Woodland Wisdom, Part 4: Three Pitfalls for Forest Landowners

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- Hi there folks.

Thank you for watching that video.

My name is Calvin Norman.

- And I'm Sanford Smith.

And we're both with Penn State Cooperative Extension.

Today is another issue of Woodland Wisdom.

- So Sandy, what are we talking about today?

- We're gonna talk about some of the common pitfalls that forest landowners fall into when managing their property.

There's a lot of ways they can go wrong, so to speak and make mistakes.

And we'd like to talk about it with forest landowners so that they have a little bit of caution, I guess you might say before they make a big decision about their forest land.

So let me start with the first one and that is a lack of a plan.

And we've been talking about that for a few videos now that if people don't have a plan, they're apt to go astray, right?

They're not gonna have a goal they're gonna meet.

You need to know your objectives for owning your forest land but you also need to know what you wanna do with your forest in terms of managing it, kind of scheduling it, you also want to determine what you don't wanna do, what you wanna avoid, right?

And there's lots of science out there that's been generated for long time solutions, I should say, solutions from science that can help you as you develop a plan so you know what to do and what not to do.

So that's the first one.

- Well, Sandy, I get a lot of emails about folks asking about running their own timber harvest, you got any advice about kind of a do-it-yourself timber harvesting?

- Oh yeah.

Okay, this is a big one.

So timber harvesting is something that happens on forest lands and many people get involved with this.

And that's fine, but what I tell people is don't do it yourself.

When you do it yourself, you're not really knowledgeable about it.

Most forest land owners might do a timber sale once in their lifetime, maybe twice, but there are so many things that need to be cared for and considered.

And if you don't understand what's going on, you may end up really regretting what happens.

You could, for example not get a market value for your timber.

Someone just offers you money and you accept the price.

And then you find out later that timber was worth three, four times that or another thing is you end up with a forest on your property that you don't really want.

In other words, all your one type of tree has been removed or all your best trees have been removed.

So there's a lot of issues and things that need to be managed properly, but the future of your forest land is really up to you.

And someone who comes in and tries to buy your timber might not necessarily care that much about the future of your property, they're there to procure something and you wanna make sure that you're assuring a good healthy forest in the future on that land.

So those are just a few things, but avoid the do-it-yourself timber sale, get professional assistance and get unbiased assistance before you'd make any kind of timber sale activity happen on your property.

- Well, Sandy, you said that we're going to have three things.

We've done two so far, so what's our third one?

- All right, the third one is let mother nature rule, not.

Okay?

We do not wanna let mother nature rule anymore because there are so many situations on our forest lands that mother nature almost doesn't know how to deal with.

People have been involved in doing things on the forests of Pennsylvania for long, long time.

And as we've done things over the years, we have kind of messed a few things up.

And one of those is introduced non-native species, insects and plants and such.

And sometimes they have to be controlled.

Sometimes things are outta whack, like there's too many deer in an area which prevent the young trees from growing back in.

So those are just a few examples of the things that need to be managed by the forest landowner or their assistance so that you have a good healthy forest in the future.

So again, a lack of a plan, a do-it-yourself timber sale and letting mother nature rule are the pitfalls that I can think of right off hand that forest landowners often fall into.

- Well, thank you, Sandy.

It's been very educational.

- Okay, and thank you folks for listening today.