When John and Bill Green assumed trusteeship of their father's 1,900 acres of timberland in 1984, one of their first moves was to hire a forestry consultant.
"We had to raise some money to operate the trust, and we knew absolutely nothing about timber," confesses John Green, who lives in Hattiesburg, Miss.
Discussions with neighbors led the Greens to Gerald Moore of Pine Belt Foresters in Petal, Miss. That was when the Greens' timber education began.
"Gerald was of tremendous help in managing our timber and arranging sales," Green says. "He knew which trees needed to be harvested and which to leave to grow for greater value later. He is also able to market timber to a whole lot of potential buyers to attract higher bids."
After the Greens subdivided the inheritance in 1997, John Green continued to retain Moore to help manage his 500 acres of timberland. It's the sort of move H. Glenn Hughes wishes more landowners would make.
Hughes is an Extension forester with Mississippi State University. He strongly encourages landowners to employ registered foresters, especially when it comes time to help with a timber sale.
"A typical landowner may do two or three timber sales in a lifetime, whereas the people he is selling to—the timber buyers—are doing this day in and day out," Hughes explains. "There is a huge imbalance of knowledge and experience there.
"A forestry consultant represents the landowner and his interests," Hughes continues. "So he levels the playing field."
Where the consultant excels, according to Hughes, is in putting together a proper request for bids and distributing it to a large number of prospective buyers.
The bid package includes a map, the tract location, a description of the type of timber, an estimate of the amount of timber and any limitations, such as areas that should not be cut.
The bid package also usually includes a clause that the harvest will comply with best management practices.
"You can find a list of buyers in the telephone directory," Hughes says. "But a professional forester will have an extensive list of prospective buyers, many from a far distance away. Buyers will go a long distance to buy timber that they need. And if they need it for a particular reason, they'll pay top dollar."
Unless you have high-value timber, the payback from using a professional forester may not come from the first sale. Hughes explains that a good consultant will make sure the forested tract is set up to make the most money over the long pull.
"For example, the first time he may recommend doing a fifth-row thinning—not taking out the big trees, but taking out the little, scrubby trees and saving the better trees for sale down the road," Hughes explains.
"If you let the timber harvester take out only your biggest and best trees, you'll be left with nothing but genetic junk. It would be like selling your best cows and keeping the culls.
"In the timber industry, we use a concept called net present value [NPV] in which all income and expenditures are calculated to a common age," Hughes says. "Using the NPV concept, the first thinning produces only about 7% of the total income, leaving 80 to 85% for the final harvest. To maximize income requires keeping your eyes on the prize down the road."
See next page for information on cost and finding a forester.
[PAGEBREAK]
What will this cost?
Most professional forestry consultants work for a percentage of timber sales. Sara Baldwin, an editor with Timber Mart-South at the University of Georgia's School of Forestry & Natural Resources, says that percentage may range from 5 to 10%, depending on what other services the consultant provides.
In Mississippi, consultants' fees range from 8 to 10%, averaging about 8.5%, according to Mississippi State University Extension Forester H. Glenn Hughes. That may seem like a high price to pay. But, as John Green points out, timber bids can easily vary by as much as 100%, so having a consultant working for you may well double your income. Some consultants also operate on a per-acre fee basis.
Obviously, if you have small parcels of timber, you can expect lower bids than you would for a large tract. It takes a timber harvester a day to move in with his equipment and another day to move out, so he can't afford to pay as much to harvest small tracts.
Finding a forester
So how do you go about locating a professional forester?
Timber Mart-South's Sara Baldwin says many states have laws requiring professional foresters to go through a certification process. They must meet specific educational requirements and be recertified periodically. States requiring certification generally have web sites that list consulting foresters.
In addition, the Association of Consulting Foresters is an organization of foresters engaged only in consulting. To find an ACF forester, go to their web site at www.acf-foresters.org, click Find an ACF Forester, and type in the name of your state.
Other sources include state forestry commissions (go to www.stateforesters.org/sflist.html for a listing) and your land-grant university's cooperative Extension Service or Department of Forestry.
Mississippi State University's H. Glenn Hughes also recommends talking with neighbors who may have had good or bad experiences with a professional forester. "I encourage landowners to interview more than one professional forester to get one with whom they feel comfortable," he adds.
"And if after you hire one, you don't think they are listening to you or have your interests at heart, don't be afraid to fire him. After all, he's working for you."