments that urban trees grow differently than forest trees, they have less competition and their boles are much shorter before they fork dramatically. Furthermore, logging is only profitable with volume and more favorable saw log markets than exist currently. With some creative networking, big equipment, and cheap land a co-op for tree services to cache their logs and dump their chips might break even. Though that is only speculation based on observing the local green waste facilities that operate for profit.

 

[Jimmychips]

My experience has been that the sawmills won't touch "yard" trees. Too many clotheslines, birdhouses, hammocks, dog runs, ect. for them to even risk trashing a blade. I have found however that the port-a-mill guys are a little more flexible. Our wood either goes through the chipper, or through the splitter.

 

[treeman82]

All quiet here Mike. I haven't heard from Eldon in quite some time, have you?

 

[bulldoglover]

I tried to do a solid for a friend. I left a few logs at a job site so he could come two days later to bring them to the mill for his own lumber. Well about two weeks later the logs were still sitting in the yard. Now i have to apologize to the customer, and load them on my trailer by my self. If I had just took care of it the day of the job I had two groundies and it would have been a cinch. New rule, no messing with saw logs, its fire wood or chipper food!

 

[Taxmantoo]

I tried to do a solid for a friend. I left a few logs at a job site so he could come two days later to bring them to the mill for his own lumber. Well about two weeks later the logs were still sitting in the yard.

Oops. I guess you should have done a drive-by on day 3.

 

[bulldoglover]

Oops. I guess you should have done a drive-by on day 3.

Lesson learned. Hate when you try to throw someone a bone and it comes back and makes you look like a tool.

 

[danieltree]

I sell everything or give it to someone else who sells it . I live in an area where they buy wood though. Pine is either pulp wood, billets which is used for plywood or saw logs. Oaks are either fire wood or sold as saw logs. I mill some of it for personal use . I don't get rich selling the wood but am able to pay my labor for the job with my log money.​

 

[RVALUE]

I think it could be ok if you could cut enough timber at a time to make it worthwhile. one or two trees probably is just a waste of time. Also urban timber has a high possibility of nails and whatnot.

I took out a 36 inch walnut, that some "kids" put motorcycle pegs in to climb, back in the '50's. They were imbedded. That tree was worth more at the scrapper than the mill.

Nails are an inconvience, Whatnot is deadly.

 

[sgreanbeans]

My friend kept telling me that HIS friend had a mill and that we should take a log to him, I wasn't interested because i knew it would be a waste, we took a large oak down , nice straight trunk about 40" dia, 16' long, so I let him have it, he had to pay the roll off guy who hauled it $100, my buddy got $125 out the log! so for 4 hours work he made $25, I knew he wouldn't get very much, and now we know...............And knowing is half the battle..................G.I.JOE.

Sorry, had to do it

 

[epicklein22]

I guess the tree company I work for is a minority. We have a yard full of "saw logs". We call up a logging company and they come load up their tri-axle. All we have to do is call. I don't know what we get paid though, I would imagine we take a little less considering the risk of metal.

 

[Quintano65]

I've got some friends here in Moab, Utah who are doing some pretty interesting things with urban timber and even utilizing the wood from invasive species like Russian olive and even tarmrisk. Of course they are limited with what they can do but they sure have blown my mind and broken some common myths about this type of wood. Check it out. It's pretty exciting!





http://www.triassicstone.com/

 

[Mikecutstrees]

I have a friend who takes all the big cedar I can find for him. Also an excavator buddy takes all the pine logs I can bring him. Its easier for me to do that than anything else. So I give it away. Ive sawn some big logs on my CSM. So I guess we do a little urban logging.... Mike

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

The problem AI see is that many people see a tree and equate it with the value of lumber, which is a value added product. You have to fell it, extract it fro the site, trsansport it to the mill, debark and saw it, grade the RGH lumber coming off the mill, dry it, then mill it to square lumber.

OOO that is walnut it hs to be worth something, yeah about $50 a log in a good market.

The real money for single logs cmkes from veneer quality sticks. In ash that is 14 ft and at least 16 in dia (if there is no EAB, then you need to mill 1in down wen debarking.)

 

[rbtree]

I have always done my best to salvage any usable timber. Here in the PNW, we have a lot of tall residential trees. Fir, hemlock, cedar, even some pines, maple, alder and birch, even cottonwood, can all the sold to the local sort yards or mills. Unique hardwood, and cool softwoods like deodar go to my www.gogreendesign.biz. Eric makes great slab art furniture.

Of course, the challenge can be getting the trees down in log lengths, and then to the log truck. Small back yards, narrow gates, are a deal killer.

The current market is in the can. I have only sold one tree to a mill in over 14 months, and it was a stinkin' cottonwood. It was huge, and paid $43 more than the trucker charged, but it saved me $550 if we'd had the debris truck haul it.

I've seldom had problems with metal in trees. The mill might reject the log, or they might just cut the butt off, and pay for the rest. And that's only happened a few times.