Authored by Blake Sherry
Blake Sherry is the Reforestation Advisor for Florida, Southern Georgia, and Southern Alabama.
Blake has been a valuable member of the ArborGen team since September 2024. Before joining ArborGen, Blake was a Procurement Forester for over five years.
In the past few months, the rapid rate of change for timberland markets in the South has been disheartening. The news has leaned towards bleak, with a few bright spots thrown in. Considering these changes, most timberland owners who are invested in navigating these difficulties are probably asking themselves these questions:
- How should I manage my existing stands with current markets?
- How should I establish future stands given the changes I am seeing?
These questions are pertinent and specific to each landowner. Because of this, I do not think I can answer each of them in a short article, but I would like to suggest some criteria to consider when answering each of these questions. For the owners invested in timber management, the focus should remain on maximizing the primary value drivers of timber return; growing the maximum volume in the quality stems that your local market is in most demand for today and will be in the future. That last part is tricky, as what is in demand today could shift dramatically tomorrow.
Some landowners have seen their pulp markets disappear in a day, while others have seen over a billion dollars’ worth of investment announced out their back door just as quickly. The landowners who planted 726 trees to the acre, planning to “plant them thick and cut ‘em quick,” are left in a difficult spot when a local pulp mill closes. Conversely, the landowner who planted 300 trees per acre because they had poor pulp markets most likely wished they had more tons to the acre to clearcut at age 15 when the upgraded pulp mill called desperately needing wood. And these scenarios are not considering the steady drip of investment in new sawmills and sawmill upgrades in the South, which are targeting stems in the chip-n-saw and small log range, which we can easily grow two rotations of in the time it used to take to grow one.
The picture below is from a visit I made to a landowner who had recently reduced his planting density to 500 TPA, planted a higher quality tree, and is now planning to manage more effectively towards his local market with shorter rotation ages for small sawtimber. Previously, they had managed towards rotations in the 25–35-year age range, and this is one of the results; butts cut off the log, 1-5 feet in length, due primarily to them being oversized for their local market, with some cut off due to quality issues like canker and fusiform rust as well. This creates lost income and an increased cost in site preparation. He became focused on one end of his current market when he made his management plan for this stand, and it left him exposed when the local sawmill’s maximum butt diameters started to change.
Considering uncertainty, the best answer is optionality, and having the most options for your current (and potential future) local market will help weather the storm of rapid changes we have seen. A lot of work is being done now to spur investment in current wood technologies and reinvigorate wood demand with new products, and many will fail, but some will succeed. Although impossible to predict, landowners can be poised to make the most out of whatever opportunities are presented, with the most options for whatever that may be.
