Best strategy after major ice storm.

[JasperFrank]

Out of 20 acres, I'm just now finishing up on clearing up all tree falls and debris on the 4 acres residential part of the property. Its divided into two tax lots. The other 16 is forestry deferred, difficult to access, and prop taxes on this are $400 a year. I spent 28 years, pulling out fuel loads and mechanical thinning from this 16 ac area. Thought I had it pretty clean and proper, then we had an Ice Storm in 2021? I had to start over cleaning up this area. And had just about got done, before the 2023 ice storm. We loved using this area because we had made foot trails, and it was like owning one's own private park, which I would walk in the mornings with the dog. Its also a bit of a wildlife Island now as the surrounding neighbors have clear cut.
Yesterday, I did a deep survey of this 16 ac for the first time after this latest, and much more major ice storm. I tried to walk the prior established paths. All that prior work of many years is gone. Took three hours just to climb over everything on the old trails, which were 15 minute walk trails, some too over covered with fallen trees to pass.
I just turned 66, and I had a realization that, I'm never, going to recover and make this the same as it was in my life time, doing what I was doing before. Its too much to deal with for just one person or even a small crew to handle to do manual mechanical clearing. Its far worst then when I originally bought the property. The fuel load is just insane.

So I ask the jury, what would you do? As the cost effective solution. I really don't want to clear cut. There isn't that much access because of the terrain for heavy equipment or even places to cold stack, or slash burn. There is only one path in and out. Which seems to have been used for high lead logging in the 30's and than again in mid-70's.

 

[Jstpssng]

A lot of it depends on soil conditions, tree species and age. Unfortunately you already made the critical decisions over the last 28 years.
On my own lot I've had an ongoing program for the last 20 years to remove all short lived tree species (mainly fir and aspen, here) before they get become overmature. I favor the later successional species ,(maple, ash, beech, yellow birch, spruce and pine), although I've been starting to thin those by taking out the less vigorous trees.

 

[ponytug]

@JasperFrank What is your goal here? Open the trail up again? Reduce the fuel load for the next fire? Or?

How big is / was your trail? Could you get a skid steer (with a forestry mulcher?) or a power-Trac, or a small dozer in to clear the trails, and perhaps push some of the slash into drifts that could be compacted?

All the best,

Peter

 

[JasperFrank]

@JasperFrank What is your goal here? Open the trail up again? Reduce the fuel load for the next fire? Or?

How big is / was your trail? Could you get a skid steer (with a forestry mulcher?) or a power-Trac, or a small dozer in to clear the trails, and perhaps push some of the slash into drifts that could be compacted?

All the best,

Peter

My ideal is to open the trails again, but these were never large enough as a something that could remove the wood fuel load. Which had been done by hand, and shagging stuff. I've seen what a small cat track excavator can do. And I am impressed. Maybe that is the answer, and I'll just have get use to the fact that this is going make cuts and roads all over the 16 ac property. Its the big trees that fell, that have me most concerned. These were big trees and should be sold as lumber trees. Yet there are very few of them, and difficult to get to. Maybe enough for one or two logging trucks. I'm just attempting to talk this through, in my own head with advice from others that have been here before. I could just sell the 16 as is. Or put money into it as a thinning operation.

 

[grsthegreat]

I have 20 acres of trees, and maintain about 1.5 miles of trails thru property. Lots of work, and every year more trees come down to start all over again. A few years back we had some bad beetle kill ( maybe e acres). that was so bad it would have taken the rest of my life to clean up. It cost me about 5 grand but had a guy with a forestry mulcher and a 100 hp skid steer clean the place up in a few days. I hated that he opened up such a large area, but it had to be done. The remaining trees are starting to fill in get open areas, and ground shrubs help.

 

[ponytug]

My ideal is to open the trails again, but these were never large enough as a something that could remove the wood fuel load. Which had been done by hand, and shagging stuff. I've seen what a small cat track excavator can do. And I am impressed. Maybe that is the answer, and I'll just have get use to the fact that this is going make cuts and roads all over the 16 ac property. Its the big trees that fell, that have me most concerned. These were big trees and should be sold as lumber trees. Yet there are very few of them, and difficult to get to. Maybe enough for one or two logging trucks. I'm just attempting to talk this through, in my own head with advice from others that have been here before. I could just sell the 16 as is. Or put money into it as a thinning operation.

I defer to experts like @Jstpssng, but if you have trees on the ground, their value as lumber isn't appreciating. So, if you want the big ones out, getting someone in to harvest them sooner rather later would be good. Big can be a relative term, and "big" trees hereabouts are often valuable enough to selectively log with heavy lift helicopters. Some acquaintances thinned some of their forest, and helicopters ended up being both cost effective and minimal cost compared to road building to access the selected trees.

Cutting enough to open trails is a different proposition in my book. As @grsthegreat wrote, a skilled operator can make quick work of it, and an ASV-RT120 can do quite a bit on some fairly steep slopes. Not Power-Trac steep, but pretty steep.

All the best,

Peter

 

[2manyrocks]

If the downed trees can be sold as marketable lumber, at least that helps with the cleanup and the cost plus guys who have the right machinery can get a whole lot done pretty quickly.

 

[JasperFrank]

Thank you Ponytug for suggesting ASV-RT120, I'll ask them if that's what they have. Or something like it.

 

[JasperFrank]

Pushing in branches and sticks yesterday in to the burn piles ... And then this happens. Some how a branch got up in there. Fortunately the radiator is okay.
Think I'll walk out to a field and practice some scream therapy. LOL.

 

[Carl_NH]

Ouch - i take it thats the hydro cooling fan that found a stick. Not fun to change I bet. Sorry for your misfortune.

We had a microburst go through our property in 2006 - sheared 100' pine trees off and dropped some other big oaks. Had a logger in to clear some trees and clean up the mess and he did it for the wood and chips he sold the chips to a power plant.

I got 4000BF of pine out of it too - but today labor/fuel/machines are 2-3 times higher than then. If you can get this done for a bit out of pocket cost then giving away the lumber, with minimal wear and tear on you and your machine, you are better off and can enjoy it now.