Clearing woods- Your experience?

[kruizeag]

I recently looked at a property easily in my budget that is covered in trees. Its almost 40 acres of 20-30 year old pine trees in a secluded yet convienent area. It has perked and has power and phone through the property. It also has a pond that is fed by a spring fed stream.

My concern is whether it is worth buying and clearing the ground for farm land to plant vegetable crops on. Have any of you cleared 20 year old trees and converted it to farm land? I know our ancestors did that, but is it really worth the labor? If you have done it, would you do it again or would you buy land already cleared. Pros/ Cons?

If we buy it, we plan to build a log house and pole barn. We would sell the remaining trees for lumber. We are looking to clear at least 20 acres completely for vegetable crops. The remainder would be partially cleared for livestock pasture. I have partially cleared areas for pasture, but not for field crops. Thoughts?

20 acres = Bulldozer

[MullersLaneFarm]

I humbly suggest you purchase land that is already cleared & have house and pole barn on it.

[BTO]

I live in Maine. My first homestead was 60 acres of raw land. We had a company come in and chip the trees. We didn't get paid for it but there were no branches or mess to clean up. Of course after that we had to hire a excavator to pop the stumps and a small dozer to move them. It really is the way to go if you get a good price on the raw land IMO.

[watcher]

Never cleared land for farming but I can tell you clearing trees from land and getting the land level/smooth is a long hard job. This is one reason raw land is so much cheaper than improved land.

Remember each tree has roots which means there going to be a hole in the ground where each tree stands. How deep and wide depends on the type of tree.

FYI, I'm still clearing trees and stumps and trying to level our 'yard'.

[Harry Chickpea]

20-30 YO pine trees = tree farm.

[Cotton Picker]

Hi Kruizeag,

You're the one who is going to have to ask yourself if it is worth the effort to clear. Do you have any experience in timber? Are you going to DIY or hire it done? I don't know what dozers rent for, however, with most rentals, hauling the equipment is on your dime.

If the land is worth the money and you aren't in any hurry, you might buy the land for an investment and clear it as you have time and ambition. You don't mention what type of pine nor tree diameter. You might try to get an extension forester to come out and advise you on the best use for the timber. If there is enough saw-log timber, selective or clear cut, you might invest in a Woodmizer mill or see if someone who has one would cut it on shares. You would need a covered place to stack dry it though.

You aren't that far from Richmond.... How much is a cord of pine selling for there? Is there a demand for pine chips at plant nurseries in your area? If you do cut the timber and plan on clearing the land you are going to have to leave from two to three feet of each tree out of the ground in order to facilitate stumping it out with a dozer. As has already been mentioned, you will have stump holes. If your topsoil is thin, it will become even thinner back-filling the holes.

I would say that it would take several years of tilling and soil building in order to have good cropland. Root runners and such will probably give you more than just a little frustration while prepping the ground.

Clearing land of timber and brush is no chore for the faint of heart in it's own right. Add to it making arable soil once the timber's cleared and you've got an ambitious project ahead of you to say the least.

Happy Trails

[unioncreek]

Find a small logging or mill operation and have them log it off. If the lumber is worth something you'll make some money on it. If there good tree's why not cut and dry them and build a log home or building.

Bob

[DaleK]

It depends a lot on how good the trees are and what the market is. We've cleared a lot of hardwood forests over the years. Dozers don't work well, cutting the trees doesn't work well... the stumps leave bigger holes if you have to dig them out. What really works well is going in with an excavator and using the weight of the tree to pop the stump out as you take the tree down, makes a lot smaller hole. Then you can cut the stump off later and push them away. We've taken old worn out sugar bushes and turned them into good corn fields within a year that way.

Pines will be different, I suspect you'll have more of an issue with pH in a pine forest than in hardwoods but we don't have much pine here.

[swamp man]

Originally Posted by kruizeag

I recently looked at a property easily in my budget that is covered in trees. Its almost 40 acres of 20-30 year old pine trees in a secluded yet convienent area. It has perked and has power and phone through the property. It also has a pond that is fed by a spring fed stream.

My concern is whether it is worth buying and clearing the ground for farm land to plant vegetable crops on. Have any of you cleared 20 year old trees and converted it to farm land? I know our ancestors did that, but is it really worth the labor? If you have done it, would you do it again or would you buy land already cleared. Pros/ Cons?

If we buy it, we plan to build a log house and pole barn. We would sell the remaining trees for lumber. We are looking to clear at least 20 acres completely for vegetable crops. The remainder would be partially cleared for livestock pasture. I have partially cleared areas for pasture, but not for field crops. Thoughts?

