Thinning the Forest - Part One

Step One - Eastern Red Cedar Removal

Here in the Arkansas Ozarks we have an abundance of Eastern Red Cedar. Seriously, it grows like weeds. 

All forests need to be thinned on a regular cycle to maintain the health of the forest.  It's important to maintain a balance of old growth and young trees. Cedar grows so prevalently on our hills that it can more aggressively be thinned. Since it has been a few decades since this chore has been addressed on the farm, there are several older growth large cedars as well as a bazillion tiny baby cedars.

We aren't quite sure what to do with all of the little ones that need to be removed and thinned (we will, of course, leave some) from the fields and forest edges. It is a shame to waste a product that has a viable use (cedar oil, cedar mulch, cedar chips, cedar pellets) but alas we don't have a means of making use of this waste wood at this time. We may stockpile some of it until we can afford to chip it and go from there, but we've yet to find a viable market for our eastern red cedar woody biomass waste or the logs smaller than 4 inches in diameter. It won't take long for us to have a small mountain of debris, we don't want to burn.

The logs that have a 6" or bigger cant (square log that can be cut from the heart) within the proper length are being sold to a mill about 35 miles from Barren Creek Farm. While they don't bring us a lot of cash, it is better than wasting the wood and it really does need to be logged. Still, it seems there should be a better market for the wood, especially when mills complain they don't have enough wood to saw. While the payout is disappointing, it is a relief to see progress made toward reclaiming the farm.

We have a lot of eastern red cedar to log off the land, hopefully we'll come up with a solution for the wood waste that is economically feasible and environmentally sound. Feel free to chime in with your solutions, especially if you know of any buyers willing to pay a good price for the logs!