Posted on 11/07/2007 1:21:09 PM PST by george76
When the U.S. Forest Service received no bids on two small timber sales in Eagle County earlier this year, the agency's local rangers encountered what is becoming a problem throughout the intermountain West.
The federal agency got a lesson in market economics and the three-way tug of war over lumber in national forests. There were no bidders for the timber "salvage" sales designed to remove trees killed by infesting pine beetles. The Forest Service also wants to sell the dead trees so they won't add extra fuel to wildfires.
The glut of dead trees is occurring at a time when economics, the few Forest Service timber sales and natural trends have left few loggers and lumber mills.
The amount of dead trees available for loggers and mills is at an all-time high and growing as the pine beetle epidemic spreads. The ability to extract them remains a bottleneck.
But in the three-part dance of the Forest Service, loggers and lumber mills...a mixture of all three combined with environmental constraints...
Chris Meyers' Intermountain Resources in Montrose is one of the few mills left in the state...
Part of the problem is the Forest Service hasn't sold enough logs in recent years to support the timber industry...
"It's has caused a shrinking of the industry,"
The closest lumber mill is the one in Montrose, more than 150 miles away and the next nearest is in Price, Utah, approximately 300 miles distant.
"Over the last two decades local mills have been eliminated," ...
"In Colorado there's only one big mill," said timber specialist Bob Garcia...
"The (cost of) the haul there makes some sales uneconomical," ...
But the situation is not isolated to Eagle County or even just to Colorado...
(Excerpt) Read more at vaildaily.com ...
We have a huge problem with pine beetles in BC too. The cause was too vigorous fire suppression — but, global warming is being blamed (with zero evidence to support it).
Only they are now desk clerks at the Local Super 8 motel
Thanks, granola heads!
F#$% that ... just reactivate the Homestead act and give the land back to the citizens.
Had a local-owned sawmill in my neck of the woods that’s been around longer than my half-century shutdown this summer. Sad to see it not operating. Affected a good number of sawmillers as well as timber haulers. Heard it was Canadian timber driving prices down that led to them closing their operations. I don’t know if that’s a fact though.
“I own a lumber company??? Need some wood??”
</Dubya>
Wow!!! What a magnificent tagline!!! (thanks for da ping)
Gee the UNION word was never used today.
All that government “owned” land makes me want to howl like that dumb wolf on that National Wilderness Institute logo!!! Is this map their creation? If so, are they braggin, or complainin???
Wow, thanks SW. Check out the map a few posts up. Sad...
Oops, never mind, you commented on the map already.
Lots of good folks were loggers.
We need them and they want to get back to work.
After several years / sets of LA fires, this may get some attention.
Fires in the ‘fly over areas’ like Montana, Idaho, Colorado, Utah, Washington...do not get front page breaking news national coverage.
With the loonie up and dollar down, Canadian lumber may get more expensive ?
I’d like to put hill climbin knobby dirt bike tire prints right on their dumb butts!!! (whilst I’m still young and healthy enough to stand up on the pegs!!!)
As the second larget timber producing county in California, we had several mills in the 1980s. All the dimensional wood saw mills and the moulding plant have closed. All we have left is two plywood veneer mills that take trees under about 23 inches in diameter.
At a meeting I attended with the US Forest Service Chief, a gentleman from Sierra Pacific pointed out that the region is losing its timber infrastructure:
1. USFS sawlog volume accounts for only 15% of total volume harvested in CA
2. Mills have closed, many mills currently working reduced shifts due to reduction in volume of wood
3. From 06 to 07, there has been a 26% drop in USFS sawlog volume and a 9% drop in non-sawlog volume.
4. The existing infrastructure is at risk and all depends on sawlog volume, not firewood or biomass.
5. There is a disconnect in the USFS in determining what is an economical timber sale.
The Chief said there was a lack of “social license” to harvest trees anymore.
environmentalists,, Perfect StormTroopers.. saving dead wood (so it can catch fire and consume forests and wildlife.. oh.. and residents, most of them taxpayers)
Who’s dirt bike should I ride on them if I can’t ride mine?
Standing dead timber isn’t much good for anything but building log houses. It’s too dry, cracked, and twisted for milling.
They should know enough to throw in some good trees to pay the bills if they want any bidders. The trees are growing way faster than we can ever cut them; it’s time to get in gear.
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