Appraising Timber For Sale

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31089, 18 June 1966, Page 8

Appraising Timber For Sale

'THE main object of a recent field day held by the Mid-Canterbury Farm Forestry Association was the appraisal and marketing of standing timber. Mr F. Armitage, who recently retired from the Forest Service, and who is now doing this work on commission for farmers and local bodies, spoke.

A report to association members on the field day says that it looks as though the long foretold shortage of milling timber has now arrived in Canterbury. The Forest Service has doubled its basic stumpage price to 9.8 d a cube. Without being unduly optimistic, it could be said that farmers were likely to have much less difficulty in getting rid of standing timber at a profitable price, provided it showed any quality at all. At the same time it was felt that farmers would be most unwise to accept any offer for their timber without being sure they knew what they had got both in quantity and quality. If they were in doubt about this they should get expert advice.

There were two aspects of the business of selling timber—what the farmer himself could do in the way of measuring his own timber and what the expert could do, what he charged and what extra value could be expected if he was paid for his services.

On the question of what the farmer could do, the report says that for a small amount of timber—say five acres of woodlot or a fairly good shelter belt—the farmer could measure his own trees and get a reasonable idea of the number of cubic feet of tim-

ber, its quality and distance to market. This gave him a basis on which to talk to sawmillers or to assess any price he was offered.

The Forest Service sold timber by the cubic foot and farmers were strongly advised to stick to this and not to be led away by any talk about how many board feet —Goss scale or Hakon Dahl or anything else—there was in a log. Farmers sold trees whoso volumes and quality could be accurately assessed. The farmer who wanted to do his own appraising should therefore concern himself with getting the volume in cubic feet for his stand as nearly as he could with the tools available on a farm. Most members of the association had the Handbook for Farm Foresters and in chapter seven the rules for simple measurement were given. Mr W. Jolliffe, who had written

the chapter, stressed that the methods given were for general approximations. He had said that if an acucrate appraisal of a woodlot was required then expert help should be enlisted. For a fee of 0.3 d to 0.7 d a cube, according to the nature of the job, distance to be travelled, etc., the expert would tell the farmer how much saw log timber he had. He would also advise on selling, call tenders and generally put his knowledge and experience at the farmer’s disposal. The need for correct and timely silviculture was emphasised by Mr F. J. Gimblett, forest extension officer. Diminishing indigenous supplies made the production of clean timber an urgent necessity. Every possible effort should be made by woodlot owners to low prune, high prune and thin stands. The fact that good framing quality timber could be sawn from unpruned stands should not be accepted if the best return was wanted from trees. “Let quality be our objective,” he said.