neighbors clear cutting

I have always wished we could buy a place with the trees intact, or at least most of them and the do what clearing I think needs doing where I want it.

I have had to make do with what the former owners had done on the 3 places I have bought and lived on to date.

We hope to move one more time and I plan for that move to be where I can lay the place out like I want.

I dont like people seeing my business and to me having a stand of timber and then having the clearings inside with the house and buildings would be ideal.

But I have seen a lot of places in E TX that people bought and all but clear cut it right off, maybe leaving a oak or sweet gum here and there and selling the timber or pulpwood for the cash.

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" Do or do not, there is no try. " - Yoda

They have trees in Hondo, Texas?

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Alice
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"No great thing is created suddenly." ~Epictitus

Depends on where you are Alice, I have a live oak out front that is about 3' in diameter but this whole place was once a 300 acre pecan orchard. Down the road there are some oaks that are half again as big.

But the places I lived that were the worst were in the Huntsville area

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" Do or do not, there is no try. " - Yoda

If they need something to do, tell em to come cut some of this.

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If its my ground that I bought, I dont need a HOA or anyone else telling me what I can do with it...outside of deed restrictions

It happens all the time in Southern Georgia. Someone will buy a parcel of land with timber and almost immediately clear cut it (or at least thin it significantly). It used to bother me when I was younger but it doesn't bother me in the least now. The only time it bothers me really is if people MOVE in to the land once it is clear cut. I also don't mind if they farm it. The timberland here is almost all pines. Mature pines stands are not loaded with tons of diverse forage for animals. Often they do not replant pines (which doesn't seem to happen as much as it did 20 years ago) that they will leave the stumps and just let the land revert to "wild". They will often sell the land again after the timber is cut to yet another buyer. If they let the land revert to "wild" within just a couple years if the soil is half way decent at all there will be a lush diverse greenery there. The animals love it (including any bees since a lot of the new plant life are flowering plants). I think it is a lot more natural and good for the area than a bunch of look alike pine trees all in a row. In ten years you have several trees poking out way higher than the rest of the greenery and in 20 you can't even tell that it used to be an all pine lot at all (although there is sure to be some pines still there since they are very prolific to volunteer).

At least ever since Europeans came over to North America there has been forested land cleared for timber and other uses. It is part of a process. Don't get me wrong I don't want to see all trees cleared out by any means but from what little I understand of it the amount of forested land in the United States isn't vastly different from what it was 20 years ago (even if it isn't the same exact plots of land). And if I am wrong and someone has proof of that feel free to post it (lol I don't mind being wrong if I am just going from what I THINK I had read before).

Our neighbor on the south sold his 400 acres for 700 an acre. We did not know that. Or we would have tried to find some folks to go in on it with us. anyway, the guy who bought it timbered it,it was all wooded. Last month it was sold at auction, 1200 an acre. A guy from Nevada bought the whole thing.

The OP mentioned he had been told the trees were protected under a covenant. If that was so it was possible the new owners were unaware or trying to have it done and then just pay a fine or whatever once it was all over. People do that all the time, it's the old better to say sorry later than ask permission now.

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"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me." C S Lewis

Around here, Forested land = $2-3000/acre. Pasture 5-10,000/acre and up. A lot of people underestimate the work / cost of clearing land. Generally it runs $1000-2000/acre. Which is why there's such a price difference.

Have you talked to the owner?

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Alice
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"No great thing is created suddenly." ~Epictitus

Just curious as to why the people moving to their land bothers you......

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Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto- - Jefferson

Trees grow back. They are a crop. A long term crop. We cut much more than that most every year. It's part of our sustainable forestry work. Mostly not clear cuts but rather selective thinning but sometimes patch cuts. Sometimes someone will complain and moan that it looks ugly and then a couple of years later comment on how beautiful it looks. They just don't understand how it comes back.

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SugarMtnFarm.com -- Pastured Pigs, Poultry, Sheep, Dogs and Kids

LOL I guess I should had clarified that one. The land around me used to be family land years ago it had never been broken down since my grandfather had died in the early 60's. My dad was very sick and wasn't expected to live much longer and (it appeared that ) his brothers felt like it would be easier to deal with him in that condition than with me and my brother. The land was sold at auction for less than what it probably would had gone for if it had been broken down and sold in tracts. The land immediately adjacent to my ten acres was bought and immediately clear cut. I just didn't have the money to bid on very much of it (although I did try to buy the 7 acres immediately besides my property). I had even tried before the auction was arranged to buy some of the land directly from my uncles however they wanted about 3x the price that I was willing to pay (and was fair). When the auction came they didn't even get what I had offered originally...made me sick. As it was after my offer, but before the auction I had a vehicle issue anyway so I didn't have as much money available as i'd hope for the auction. Those tracts of land have sold again but thankfully no neighbors. I moved away from town to get AWAY from people. As it is now my closest neighbor is over 400 yards distance. I really like it that way.

BTW that bit of family history is passed. What is done is done and it is just best to move forward (but just explaining why people moving to clear cut land adjacent to me bothers me--I wasn't clear in my other post).

