What to do with all the trees?

[Jason Woods]

My father-in-law lives in Anahuac, TX, which is about 45 minutes from Houston (east side of Galveston bay). He alone has TONS of oak trees that were damaged in one way or another from hurricane Ike. I'm still waiting on pictures, but many have either had their tops knocked off or were knocked over in one piece. We're talking probably 20-40 fully grown oak trees here.

I'd REALLY hate to see these trees left to rot or burned in a burn pile.

Some basic questions I have:

1) How long do we have until the freestanding/laying trees are no good?
2) What should we do to the trees to facilitate future milling? Cut length, end treatments, etc.
3) What is considered the smallest usable/millable size log (both length and circumference)?

If anybody is interested or knows someone who might be interested in milling these please let me know. This could be a work for wood arrangement, or something else that is equally equitable for all parties.

He has a tractor and trailer on site, but we really need someone with a portable mill and a strategy for drying all the resulting lumber (which I suppose could occur onsite if something is built/setup to do so). Given the extensive damage in the area I doubt anyone local is going to be available anytime soon. There are probably other opportunities in the area as well if this amount of lumber isn't big enough for the trouble.

[Per Swenson]

Jason,

Though there is always a morality issue from gleaning opportunity from tragedy, somebody has to do it.

If I lived there and was not financially wiped by Ike,
I would have all ready ordered a trailer able mill.

Put a few guys to work and make the best of a bad situation.

Per

[Steve Nouis]

1 White oak will last years as a log, red oak 2 or 3 years, pine saw soon as possible.
2 102" is stanard cut length but any length is OK so long as your shop is long enough to handle it, use at least 3/4" stickers, 5 on each row for 102" with the end ones close to the end, when drying the boards will only crack untill they get to a sticker.

3 9" on the small end is as small as you want to go and then there won't be much good lumber in a log that small unless your after the rustic look.
You might have trouble finding someone to cut on shares as most mills have too much lumber allready, I sure do. You can air dry outside or in a open shed, if outside cover with a loose cover leaving a little space between the cover and lumber. In a shed run a fan on the pile for a week or 2 untill the surface moister is gone. You might want to check with the DNR or over on the forestry forum to find a local sawer. If you get a bandmill make sure it has lots of hydraulics and maybe a diesel which saw way faster than a 25HP gas. If your logs are much over 30" on the big end they won't fit through a lot of bandmills(some can go bigger) and your might get a swing mill instead which can handle big logs. Steve

[alex grams]

Jason,
Are most of them live oak? You would be lucky to get a live oak that has a straight trunk of 10" before any major splits/crotches/branches.

I am on the west side of Houston myself, and 90% of oaks are Live oaks which are short and stumpy and not much trunk before they split. The rest are river/water oaks which tend to be taller in the trunk, but have to be pretty big to be worthwhile in terms of lumber.

I don't know the quality of oak from a live oak, anyone got any experience they can chime in with?

[Jim Becker]

The poplar logs I had milled yesterday were sitting for a year due to the logistics of our addition construction project. There was a small amount of spalting on two log ends, but otherwise, it was fine. The ends had been coated with AnchorSeal and that helped a lot.

[Jason Woods]

Thanks for the tips so far. If we clean up the logs and leave them sitting for awhile I assume we should get them off the ground to keep them from rotting? It stays pretty wet down there.

Neither of us is really looking to profit off of this mess, I just hate to see more needless waste come from this disaster.

I'm not sure of the exact Oak species (I'm not a big user of Oak myself), but most of them had good straight trunks.

[Jason Woods]

I just found some info on the Woodmizer website for people looking for assistance (or those who want to provide assistance). So far though, no sawyers have signed up in Texas. Here's the link:

http://www.woodmizer.com/us/floodDamage/flood.aspx

[Neal Clayton]

the guy i get my longleaf pine from in MS does the same thing. he went around after katrina and removed topped trees for people, in exchange for being able to keep the logs, with the plans to make floors from it all. he had a construction business before so already had bobcats and trucks, just had to buy the sawmills.

in his words "i've done alot of stupid things, but this ranks up near the top".

it wound up being alot more labor intensive than he thought it would be, and without being able to get something of value from poor quality logs like the bigger sawmills do with pulp and mulch and such, it quickly becomes a break even or lose equation from what he told me. i have no personal experience but figured the frustrations of someone else might be worthwhile. /shrug

[alex grams]

Good input Neal. It may be more economical for Jason to gather a pile of stuff together and have it set up for the sawyer then, so he can maximize the efficiency of the sawyer.

Let us know how it goes Jason if you do it, I would be interested in seeing what you get.

Also, I would have absolutely no moral qualms with taking advantage of the situation. It isn't like you are causing the damage so you can take advantage of the opportunity. As some would say, to make lemons out of lemonade is the typical American ingenuitive spirit.

[Jim Becker]

Jason, off the ground would be a good idea if it can be effected.

[Jason Woods]

The rough idea I am forming in my head is that we would prepare the logs (trim/cut/seal) and stack them in an easy to get to place before having someone with a mill come onsite. They would then hopefully have to spend minimal time getting them all cut up.

From the sound of it, we may not be able to find anyone willing to mill "for wood" (keeping say 50-70% of it) or pay us for the rough logs outright. This would certainly be my preference though.

I'm not sure how feasible it is for us to pay to have all this milled and keep all the wood ourselves. We certainly don't really need it, but maybe we could look at it as an investment which we could sell later. If this were maple or cherry I'd do this in a split second. I just don't have much personal use for Oak though.

Does anybody have a link to some bd ft calculators/tables for logs?

If I can't locate any Anchorseal to seal the logs, is asphalt roofing cement an ok alternative? Any other alternatives that are easily available?

[Neal Clayton]

i use plain white latex exterior paint from the BORG on mine. it spends ~3 months in south louisiana (high moisture) then to my shop in arkansas (low moisture) and splitting has been minimal on old growth pine, which is more prone to split than oak to start with.

i think any sealer is sufficient.

[Tony Bilello]

but the few people that I have met that have them actually use them as a side business. Most of them were into land clearing and leveling. They make their big money on that and mill the trees when and if they have spare time. I would think it would be difficult down here to make a living on just a small portable sawmill. i may be wrong.

Tony B