Bugs, Fire, Old Age is why we need to Log

      Yellowstone burned  in 1989, we learned why  Proper Forest Management  now includes a “let it burn policy”  if you don't log the excess, bugs infested the forests, you must remove the forest fuels, litter, brush, dead trees,  by logging, thinning, pruning, or controlled burning or it ends up like Yellowstone in 1989.            

  Jack Pine-Lodgepole  grow so thick sunlight cant get to the forest floor.

  Land burnt in the great fire of 1910. This is re growth is from that fire.

     

  Bark Beetle Killed Timber,  Lodge pole is peculiar, its life blood (sap) flow,  is on the outside ring. Other trees its in the center (heartwood). Bark Beetle eat the fresh, new ring of tender wood just under the paper thin Lodge pole's bark.  That girdles the flow and kills the tree. See below the Girdling under the bark?  The pine fights back by plugging the holes with pitch. See above       

     Soon the tallest timber will hog the sunlight, moisture & nutrients from the weaker lodgepole.  They self prune, self thin to allow the healthiest to thrive. The big thick bark Firs, Larches Ponderosa Pine can endure ground fires  and bark beetles.  But wind, other bugs, hottest of fires and drought take them for the next 300 plus years. Then it starts again.

Below Lodge Pole Pine or Jack Pine, see the colors and thin bark and I’m trying to show bug damage on the surface only of the wood

    This land we purposely disturbed the ground, it allows the seeds to take hold on the rich  glacial silt soil (ph 6.65 ) With out this  process the seeds lay  inches above the soil on the duff and never take root. In several years from now the trees will be thick as dog hair. You’ll see the boyzs in them below.

  Below 1995, the boyzs (Zack and Zane) in 7 year old lodge pole  after a fire the seeds fall into the ash. Lodge Pole  or  Jack Pine  is one of the only sun tolerant  trees that love the ph in the ash. Cones  need near  300 degree heat to pop open so the seeds can land in the  fresh ash. 

   Soon growing a thick forest canopy. Shade from the Jack Pine allows new species like  Firs, Spruces, Alpines to they take root,  there superior competitors, they will take over. Jack Pine cant compete for the  limited sunlight,  Lodgepole cant survive without lots of sun so it dies, standing, drying waiting to burn or fall some distant day. Bark Beetles,  wind or a light ground fire can easily devastate  the thin bark Jack Pine  forests but not the other species.

 Environmentally  Friendly  Utilization  of Small Log Forest  Woody Biomass

                           Home of bone dry lodgepole  pine house logs,  we mill at 1/3  the moisture  of finished Kiln Dried Lumber

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  Right   is  lodgepole Pine tree dying from Bark Beetles see the tree trying to fight the holes into the trunk base by plugging the bug holes  with a self defense tactic called pitch, sap. This 60 year old tree has lived because it gets more sunlight... dad says “ more sun, more pitch, trees out in the open they can survive.”

     The Bark Beetle does not hurt the wood, just the outer ring, we mill off the outer rings to make a round true strait house log...at this point it is  bone dry, all the twisting, warping, shrinking drying  has naturally taken place...free of charge! 

We thin out the dead as it is happening

Lighting Fire

1975  back yard

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Same land 2011 after the beetles

What old timber does

What managed and logged forests look like first year

What logging looks like a few years latter, new trees starting

 Fall Colors in the Flathead oct. 12-15 ish   Zane 1999

Axmen Zane

    several years after a fire Lodgepole Pine...Jackpine

you tube  hubblelogging       

Axmen Zane and Zac 1990

             Wilderness Building Systems

   Logging

Tally Lake Ranger District

Flathead National Forest

                             Shares our border

 

 

Logging …

 

     Is a common sense approach, we use a dead standing, renewable, regrowable and resource.

      We save energy manufacturing  WHY SO EFFICIENT ? We mill a round log ...Round!  And we save wildlife habitat, living trees and land from forest fire and the costs to taxpayers.

 

     Timber thrives with the sun, soil, certain temperature conditions and water. Growing  wonderful living things  world wide every minute of every day, unwatched trees, timber, will grow constantly.

    When then die of old age, fire or disease, they go unused, they rot, catch fire, burn, breed bugs then it starts all over again. We intervene, seek the dead or dying trees  for our source of logs. Pine Bark Beetle girdle the tree eating the last years fresh growth ring. Then hatch, fly away, we harvest them and mill that damage away.

 

Lodge Pole Pine and Doug Fir, we use Dead standing, after they mature the beetles weaken their resilience and they self thin. The dead timber seen on the forest floor is now called Biomass.