noble fir foliage.

[s o c]

hi. we may be felling and reducing a lot of douglas and noble fir in 2 weeks in a small mixed forest. mostly edge trees and trees too tall to straight fell so the timber will not go anywhere near covering the cost of the job.

has anyone on here any experience of harvesting noble fir foliage? i have a customer for it provided he is happy with the quality.

just wondering if its worthwhile. if it was it could become a small annual income for the client from his forest.

any imput/advice would be appreciated. thanks

[s o c]

:001_smile:bump

[Scott Walker]

Try some garden centres they use it to make wreaths and as we're coming upto Xmas you might get so lucky.

[Spruce Pirate]

I used to be involved in NF foliage for wreaths. Very rarely enjoyed it. Always found it difficult to make money on it when cutting it, bundling it etc. There are, or at least were, several different grades of foliage, I'd suggest you speak to the prospective buyer and send them some samples of your foliage, see if they're interested and what they're paying. We always cut foliage from the standing tree, either with a lopper or climbing, I've never cut from felled trees. The foliage had to be cut as a minimum of 3 branch whorls. I would think that damage from felling may be an issue, but I do know that others harvest foliage this way (a mate of mine did a bit the other year from felled trees). Overall I think it would be hard to add sufficient value to the job you're talking about by cutting foliage to bring it into profit, but I could be wrong.

 

Sorry if that's all a bit rambling, thoughts as they come to me.

[s o c]

thanks for replies. sounds like labour would eat any income . i am sending samples to a fella interested in buying some so we will see what he offers.