Selective thinning

[benedmonds]

20,000 sq m......what is that in real money?? If its 80 hectares , you gonna get burned!!

40 man days 80 hectares

each man 2hectares per day ( 1 hectare = 2.47 acres )

1 man x 5 acres a day......I wouldnt do it if you paid me!! But then I havent walked the site....!

 

I think you've got your sums wrong:

I might be wrong but I think:

 

20,000 m² = 2 Hectares or 4.94210 acre

therefore 500m2 per man per day or a 2000m2 a day..

 

A football pitch is between 5,000-10,000m2

 

Hmm, we might do it quicker..

[Quickthorn]

It would be good to know what species are in there. How is it stocked at the moment..do you have any idea of spacings? Do they ever want access, or will they ever want to extract stuff? If there are plans to extract anything, they'd want to cut racks at some point. What's to happen with the brash? Sorting this out may take more time than the actual felling...I'd have thought 30% removal in one go would be your absolute maximum, favouring trees with best form/few faults. Ash need space early on, oak can cope with a bit more competition.

 

Thinning is always hard to estimate..for comparison, 2 of us coppiced about 1 ha in about 20 days, not including extraction. It was mainly 15 year old regrowth, there was a lot of brash processing to their spec, and we had to work around standards left at about 60 / ha, then go in again when they reviewed what was left and decided more needed to come out. Whether that can be compared with your job, it's very hard to say.

[Quickthorn]

PS

 

How about thinking in terms of trees to be removed? If they're spaced at 3x3m now, that's about 1200 / ha. If you went for a 30 % thin, you'll need to take 720 trees out on your 2 ha site. With 4 men working 10 days, that's 18 trees per man per day. Do you think that's feasible?

[Log-ologist]

If your new to this then 1 acre a day is optomistic.

 

If the client was to mark the trees (or a sample )to be retained then it may be easier for you to visualise.

 

If you ask the owners too many dumb questions they may think you have nebver done this before and ask elsewhere.

 

Find a friendly forestry contractor to price it for you and add a commission.

[benedmonds]

If your new to this then 1 acre a day is optomistic.

 

If the client was to mark the trees (or a sample )to be retained then it may be easier for you to visualise.

 

If you ask the owners too many dumb questions they may think you have nebver done this before and ask elsewhere.

 

Find a friendly forestry contractor to price it for you and add a commission.

 

To be honest the client (a local authority) knows as little about forestry as I do.

 

If my calculations are right 4 men 2000m2 a day that about 1/2 an acre (4046.85642 square meters in one acre). As to getting a forestry contractor it's pretty small scale.

 

It would have been usefull for the client to mark some trees, to show what they want. I've got a pretty good idea what I think should be done and we've easy got the kit to do it. I'm just unsure of how long it will take, which is why I'm after advice from you lot.

 

The client will get 4 quotes from local tree firms and pick the cheapest any how and as there is a "fluffy" brief another firm will probably quote less but do less. This has happened before on different jobs and I've been back to a site and found that they've ony done half what we would have.

[Log-ologist]

With a fluffy brief they tailor the work to suit the quote.

 

I recently priced clearance of holly underwood in just over 5 acres of Scots pine at the same rate as the local mulcher man charges 3.5k in all material left on site. The reason we got to price was the ammount of beech regen mixed in that they wanted to save not mulch. ( 2 experienced blokes 7 days)

 

Also I just priced a clearance for a mountain bike trail of 5 miles in length and the spec was tight as a ducks rse , thats the FC for you.

[Buzz]

Ben I have alot of experience at this sort of work. Arrange a site meeting and get every thing agreed on spec and written down or at least some marking on the ground to avoid your fingers being burned.

If it's local to you give me a bell I'll happily walk the site with you when i'm in the area.

 

Regards, Matt.