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Portable Band Sawmill
By Carl Kilbourne
Saw Mill Pictures
Solar Kiln Pictures
In 1873 my great-grandfather
sold several hundred acres of virgin hardwood timber for $l.00
per acre. In 1937 my grand-mother sold about 30 large wild cherry
trees on her farm for $5.00 per tree. In l950 my father sold about
15 prime walnut trees on his mountain farm for $500 that were
worth about $2,500. He also sold a second growth stand of large
poplar trees for pulp wood.
During the past 50 years of
my adult life, 5 years were spent as a small town lumber dealer
and part time building contractor, and 32 years as a school shop
teacher. My hobbies were developing a tree farm and woodworking.
I now realize the true value of the hardwood trees that my family
squandered over the past century.
The tree farming experience
during the 1970's and 1980's was most gratifying personally, but
it was very frustrating because loggers who cruised
the forest land were not interested in small scattered stands
of oak and poplar trees. Also, it was learned that even if the
hardwood trees were cut, commercial wood kilns were only interested
in large quantities of lumber to process and it was inconvenient
and expensive to have lumber kiln dried.
About a decade ago I suddenly
realized that the development of the one-man band sawmill and
the inexpensive solar dry kiln was the major breakthrough farmers
with wood lots needed to harvest their valuable hardwood trees.
Recently, I met a friend at
the hardware store who operates a small circular saw mill. He
eagerly related that he was selling oak lumber at his mill for
sixty cents a board foot. If he had kiln dried his oak lumber
in a solar dry kiln it would have tripled his income with very
little extra work and expense.
Few people realize that about
three-quarters of the trees in the Southern Appalachian Region
are hardwood species and that about one third of them are oak.
We may have the most hardwood trees anywhere in the world. Germany
and Japan are eager to buy our hardwood logs for their furniture
industries. Farmers can use one-man band sawmills and solar dry
kilns to provide hardwood lumber to develop our own secondary
wood industries for oak flooring that is coming back in style
in houses, for barrels, cabinets, furniture, plywood backed veneers,
molding, trim and crafts. The craftsmen prefer the "Character"
marks of the flitches and knots, burls, croutches
and slabs that sawmills usually sell for fire wood or burn as
scrap.
The use of portable band sawmills
and solar dry kilns to harvest our plentiful and renewable hardwood
trees can also help to improve our environment by select cutting
and processing mature trees rather than clear cutting all of them.
Portable one-man band sawmills
and solar wood dry kilns can provide another major source of income
for farmers with woodlots. More practical research, education
and effective marketing, in addition to the free available assistance
of the Kentucky Division of Forestry is needed to help farmers
to better manage, harvest and market their valuable, renewable
hardwood trees. The Sustainable Mountain Agriculture Center will
provide on-farm demonstrations of the Wood-Mizer portable sawmill
in the southern Appalachia area. Click HERE
for details.
  
   
Explanation of terms:
Cruised - A term for when loggers or tree appraisers walk
through a stand of timber to appraise the value of the trees.
Stand - A grove or small number of trees.
Flitches - Slices or cuts from logs being sawed. The term
is more used in veneer and craftwork.
Burls - Rough growth on some trees. Will have a beautiful,
irregular grain pattern.
Croutches - The V where two limbs join.
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