[Ironlikebike]

I recently read a book on managing forests "A Landowners Guide to Harvesting Your Woods" and one of the salient points in the book is the fact that the majority of woodlands in the northeast are now privately held, (relatively) small parcels, that don't get harvested for a number of reasons.

1) Scarcity messaging over the last decades have created new property owners who see tree harvest as a moral outrage. 1a) Property owners aren't managing small private woodlots for harvestable lumber. 2) Harvesting small woodlots does not offer necessary economies of scale needed by harvesting operations, i.e., they're not going to invest the time to harvest < 20 acre plots.

[shagie]

> 2) Harvesting small woodlots does not offer necessary economies of scale needed by harvesting operations, i.e., they're not going to invest the time to harvest < 20 acre plots.

There are small sawmills that don't operate quite in the same economies of scale that the larger ones do. They've still got challenges and your first two points are still very applicable.

https://www.marketplace.org/2021/06/10/small-sawmill-sees-gr...

https://www.marketplace.org/2022/11/07/tough-housing-market-...

The second one is the more applicable one for this case (note: the transcript is abridged - listen to the full version).

One of the things that they specialize in for small lots (home owner) is storm damage.

[bombcar]

It also depends on what the trees were planted for, around here there's lots of pulp trees that are really only used for paper, not boards.

And the amount you "make" with such logging is barely enough to overcome the taxes you pay, even if the land is classified as special tax-reduced forestry land.

[halpmeh]

Trees on small private lots also greatly increase the property value. A clear-cut private plot? Not worth nearly as much as the plot with the 300 year old old-growth.