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Of the 80 acres on the DBN Farm, approximately 70 areas are wooded in a combination of native Ohio hardwoods, and native and non-native pines. In the mid-1980’s when the farm was sold to Grant Kittle, the previous owner sold the timber rights to most trees over 18" diameter. This timber sale reduced the number of large oaks, maples and hickory left in the forest, but did open up a number of hiking paths as they created skid trails for removing the logs. Several very large (3-5’ diameter) oaks were spared during this cut and serve to remind us of what size old growth trees really are — HUGE!
DBN is a member in the Eastern Central Ohio Forestry Association (ECOFA) and has developed a long-term forestry plan in conjunction with the Ohio Division of Forestry. This plan sought to maintain a multi-use forest that would eventually return to a primarily Ohio-native hardwood stand. Scott Costello created a plan that allowed helped us define areas that were best for:
- Selectively cutting red pine stands to allow for natural hardwood regrowth
- Re-establishing sugar maple stands through planting of Ohio State’s high-yield saplings
- Crop tree development
- Wildlife habitat and food sources
- Recreation
Though Carroll County is known for its pine trees (#1 pine tree production county in Ohio), we have 20+ acres of non-indigeneous red pines planted by the Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC) in the 1930’s and 1940’s. Now over 60 years old, these red pines have never been thinned are beginning to "naturally harvest" themselves as they die from old age, competition from other trees or storm damage.
During wind storms, we loose dead, weak and even healthy trees as the domino-effect pushes through valleys of red pine stands. These blow downs create not only a mess of very large pick-up-sticks, but they also take out good hardwood regrowth, block hiking paths, and can be down right dangerous. As Gary Roof (our timber farmer) says, "you really don’t want to be in the woods when we have high winds down here."
DBN generally plans to use these "naturally selected" trees for small scale timber harvests into the foreseeable future. Best management practices for harvesting will be employed to minimize impact on the surround forest. For example, during the red pine harvest for our house’s timber frame, 4-5 tree tops, or slash, were grouped into piles in order to create wild life habitat. Logging trails were designed to create new hiking paths and were immediately seeded to minimize erosion.
In 2001, we purchased our own band saw mill. This 1991 Timber King allows use to mill trees up to 30" in diameter and up to 16’ long. Though a little older, it has hydraulics that load the log, turn the log and move the band carriage. I’m far from and expert at this point, but I’m getting pretty good at sawing dimentional lumber for rough construction projects. Hopefully with time we can create another income source from our own trees and from other "naturally selected" trees in our area.
What have we learned?
- Trees look bigger in the woods than they do on the saw mill
- It’s hard to cut a live tree
- You need a long rope — winch
- Trees = boards
- Find a good use for the slabs
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