How to Harvest Walnut Trees

Rob from Minnesota asks,



Bill, To start off, I have been a huge fan of yours for many years and loved the Midwest whitetail series you produced! I hope in the future you will get back in the game and produce another series....viewers will follow you. Anyways, I purchased a 40 acre parcel in the beautiful bluff country of Houston county MN and this will be my 4th season with the property. We have quite a few mature walnut trees interspersed across the 30 acres of timber that we're looking into possibly having a select cut done. Do you have any recommendations of ways to make sure as the landowner I get paid appropriately for the the trees taken? I have never had a property logged before and want to ensure I don't get taken to the cleaners so to speak. And a land management question to go along with it; my property has a lot of bush honeysuckle in the underbrush, do you recommend trying to cut and spray the honeysuckle prior to having a select cut done? Does bush honeysuckle have any value for deer? Thanks in advance for your time in answering my questions. Congrats on the new farm!




Bill responds,


Topic: How to Harvest Walnut Trees

Harvest Walnut Trees

I have harvested walnut trees a few times in my life and have learned a few things.  In order to be sure you get a fair price, you need to have at least two reputable saw mills bidding on the trees. If the job is big enough, you might encourage someone from outside the immediate area to come and bid also – to keep the local mills honest. On smaller jobs, you will be stuck with the local mills and you then have to trust that they honestly compete for the logs. If the price seems too low (talk to a few people who have recently sold walnut logs to get a general feel for it) you can always reject all bids.

Rob,

Congrats on your property and thanks for your support and note. I know Houston Co., MN as it right across the line from my farm and I have traveled that area many times going to La Crosse.

I have harvested walnut a few times and I have done it a number of ways.  The best route is to talk to people who you know who have done it in that area and see who they used and then talk to those people.  Usually, a reputable mill will give you all the assurances you need both through transparency during the bid process and later with a very clear and thorough contract.

I think Root River Hardwoods, in the SE MN area, is one possible option.  I have heard good things about them.

If selling to a mill, you normally mark the trees you want to cut and then invite a few mills to come and bid on them.  That is a very fair method. Some people hire private foresters to handle the sale for them, but for a small job you can handle it yourself. 

This would be my preferred approach. Mark the trees (or have the forester mark them) and invite the mills to bid.

However, if you want to sell through an independent logger (not directly to the mill) it is very common to do it on shares. If the trees are easy to get and they are big, you can often get it done for 20 to 25% split. You get 75 or 80% and they get the rest.  They then sell (in theory) to the best paying mill.

I have seen that go bad, however, as some independent loggers only work with one mill and they get some preferential treatment when they bring logs to that mill. I had that happen on one job. The logger told me he had multiple markets and I was getting the best market price, but I found out later that the actual cutters (not the buyer who was only a middle man) were paid by the mill not by the middle man. So, in reality, my buyer only had one mill he could sell to.  When I confronted him with it, he said that the mill he sold to always had a best prices. 

No transparency and no competition. Who knows what those logs would have been worth if they had been sold in the open market! It still bothers me.

So, that said, I would just mark the trees (or hire a forester) and call the mills to bid. Don’t sign anything that seems even the list bit fishy. Unless you really need the money now, you can always reject all bids if things don’t seem square.

There are some very honest timber buyers, but there are also some bad shysters.  Seller beware!

Regarding Bush Honeysuckle: I am no fan of that invasive plant.  I would probably try to clear it out as best you can prior to opening up the canopy on the property for any reason (timber sale of TSI).  It will only get worse later, so try to manage it now before you let in more sunlight.  There are some proven methods for managing bush honeysuckle, but they all take several years to complete because there are years worth of seeds on the forest floor waiting for a chance to grow. You have kill all young trees each year for several years (with glyphosate, probably) even after killing the adult parent trees in year one.

It is a tough project to completely eliminate bush honeysuckle, but definitely one that needs to be done. Good luck. (7/7/22)

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Comments (3)

  1. Rob

    Thanks for the feedback Bill! I think we’re going to hold off on any timber sale until we can get the bush honeysuckle under control. Really appreciate your suggestions and I can’t wait to see what you do with your new farms!

    1. Bill Winke

      That’s a good plan, Rob. Good luck.

  2. Jason

    Hey Rob, we are also in Houston County. I have the name of a guy we have used for timber cutting that is in the area, and we believe him to be very fair and also responsive. We have dealt with some other loggers in the area and have waited months up to a year to even get the properties looked at. Let me know if you would like the name and number of the logger. He also builds roads, so it is a win win when logging.

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