OT: trading timber for land clearing

Jake in NY · Jan 7, 2010

I'm looking to clear about 2-3 acres of forest and turn it into pasture. Looking through Craigslist I see a few guys who are advertising land clearing services. My hope is to trade timber and firewood towards the cost of the clearing.

Do any of you have any experience with this sort of thing? Any tips or pitfalls to avoid?

Thanks

Jake in CT

chris blohm · Jan 7, 2010

bil had a couple people come over and do this sort of thing and worked out very well for him
guys that cut the tree hauled it all away and even raked up the saw dust piles and all
hth

big fred · Jan 7, 2010

The way I did it was I hired a company to come in and take down about 70 trees (on about 2-2.5 acres) and offset some of the cost by selling the timber. The agreement we reached was a 50-50 split after trucking charges. Trucker was about $350-450 per load, depending on which mill he was going to. At the end I was left with a part load that would not have payed trucking cost, as the bottom dropped out of the timber market about that time. If it's simply a matter of clearing land with no buildings, it might pay for itself. In my case, I still needed to come up with about 70-80% of the cost, since many of the trees were close enough to the house and garage and fencelines to require a great deal of special rigging, and many of the larger maple trees were unsaleable due to rotten cores.

JBruce · Jan 7, 2010

Pay attention while they are cutting. Guy came to me wanting to cut my timber. He had a three wheeled Bell logging machine that could cut close to the ground. I told him hae could have the logs in exchange for clear cutting the underbrush. I also told him to clear as he went and if he found he couldn't afford to do this to sstop. He cut all my logs and left leaving a mess. I didn't expect him to pile the brush jusst cut it and leave it. I had logged with his Dad a few years before and supposed he was as honest as his Dad. I couldn't get down there to see whaat was going on as I had just got out of the hospital after a bad heart attact.

JayinNY · Jan 7, 2010

Lucky he dident give you another heart attack when you saw the mess he left you.

VaTom · Jan 7, 2010

Jake, I've had people approach me about that. Invariably they had small trees with no market value other than firewood. Not worth anywhere near the machine time. Trees for firewood aren't worth much here, often given away.

Better to determine the value of your trees, then ask about clearing cost. Bear in mind that clearing cost will be directly proportional to your expectations.

My experience is that everyone wanting clearing had a dollar figure in mind, my first hurdle was to determine what it was and then explain what they could expect for that amount of money. Rarely enough to do as clean a job as I would have preferred, but never a problem.

Good luck.

Frank in DE · Jan 7, 2010

I'm getting ready to have 3 - 4 acres cleared for tillage. There are some beautiful 24+" diameter pines but the timber market is so poor I can only get $400 to $700 per acre for timber. I got 4 quotes on the land clearing (bulldoze, pile, burn, root rake, etc) they all came in at $4,200 to $4,500 per acre. I then found a fellow that would chip all of the timber including stumps and clear the land for $3,000 per acre. That is what I'm going with. At least in this area, there is no way the timber will pay for clearing land to a tillable state.

Spook · Jan 7, 2010

Around here it wouldn't work. Not enough money in the timber to pay for it.

Gun guru · Jan 7, 2010

DONT DO IT.

Any company or individuals will leave your land a mess, brush, stumps, unwanted log pieces. They will take the wanted logs and leave the mess for you.

Ken Macfarlane · Jan 7, 2010

Go and try the forestry forum.

Around here its the grubbing of stumps that costs a lot. The people without money log the land and put cattle and other animals on the land for a few years. The stumps come out easier then.

Anonymous-0 · Jan 7, 2010

Around here in Tn. there is a diffrence in what you want at the end. You mentioned pasture. Cut over hard wood what we call clear cut. You can get it raked , piled and burned, for around 2 grand an acre then you have the fertlize, lime and seed cost. But that did nothing for the stumps. We treat the stumps with something to keep the growth down then three to five years later IF they want it put in crop land you spend another 2 grand. When farming was rolling we were getting $4,500 acre but not much of that kind of work now. Dollars just won,t work out. With the price of beef the making pasture out of forrest won,t even work out.

kyplowboy · Jan 7, 2010

Most of the time around here it just don't work out right. It's a lot harder to get rid of stumps than standing trees. It has to be good lumber to pay for the dozer'n. Only guy I know who made it work out even payed a guy to come in a doze out a ditch line that had mostly oaks two men couldn't wrap the their arms around. Once every thing was on the ground he cut the logs out and sold them him self. Then let some guys come in and cut tops for about $10 a truck load, then pushed up tops and stumps with a front end loader and burnt it.

With prices the way they are right now it's going to take some really great timber for any one to come in and cut two acres and leave it ready to plant in pasture for just your share of the timber. (Get everything in write'n and a little front money to make sure they do a good job would be a good idea.)

Dave

JOCCO · Jan 8, 2010

Get a contract!!!

OT: trading timber for land clearing

Jake in NY

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chris blohm

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big fred

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JBruce

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JayinNY

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VaTom

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Frank in DE

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Spook

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Gun guru

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Ken Macfarlane

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Anonymous-0

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kyplowboy

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JOCCO

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