Cutting Off My Lot

[johnpma]

Have a question for those of you cutting off of your own property. How do you choose what you are going to take from the property yet still maintain a renewable resource? I have 10 acres of maple, oak cherry, white pine, hemlock, apple, and birch. This property is new to us. We have been cutting mostly standing dead wood for the last year, and cleaning up the fallen trees from past storms. All of which is very good firewood.

As we begin to see what we really have I'm seeing more and more clumps of 3-4-5 trees mostly maple and cherry. My thoughts are the next step will be to down some of the hemlock and thin out the clumps.

The land is completely over grown but I'm really not sure where to begin.

 

[fireview2788]

Call you state forestry department and ask for guidance. I know Ohio sends someone out.

fv

 

[Knots]

Yep - a Maine State Forester walked my lot with me.

 

[gerry100]

On my lot, I've got a similar mix with parts overgrown.

A useful guide is to look up when the leaves are gone, if you see two trees interfering with each others crowns, take the easiest one down. The survivor will expand and bring back the shade.

If a tree is crooked and bent, make firewood out of it.

Ideally you want to end with a mix of saplings, 4-8"dia and larger mature trees.( if you're overgrown this will still yield plenty of firewood).

DO NOT clean up the resulting brush and limbs, leaving it protects seedlings from deer and lets the forest regenerate.

A forester will give more and better tips, but this approach works for me,

 

[johnpma]

good info guys thank you. I will contact the state forester in my area.

I've noticed that many of my maples are all clumped in groups of 3-6 trees and are 4" or so in diameter and others 4" trees with 8" trees.

We intend on continuing to sugar our trees so I'd like have nice healthy maples in the future. The large stand alone maples see to produce a lot of sap. Not sure what to do with these clumps

 

[gerry100]

good info guys thank you. I will contact the state forester in my area.

I've noticed that many of my maples are all clumped in groups of 3-6 trees and are 4" or so in diameter and others 4" trees with 8" trees.

We intend on continuing to sugar our trees so I'd like have nice healthy maples in the future. The large stand alone maples see to produce a lot of sap. Not sure what to do with these clumps

With the 4' dia clumps, I'd save the straightest healthiest looking one and let it live off the root system of the others you've made into firewood.

Of course the sugar maples are moneymakers so I'd listen to the forester instead of me.

 

[tcassavaugh]

here is a link for managing your woodlot, provided by Maryland DNR....not bad advice for the most part. (broken link removed to http://www.dnr.state.md.us/forests/programs/fpum_woodlotmgt.html)

 

[JP11]

All good advice here. The short answer is.. Let a PRO do it.

Very neat to just talk to them as they are marking trees. You'll hear things like.. This one's not worth much. This one's already seeded that one. This one's shading that one. This one's got X disease and will be gone in 2 years anyway. They look at what will be left growing after each tree is removed.

Very cool things going on in their heads. I had an uncle that has a degree in forestry come over and walk with me for an hour. He marked out a couple year's cutting in that time.

JP

 

[Gboutdoors]

Hi Johnpma I would try the state forester but I hope you are in a different county than we are. I have called our state forester a few times over the past 5 years that we have been in our new home/land with not a single call back. We bought 22 acres all forested built our new home and started to heat with wood off the lot. I still plan on getting him here some day just don't know how. We are in South Eastern Mass.

 

[TreePointer]

here is a link for managing your woodlot, provided by Maryland DNR....not bad advice for the most part. (broken link removed to http://www.dnr.state.md.us/forests/programs/fpum_woodlotmgt.html)

Excellent link. thanks, tcassavaugh!

+1 on having a state forester visit. Here in PA, the visit and consultation is free. They are all professionals with degrees in forestry.

Much of what private foresters advise is for theirs or the lumber yard's benefit and not for the health of your forest. For example, when they say "diameter limit cuts" and "making space for smaller trees to grow," it sounds good but can be very destructive to a forest. Many smaller diameter trees can be as old as the very large trees in your forest and will never grow to be large trees.

 

[jillybeansisme]

If you can't get a State Forester out, why not check out an Arborist and find out what he/she would charge for an onsite consultation. Failing that, is there a college near you that has a program?

 

[Fred Wright]

Agreed, a walk through with the state forester or an arborist would be your best bet. You should sustain your woodlands as best practice. I'd suggest getting advice from a pro.

Where some firewooders go wrong on woodlots they own, it's very tempting to just cut all the good stuff and leave the rest. This practice upends the forest and often causes serious challenges for wildlife. The critters depend on those trees.

I recall years ago my brother-in-law bought a place with a few acres of 75+ year-old timber. Within a couple years he'd cut practically every firewood-worthy tree and destroyed pretty much the rest. This was around the time the house became inundated with squirrels and chipmunks. They'd never seen so many critters around the house before.

Rabbits in the garden, bird poop all over their cars... They wrecked the woods and became overrun with critters.

 

[19FarmHand78]

A buddy of mine did a paper in collage about wood lot management. Something I remember about it was that 10 acres of established wood lot will supply a average family home with enough firewood each year, and "never run out of timber" for life, if properly managed.

I know as a kid I was always looking at the plat book and I remember asking dad or grandpa why there were all these little 10 and 20 acre wood patches, they told me those where firewood lots people that live in town in the 40's and 50's, would buy to have a place to cut wood.

 

[Wood Duck]

Focus on the trees you want to leave standing. Pick well spaced, straight, healthy trees, and cut to give each one some space to grow by removing trees that are crowding it. I'd save a nice mix of all the species, and I'd manage my woodlot to have big, healthy trees. If you are really focused on firewood production you might manage differently from the way I'd do it, but with ten acres you should be able to cut plenty of firewood and still manage the woodlot for large, healthy trees.

I believe a cord per acre per year is a sustainable yield for typical eastern forests.

 

[Vikestand]

In Missouri the MDC preaches about TSI(Timber Stand Improvement). Essentially it's a program that helps you select the right trees to manage and cut. Cutting trees in an educated way can encourage growth. My wife and I have 35 acres here. It's the same 35 I grew up on. We never ran out of wood but we never cut it ahead a year either lol.

As for 10 acres, I believe you can do it for far less than that. Just my opinion.