20 acres is a whoooooooole lot for veggies, but if you're gonna' go for it all at once, get a dozer. You don't need an excavator for 20 year-old pines, and the dozer will level the area and fill the stump holes as well. A medium dozer and operator cost around $100-$125/hr around here, and a good operator can get an amazing amount of work done in a short time.
Yep, on a smaller scale, I've done it completely by hand (as in, a good chainsaw, lotsa' cold beer, and sheer determination), and this last area I've cleared I've had a 40 horse tractor with a loader and box blade to help. In both cases, the timber company has bought the timber, but left it to me to clean up anything but the logs, get rid of what stumps I'm able to, and level it.
My timber in the areas I've cleared is around 20 yrs old, and stumps I couldn't pull have taken between two and three years to rot out....if you're in a hurry, you're gonna' need that dozer.
Is this native volunteer timber, or properly planted timber? If the latter is the case, and it's been managed properly on decent land, 20 year old pines oughta' be on the verge of being worth a healthy chunk of $. They shoulda' been thinned once, or have taken a recent second thinning. If that's the case, I'd clear just what you need now, and give them trees a few more years.
The price of timber is in the toilet right now anyway, at least around here.
Good luck.

[kruizeag]

My father-in-law is a tree nurseryman. I am aware of the holes trees can leave behind. My dad and I years ago used the loader on the tractor to push over smaller trees (8-10" diameter at most) and that worked well. Of course that was only in a pasture and on the edge of the fields, not fields turned into crops.

I would be doing the work myself. I am stubborn that way. I have some logging experience so I am not scared to jump in. I also have a tractor but no loader or dozer. I would rent or buy one if I can.

[eddiemac]

If you live among the amish, that could be a very eco friendly way to go to clear some acerage without tearing up your land with all that heavy equipment. Our guy did use a chain saw but the logs were hauled out with teams of draft horses. I know they like to do this in the wintertime where snow is on the ground which makes it easier to drag logs out and leaves less impact on the land. The logs then can be painted by type and sold to a local mill... Hope this helps.

eddiemac ;-D

[Highground]

Around here timber prices are way down. All the mills are laying off. Ain't no way I'd be trying to sell any pine logs in this economy. Rack 'em and cover 'em and wait for better times if you have to take 'em down. Then put a dozer to work on the stumps.

[Sawmill Jim]

Pine stains fast in a pile an those pesky bugs eat a bunch .Mill it put sticks between the layers an use it . Here pine stumps are easy to get up they burn fast too.

[eddiemac]

I had an inventory hard maple, cherry and ash which brought in better numbers and it was all timbered at least a year ago when prices per board ft. was worth more, it's another sign of the times...

eddiemac;-D

[fantasymaker]

What size are they? Are you getting the land enough cheeper to make it worth the trouble?
The way to clear 20 acres of pines is to have someone with 2 dozers and a cable between them windrow them over then do the clean up yourself with a chainsaw and backhoe.

[texican]

Depending on your location, you might add four or five hundred dollars of 'prepping' the forest into fields... and probably two years of work. After clearing the first year, numerous sprouts are going to pop up.

Add the time/money equation and if it's still a deal, go for it. Personally, if I had good pine trees, I''d buy it for a plantation, and in a few years, thin it, and pay for half the property... That's what I did. Bought a plantation in 96 for 500/acre, thinned the trees in 03, paid for half the cost of the land. "IF" pine trees ever have value again, I could thin again and pay off the remainder of the original purchase price. [Of course, I paid cash, so there are no interest costs]. A portion of the plantation was sold last year, for 5k an acre.

[tallpines]

Our woods had NEVER been cut off until we cleared a couple acres for our house and garden.

Once all the vegetation was gone we had very poor soil remaining for a garden.

With the removal of stumps, any top soil had gotten thoroughly mixed in with the prominent sand that lay beneath.

We hauled in MANY, MANY loads of composted manure (before selling the farm) just to get the small garden area we have now.

Once your trees are gone, it may take lots and lots of soil preparation to get your 20 acres of veggies.

[Ceres Hil]

how about pasturing hogs--let them eat the brush down then log it off...

[indianheadranch]

what i would do is take a random soil sample where you want to clear the area gives you somewhat of an idea of what nutrients the soil needs, a dozer would be a good idea lots of topsoil displacement, the best idea is a trackhoe dig stump and tree, cut logs put stump back in hole & cover then pile brush and harvest timber for future use at the same time, if for some reason soil displacement isnt an issue for your garden then a good size dozer would do you fine just remember not only removing the timber is not the last thing you have to worry about sometimes under brush to small for a dozer and to big for a cutter disk is a problem, not to mention the rocks 3 to 6 inches under the ground trust me i ran into this a few years back for what it cost me to clean up 35 acres i could have bought a cleaned 15 acres clear and lein free just down the road with better soil for less than what i cost me to clean the area, a hard lesson learned for me. ask your neighbors in the coffee shops they usually can give you a better idea what is available & best option in your immediate area just my 2 pennies.