Just made contact with a tree service.

[Jags]

Local craigslist had a tree service advertisement for "Free Wood". I emailed the fella, and he returned my call. He is a tree service in the city north of where I live. I made it clear that I would not be interested in a 100 cord per month, but that if he was doing a job around me, he has a place to dump the logs. Phone hand shake was made.
He said that this will probably pick up in the spring and that he would be dumping 14,000 pounds at a time. Could be any variety of tree. No guarantee what will be dropped.
This would be sweet if he dumped a handful of trucks per year. I hope it works out....YEEEE HAWWW.

Moral of the story - keep your eyes peeled.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Good luck on this Jags.

 

[Jags]

I have been thinking about a road side stand selling small amounts - like $5 - $10 - $20 amounts of wood. This would fall perfectly in my plans. What held me back was the dropping and bucking and trucking of the wood back to my place. Time. I have all the wood I could stand if I had the time to go get it. I have two places that are begging me to come clean up. One is 40 acres and the other is about 10. I just don't have the time.

 

[Flatbedford]

Time is the most precious commodity in my life.

 

[ScotO]

Sounds like a win-win, Jags! Let us know when the first load arrives. I like the idea of a roadside wood stand.......I bet it'd be a hit because you know what seasoned wood is, those customers would be getting a great deal!

 

[Lumber-Jack]

I bet it'd be a hit because you know what seasoned wood is!

Just to be clear,,,, what is seasoned wood again???

Sounds good Jags, but if he drops off truck load after truck load of pine and poplar will you still continue with the arrangement?

 

[Thistle]

I'm very selective on what I look for on CL.Almost never see any of the Oaks or Hickory on there,but I have access to all I could ever use anyway.But will gladly go after Silver/Norway Maple,Black Cherry,Honey Locust,Green/White Ash,Mulberry and a few others including Eastern Red Cedar.Unless I know or recognize the person placing the ad I dont respond if there's no photos,a pile of brush/few small logs or something similar.I'm no trash removal service. If they actually know what the wood is & describe it,I may check it out if its not more than 10 miles one way.



My main contact runs a small tree service in small town about 40 miles to my west,routinely does business in metro area.Last summer I got 1 big load of primo Black Cherry from a huge old tree about 9 miles to my SE near city limits.Also he had 2 loads of a monster thornless Honey Locust that he brought to my house.Normally he will deliver & dump for free if you live within a few miles from where he's working.This was already loaded on the dump trailer when I returned the next day to the address for more wood.

Asked him "what would you charge to follow me home & dump that in my backyard?" He replied "Nothing,same as always" I was so pleased to get that primo wood (including 1 PERFECT 36" diameter round that was almost 4 ft long) that I handed him a $20 so the 3 guys could go buy a couple pizzas for lunch. He had some Mulberry yesterday,but it was already gone before I had the chance to grab it.But I'll keep watching on there for more in the future.

 

[Augie]

I have a arrangements just like this. Started in October. I have 1/2 cord maple, 1 cord willow, and 1.5 cord walnut. If it keeps to one bad dump out of three I'm okay with it. I'm not planning on selling it just trying to get 4-6 cord per year. I work out of my house so don't care if some of the wood is less than optimum, I'll just burn that during the day.

 

[Village Idiot]

I too have a similar arrangement. The company is small and they don't have a wood lot where they can process it for sale, so they have to take it to the local landfill. It is a win-win situation. He pockets the landfill fee that the customer paid and drops the wood off at my house. He knows I do not need a lot of wood and I just call him when I am ready to process more. Plus, he appreciates heating with wood and doesn't waste time delivering pine and poplar.

I am convinced that with a little creativity, willingness to work, and enough space to properly season wood it can be had for free.

 

[Dune]

Good for you Jags.
I assume you have room to store all the pine and box alder?

Reminds me of a little story, considering your business idea.

I have a good, old friend.

He owns a wine and spirits shop here on Olde Cape Cod.

He sells bundles of seasoned pine at his store for the same price as kiln dried hardwood goes for at the supermarket.

Says that the folks who buy the pine love it since it lights easy in their fireplace and burns out about the time they finish their bottle of wine and head to bed.

Of course, he gets the pine for free and sells quite a few cord over the course of a year.

 

[Jags]

I have no problem with the pine and populars, but the reality is that these are not dominate yard trees in my area (lets face it, a tree company is working yard trees.). I have more than enough room for the wood and I also have a pit to burn anything unwanted.

It was pretty funny...he asked if I have the ability to handle the BIG stuff. I just snickered....um, yeah.
This is one little back corner of my yard: (I have lots more room available over this).

 

[jdinspector]

Way to go jags. I have Had several sources of wood over the years, but now that I am up 3 years and can cruise, I have one main source for wood. It is a tree service. Just today on the way home I drove past their yard to see if there was any new stuff. There were 3-4 medium sized oaks (10-12") that I could cut 5-6 logs off of. I went back a short time later to get the small load (maybe 20 minutes) and there was a whole new load of 20-24" oaks stacked up. I must have just missed the truck. Oh we'll, I ended up with a whole truck load of white oak; nice and straight. Should be easy to split.

This is for my road side (sidewalk, in my case) stand too. My kid made about $400-500 last summer/fall.

Yes, it pays to keep your eyes open!

 

[Jags]

The really good part is that I don't have to "go get" anything. They will back up and dump. We shall see.

 

[lobsta1]

Up until a few years ago I used to go to the city yard & cut wood from all the tree trunks dumped in there. Bumped into the foreman one time & started talking. He asked where I lived & then said, "Oh yeah, your the one with all the wood in the yard". A short while after that the city was notified by the Conservation commission that the area was a designated wetlands & the city could not dump wood there anymore. City had to hire a commercial grinder to turn all the trunks into mulch. This rig could take 12' long trunks that were that were ANY diameter.

Since then the city has to take them to a commercial recycling plant & pay by the ton to get rid of all the trunks. Well, a short time after this started I hear a truck in my driveway. It was the foreman with a load of logs on the way to the recyclers. He wanted to know if I wanted them. He dumped them right next to my splitter & has been doing it since then. He used to drop off a lot of 4' > 5' diameter logs. So last year I casually asked him if his guys were getting all the prime stuff. You know, the trunks that are 18" > 24" diameter. He said none of his guys wanted any of it. I mentioned I'm about to sign up for medicare & would appreciate some smaller stuff., so that's what he drops off now. Last week I just got another dump truck load of all prime oak from 14" > 26". This past August I built another shed that holds 5 cords.That will be full before I get that last load all split. One of my other sheds holds 8 cords. Another holds 3 cords, plus I have a 8' high framework that is covered with shrinkwrap that holds another 3 cords. I'm happy!
Al

 

[loadstarken]

Awesome I love hearing this stuff!

I ran into an old friend last year and found out he runs a tree service and I jokingly said that he could drop off the wood at my place instead of paying to get rid of it. He has dropped off many huge rounds with some being 5 feet across. I asked what he did with the smaller stuff and the branch rounds that are bigger than 4" and he said they go in the chipper! Dang!

So last time he was here he commented that once I get my truck up and running that I could park it at job sites the night before and he'd call me when its full. So now that I have that in my head I'm super motivated to get it done.

 

[rdust]

I hooked up with a tree service this past summer and it worked great. I don't get home drop off though, I have to pick it up at the curb of the job site.

The only downside is I don't get out and cut much anymore since I have a bunch of tree service wood coming in. I have some cutting I've been promising I'd do for some friends so some wood is going to get sold at some point.