From the July, 2005 Georgia Farm Bureau NEWS magazine

I have referred to our web site several times lately. There has been a bit of confusion with the site address, but you can reach this site from your Georgia Farm Bureau site (www.gfb.org) by clicking on “GFB Services” and then “Forestry Division”, “Real Estate Co.” or “Mortgage Services.” If you want to go directly to our site, you can simply type in our web address of www.TheFarmSite.org. You will want to check back with our site from time-to-time to review our latest or archived Timber Update articles, or to review our newest land listings for sale.

If you were not aware, we also have Mortgage Services that you should take advantage of in purchasing your next home or just refinancing your current home in order to lower your interest rate and monthly payment. You can reach our mortgage web site through www.TheFarmSite.org or go there direct by typing in www.FarmBureauMortgage.com.

Now, with this housekeeping out of the way, I want to briefly mention a problem with pricing. It appears that when there is a range of timber prices for your area, everyone wants to get the highest price for their timber. Well, I understand that is human nature, but there are a couple of issues the price tables do not mention. They do not tell you that younger trees and especially first-time-thinning pulpwood and chip-n-saw, are generally lower priced products simply due to the quality of wood. Wood quality has to do with fiber lengths and wood density, as well as number of limbs and knots present, all of which generally improve with age.

Prices are generally lower for thinning operations. This only stands to reason when you consider the extra care and time it takes to identify selective trees to leave and then to protect these trees during the logging process. This takes extra time, fuel, and labor, which translate to more expense for the logger, which eat up funds available to pay the landowner, hence lower prices for thinning.

Another issue to consider when comparing prices, especially for chip-n-saw, or any sawtimber product for that matter, is the specs of the trees delivered to the mill. Top and butt diameters of trees accepted by a mill can have a big effect on the total value of your timber tract. In other words, if you have a lot of smaller wood that will have a 5” top and will be delivered as chip-n-saw under one spec, you might come out better than taking a higher per ton price for your chip-n-saw with specs requiring a 6” top or greater. In otherwords, you might cut out more volume at the lower specs that offset the higher per ton prices, thereby resulting in more income from your timber as a whole. This can get complicated so you might need some help evaluating the terms and conditions of your sale, since most of the time the specs of the sale are never mentioned in a contract or in the negotiations leading to the sale.

If you need help with your timber sale, call the timber equalizer, the Timber Services of Georgia Farm Bureau. To learn more about managing or selling your trees, go to our web site at www.TheFarmSite.org.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON FORESTRY SERVICES OR OUR REAL ESTATE DIVISION, CALL GENERAL MANAGER/BROKER JIM GRIFFITH AT 1-800-342-1192 OR (478) 471-0440 OR SEND AN E-MAIL TO: jcgriffith@gfb.org