Services

Who we service

The services that we offer are specialized toward landowners that have the desire to improve their land by working with the trees and landscape of their property to create the desired products and services that come from the forest. Whether it is a singular tree or an entire silvicultural reset we can help you complete your property goals to turn your property into the space where you can do your recreational hobbies more thoroughly. We enjoy helping outdoors enthusiasts to create their property into wildlife habitat that is abundant, creating trails, controlling invasive and noxious species, and much much more.

What Services We Normally Complete

The main work that we do for landowners consists of Timber Stand Improvements (TSI), forestry mulching, timber sale contracts, and general forest cleanup. TSI consists of removing the correct trees that will allow for the forest to respond in the way that is desired. Most of the time TSI applies to a forest that is full of unwanted species, poorly formed trees, or has too high of a density of trees to begin with. The goal is then to take out the trees of lesser quality, leaving the trees that are desirable to allow them to continue to grow and seed out into the freshly opened areas. TSI can be completed with a forestry mulcher in the right setting. A forestry mulcher is an attachment that can go on the front of a skid loader (In our case) and will turn smaller trees and brush into mulch in a matter of seconds. It is extremely effective for clearing out overgrown and brushy areas along with shredding the trees. This also allows for a cleaner look after a TSI because under normal circumstances the brush and trees that are cut down are just left to allow nature to rot them away. However with the mulcher shredding the trees into much smaller pieces it allows the mulch to degrade much faster and gives a much cleaner refined look when it is done. We also can grind the stumps down to below or level to the ground meaning that there aren’t a bunch of ugly stumps left over in the woods. The only downside to mulching all of the trees and brush is that it removes a lot of the understory making it less valuable to wildlife for cover. This cover may be able to grow back relatively quickly if the sun is able to hit the forest floor, and the new clearing may allow for high quality wildlife bushes and trees to be planted.

Timber sale contracts that are being supervised by a forester are a must have for anyone selling timber. It is essentially a way to make sure that both the logger and the landowner play by the rules. When a timber sale is being conducted there can be a lot of information that a landowner may not fully understand that can cause a bad ending. TImber can be worth a lot of money if it is grown correctly and the markets are good, but to the untrained eye it can be easily mistaken and sold for much under market value. Several studies have suggested that having a forester that controls the timber sale can improve the sale by at least 10% and on many occasions making the landowner large amounts more than the original pre-forester sale price. Along with making sure that the correct trees are being harvested for the health of the forest. A lot of trees are harvested way too early, not only ripping off the landowner from significant value of the tree at full maturity but also making it more work for the loggers because now they have to cut down and move twice as many trees to get the same amount of wood. There is plenty of forest here for us to supply the lumber market but it is necessary to not over harvest because then it is difficult for that area to catch back up to lumber needs. Most trees are living in a 70 year revolving game that is full of surprises that can be harmful to trees. That is why our favorite harvesting method is called a silvicultural harvest, which is where only certain trees are allowed to be harvested. When they are picked to be harvested a bunch of things are considered such as how healthy they look, their size and branch structure, what species they are, if there is a higher quality tree nearby that is being negatively affected by it, etc. You have to look at a tree like an investment, for the first 30 years the returns are minimal, but once it gets that point it starts growing in leaps and bounds. A tree is the same way, once a tree gets to 20 inches in diameter at chest height (DBH) then it is able to become a veneer log, and veneer logs can get large amounts of money. Depending on the tree species and conditions every year it can gain ⅛ inch to ½ inch in diameter which means that once you get to 20 inches it starts to multiply quickly gaining an extra inch every 2 to 8 years. Depending on the species that can change it from a 50 cents per board foot tree to upwards of a dollar. With walnut logs especially you can see prices go from $2.50 per board foot with a regular sawlog but once it gets to 20 inches it can go up to 3$ and every inch past that will only gain large amounts of dollars per board foot. For perfect large walnut trees you can get $6-$10 per board foot which can drastically change the amount the landowner gets just by waiting to harvest their tree for another 10-30 years.