dmccarty
Super Star Member
It depends on the timber sale. In NC, and I would assume much of the South East, timber can be cut to thin the forest, take out the more mature trees or clear cut. Thinning can be done to remove densely growing trees, I always see this with pines. The smaller trees, roughly 15 years old, are chipped up and sold for wood pulp or pellets. This allows the remaining trees to grow faster and larger. Eventually, the larger trees will be cut but it still might be a selective cut where only some of the trees are removed. Then there is clear cutting where almost every tree is cut and sold....
Timber sales do not help the fuels problem. In a timber sale you take the biggest trees because they make more 2x4s. But those are also the trees that survive fire the best. To restore forest health we need to thin out the small stuff and do way more controlled burns. The trees that get thinned are often not good for lumber. We need ways to use them like pulp mills and biomass plants. Even if we have to subsidize those, we can still extract some value from the thinning slash.
...
The bigger trees often are used for veneer so my forester told me.
NC has regulations and law to allow prescribed burns which seem to be effective. The native Americans are supposed to have set forest fires to clear out the under growth to make it easier for hunting and traveling. Saw something about the native people in Australia doing the same thing. Course, "modern" people put a stop to this but now seem to realize the importance of controlled burns...
Later,
Dan