Help pricing standing hardwood firewood

[Big J]

As I have a small forwarder coming in June, I would like to get some experience under my belt up near Edinburgh before moving down to Devon. There is a nice woodland with amenity value almost directly next to our house. It's stretches for about 400m as an increasingly wide dividing belt between two large fields before fanning out down by the railway line. It's mostly sycamore and ash, with some birch and oak, and the occasional horse chestnut. Also plenty of scrub elm. There is about 13 acres all in, and the longest extraction distance would be 450m, with 2/3 of the that over a field (so quicker). 

 

It's not massively dense, but it would certainly benefit from a thin. There is in places a lot of canopy competition and already a fair proportion of the non dominant trees have been closed out. The terrain is easy, with only one wet area, which is directly around a drain. Easy to avoid or traverse. There are two badger setts, both of which are easy to stay well clear of (though the contractors clearing for the railway didn't afford the little beasts such courtesy - there are trees down over the larger sett). I would also, obviously stay a couple of tree lengths away from the railway cutting. Finally, some of the sycamore at the narrowest part of the woodland would require a gentle winch assist to keep them in the woodland rather than the field. 

 

Other than that, it's straightforward. 

 

My plan was to do a gentle thin, taking perhaps one in 4-5 trees (when averaged out over the whole woodland, as some areas don't need any work and others more). I'd prioritise the Oak, followed by the birch and sycamore. That being said, some of the birch are fairly large so how long they have left is questionable. The ash doesn't have a desperately long life ahead of it so I'd expect that the Estate would be happy to see that thinned more heavily. The trees are a good size, with an average DBH of 375mm or thereabouts, and they are well drawn.

 

My question is, what would you be offering the Estate for the timber standing? I've done harvesting before, but only for milling timber. The firewood was always incidental, and didn't really factor in as part of the calculations (as firewood arising from larger hardwood felling is never that pretty). My feeling is somewhere around £15/t, as the extraction route is fairly long in places, and the winch assisting on some of the edge trees will slow us down. They have done a lot of heavy handed felling around the estate in the last few years, and my approach would be diametrically opposite, and they'd barely be able to tell that I'd been in once we'd finished. At a rough guess, I'd think we'd end up with 150-200t. My plan is to put a proposal in with the estate next week.

 

I can get photos easily. 

 

Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

Edited March 24, 2018 by Big J

[arboriculturist]

TCD's your man for this J, especially as he is well versed in the firewood element. 

[the village idiot]

30 minutes ago, Big J said:

As I have a small forwarder coming in June, I would like to get some experience under my belt up near Edinburgh before moving down to Devon. There is a nice woodland with amenity value almost directly next to our house. It's stretches for about 400m as an increasingly wide dividing belt between two large fields before fanning out down by the railway line. It's mostly sycamore and ash, with some birch and oak, and the occasional horse chestnut. Also plenty of scrub elm. There is about 13 acres all in, and the longest extraction distance would be 450m, with 2/3 of the that over a field (so quicker). 

 

It's not massively dense, but it would certainly benefit from a thin. There is in places a lot of canopy competition and already a fair proportion of the non dominant trees have been closed out. The terrain is easy, with only one wet area, which is directly around a drain. Easy to avoid or traverse. There are two badger setts, both of which are easy to stay well clear of (though the contractors clearing for the railway didn't afford the little beasts such courtesy - there are trees down over the larger sett). I would also, obviously stay a couple of tree lengths away from the railway cutting. Finally, some of the sycamore at the narrowest part of the woodland would require a gentle winch assist to keep them in the woodland rather than the field. 

 

Other than that, it's straightforward. 

 

My plan was to do a gentle thin, taking perhaps one in 4-5 trees (when averaged out over the whole woodland, as some areas don't need any work and others more). I'd prioritise the Oak, followed by the birch and sycamore. That being said, some of the birch are fairly large so how long they have left is questionable. The ash doesn't have a desperately long lift ahead of it so I'd expect that the Estate would be happy to see that thinned more heavily. The trees are a good size, with an average DBH of 375mm or thereabouts, and they are well drawn.

 

My question is, what would you be offering the Estate for the timber standing? I've done harvesting before, but only for milling timber. The firewood was always incidental, and didn't really factor in as part of the calculations (as firewood arising from larger hardwood felling is never that pretty). My feeling is somewhere around £15/t, as the extraction route is fairly long in places, and the winch assisting on some of the edge trees will slow us down. They have done a lot of heavy handed felling around the estate in the last few years, and my approach would be diametrically opposite, and they'd barely be able to tell that I'd been in once we'd finished. At a rough guess, I'd think we'd end up with 150-200t. My plan is to put a proposal in with the estate next week.

 

I can get photos easily. 

 

Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

Sounds good and well thought out to me.

 

Quote seems about right.

 

Would be great to see some pictures.

[Big J]

[Big J]

Last picture is of the tree over the badger sett

 

[Big J]

There are whole areas that don't need to be touched, but also some very dense clumps where one in two trees needs to go. At the near end in the denser section, the trees average about 0.75 tonnes at a guess dropping to about 0.3 tonnes in the middle, increasing again to about 0.75 at the bottom. Maximum travel time with forwarder from furthest point of the site is about 5 minutes along a bridle way.

[Khriss]

Badger sett ! Railway line ! Make sure yr paperwork is sorted out mate ! K

[gdh]

£15 a ton sounds fair as it looks like a nice site to work on and assuming you can leave the brash in the woods. 

[Big J]

2 hours ago, Khriss said:

Badger sett ! Railway line ! Make sure yr paperwork is sorted out mate ! K

There are two setts in there. One is in a very sparse area of trees (so no felling required) and the other one is right on the railway embankment, so we wouldn't be going near there. 

 

I'm glad that I'm not a million miles away at £15. Thanks chaps

Edited March 24, 2018 by Big J

[Khriss]

From memory it's 10m from a known sett  ( tho' they tunnel fr miles in clay/sand ) an Obvs two tree lengths from track / overheads fr yr felling. But a nice job to get  k