Well . . . . . . . think about it. Your Uncles dealing with one person (their sibling), or having to deal with two people (their nephews). The more people you have, the more opinions . . . . . .

But yeah, I know what you are saying. Lots of land that used to be "family land" gets broken down. The 150 acre farm that is owned by John and Bertha gets passed down to their 3 children - Bill, Paul, and Sally. Bill, Paul, and Sally build their own houses, so after John and Bertha pass away, they sell their house and 3 acres to new comers to the area. At that time, Bill, Paul, and Sally break the rest of the farm down into 3 different tracts of land - each 49 acres. Sally gets married and moves and sells her 49 acres. Bill and Paul don't have the money, so a guy buys the house and 49 acres and keeps 19 and breaks the remaining 30 acres down into six 5 acre parcels, which are bought up by separate people and a house put on each one. Bill has 2 kids and gives each kid 10 acres which they build a house on. After Bill dies, his 29 acres and house is sold to a new person. 2 of Paul's kids build houses on the his 49 acres. The youngest lives with Paul untilPaul dies, when the land is broken up with the youngest getting 19 acres, and the other two each getting 15.

Within 3 generations, the 150 acre farm that only had one house, now has 14 houses on it - and it doesn't resemble farm land anymore. In fact, you can't even tell it was, because the barn and outbuildings fell down long ago.

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Michael W. Smith in North-West Pennsylvania

"Everything happens for a reason."

Or you can get the opposite.

Back in the 1800's our farm was an entire village. There were many houses. Then the cold snap hit causing crop failure for multiple years in a row and much of Vermont emptied out heading west to easier land and the gold rush. There were just a few farms left in our valley. The got consolidated in the 1900's but not strongly farmed so the trees grew up almost completely covering all the old fields. The houses all fell down except for ours. Ours was the first house in the valley and it is the last house. Now there are a few new houses but at this point 99% of the valley is consolidated as one farm, ours.

Turns out you can bring back the wild lands.

-Walter

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SugarMtnFarm.com -- Pastured Pigs, Poultry, Sheep, Dogs and Kids

Yeah, Like I said what is passed is passed and I understand fully why what went on. No hard feelings in any of it now. I think in retrospect now both my uncles feel they could had handled things better than they did at the time and admittedly so could I. Neither live here anymore (the closest 20 miles away the other 80 miles away) so they didn't have the ties to it as they once did when they were younger. We get along pretty well now I think. All told there were close to 300 acres that were sold.

I actually live on a road named after my great grandparents who owned more than 4000 acres on this road. Several large families had it broken down multiple times and many transactions also saw large chunks of it sold. It is what it is. At least I still own a part of what has been family land for several generations. It is what the Lord has seen fit to entrust me with for now and I am thankful for that and will do my best to with it (lol even if all the topsoil was sold off in 1970 leaving me nothing but hard clay).

Unfortunately with 5 kids of my own I don't see any large land gifts in their future but I assure you that they will at least appreciate and care for whatever they get the opportunity to have in the future.

I think it all gets down to the fact that most of us are here because we like a rural lifestyle and with that, we always envision uninterrupted woods (except for our cleared pastures and outbuildings and house of course!!. But we must, along with our dream property, also keep in mind. We either believe in individual land rights, or we do not!! Nostalgia is good and dreaming of a perfect little (or big) homestead is fine. When we get to the point of trying to stop someone from developing their own property to protect our idea of what it should be. To me, then we have crossed a line and are wrong for it. I have 13 acres adjoining my new property I would like to have, but the cost is too high.
I imagine in time it will be broken up and sold as lots and houses built. I wish it would not be done, but it is not my property. I certainly will hate to see it, but at the same time, I would not do anything to keep the owner from doing what they believe is in their best interest for their own property.

Down HERE in NE Okla, theres a lot of that, breaking off sections for kids, ect. Up home in NE Kans, they don't do that. Kid buys an available farm or moves to town till ones available. Theres so few farmers in Doniphan Co Kans, that they can usually do that. Sometimes the kids fine they like living in town.

Forcast, what part of the country are you in?

I'm in N. Arizona and treed lots here are a routine point of contention between neighbors -- because of fire danger vs. the "save the trees" mentality. Thinning lots down to a few big trees is highly encouraged, and smart owners do this. (I think we have about 18 trees on our lot, which is an acre.) However, there's always somebody who loves the look of a heavily treed lot and objects to cutting trees down -- even when it's not their lot, and it's done to protect homes and property and so that the remaining trees are healthier.

This isn't going to be poplar here but the day that you did not buy the land you stopped having a say so over it.
My farms are mine and under my control and if you do not like what I am doing you should have bought them before me. I have a neighbor that lives behind me which has already called the sheriff on me parking my truck on the back access to my land. They are on probation by me and if they raise their little head up to complain any more there will be a rental house (THE ONLY ONE ON MY FARM) at their driveway. I am clearing trees taking down barns and getting roads back to be able to use the land.
You live in a Republic that was set on the promise that your land is yours and not the government where you came from and when you allow people to tell you how to live you are on the way to become a subject not a citizen.
Yes I will be replanting the ceder that I am cutting with Fruit and nut bearing trees.

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