buying a tree

[yashin57]

Anyone got advice regarding buying a whole tree? Is it done by weight, quality, size etc? And what about current prices? Any help appreciated. Thanks

Ian

[windfall]

I've never known anyone to sell a tree before, but I suppose its possible. So far I'm lucky I haven't paid for any wood. I would google "tree surgeons" "arbourist" or firewood near you, a lot of the time they sell the wood they cut down or sell the logs whole sale to a firewood place. As for price - sorry no idea, the cherry tree I had dropped of last week was from a farmer and I said I would make him something later this year from it in exchange. That's all the advice I have on buying a whole tree

[Les Symonds]

Anyone got advice regarding buying a whole tree? Is it done by weight, quality, size etc? And what about current prices? Any help appreciated. Thanks

Ian

....that's an un-answerable question, because it's far too vague to give one single answer. One of the possibilities you mention is paying by weight, well, being realistic, how would that work, you can't exactly weigh the tree! I have bought several trees and had many more for free. The important factors are things like...

• what species is it?....do I really need that timber?
• how large is it?....will it yield good bowls or is it all branchwood?
• what's its overall health like?....is the trunk dead and hollow, or sound?
• what's it going to cost me to move it?....distance/access/my time etc
• where the heck am I going to put it when I've got it?....do I need to rent space from someone else?
• does the owner want folding money for this, or a couple of bowls out of it?.....that usually works!
• .....and all of these have to be balanced against how much the owner wants to sell it.....do they appreciate its value.....is it a nuisance to them where it is....could they sell it easily to someone for firewood, or are they stuck with it??

The only person who can answer all these things is yourself. When I buy a tree, I balance these things in my head and make up a figure.....more often than not, I get 'em for free!

Les

[michaelb]

Like Les the wizard from Bala,  I sometime have the opportunity to  see a tree someone  has, and agree total with Les, think very carefully about cutting, storage and importantly what you are going to with the waste, and how are you going to dry out what you need could be 4 to 5 years for air drying . Think very carefully.

[John Plater]

A good post from Les which covers many of the bases.
I have been able to buy a couple of trees off ebay in the past, one, a Mulberry tree, that yielded about 11 linear metres of timber and a truckload of English Walnut  which had really white sapwood (it often turns grey). Both were lovely to turn and sold well at craft shows. Neither of them owes me anything. I paid the sellers' minimum bids of £100. Lots of timber has come through contacts made at craft shows. People are usually thankful that someone else is prepared to come into their gardens and take the timber away for free. It would otherwise cost them to have the stuff removed. The absolute ideal is when one is able to work alongside the tree surgeon, suggesting where cuts should be made. I often give a bowl back as a thank you. I am in a position to be able to process and transport the timber for myself. The waste goes on a log burner. The only thing I do not do is cut trees down, let someone else have that responsibility. I recently purchased some ash in the round from a local woodyard and paid about £18 per cubic foot. In the past I bought some sawn plane from a woodyard and paid £25 per cubic foot. I hope that helps.
ATB,
John

[fuzzyturns]

I remember having a conversation with Sally Burnett on this topic. She gets whole sycamore trunks from a local tree surgeon. Her work is mostly large open hollow forms (vases), with diameters up to 16 inches (or possibly more), so she needs a lot of large blanks.
If memory serves, she pays about £300-400 for a 2ft sycamore tree, all small branches removed, delivered to her workshop and cut into pieces as instructed by her.
Mind you, this is for a very specific purpose. If you are not that picky, do what I have done: I am the webmaster of the Black Country Woodturners, and the club gets contacted numerous times each year by people having to bring a tree down and they simply want to see the wood go to a better use than being burned. Sp more often not it's free (but you'll have to go and cut it up and transport it and store it all yourself).

[seventhdevil]

i'm possibly the only turner on here to buy whole trees for a specific purpose.

i make skittles for pubs and clubs and lumber companies don't have the sort of timber i need so i commission a sawmill to cut up beech and sycamore trees o my specs.

you buy timber by the cubic foot and the last tree i bought was over 200ft3 in volume and i paid £12ft3 for green wood that they stored in a barn ill i needed it. i then paid to get it palleted down to me in windsor all the way from scotland.

i will be buying more beech soon and am only paying £15ft3 for wet timber.


other factors for price will depend on how you want it processed (ie boards or beams) and the quality of the wood will be down to you to check before you buy...

[otterbank]

I buy all my timber in the round. I’m in Orkney and the timber comes from the mainland. I’ve had logs from an old guy that still works out the cost in hopus feet. The last lot of 6 logs of oak elm and yew worked out at about £13 per hopus foot. The other source is a firewood guy who dabbles in selling air dried timber. I  bought logs from him but it was a case of going round his yard and dealing on each log I wanted. Probably paid a bit more than firewood prices but it was nice logs. Maybe £100 for a sycamore log and £200 odd for a burr elm. Then obviously shipping on top of that which is a bit if a lottery. We used to go down with a pickup and trailer. Ok if we fancied a trip away but it’s not that much more expensive to get it picked up, sometimes cheaper if you work out lost workshop time.
I have a Woodlands mill at home so I can slab up as I want. I also did a LANTRA chainsaw course.
I find it a nice change to process the timber. You need a bit of room and it is a bit messy.
Not many trees up here so there is never really the option to deal with private sellers. The one or two thought they were sitting on a fortune and wanted silly money for a few small pieces of timber.
All the best
Michael

[Twisted Trees]

As above really, but you should never pay for garden trees, tree surgeons charge about half their fee to transport  and dispose of the waste, the principle cost of timber is the processing & storage while it dries that is why complete items of furniture can be bought from countries with low population density for less than the cost of the timber in the UK.

 

[Derek]

Not something I am qualified to answer as I pay a pen or bowl up to £30 so it does depend on the person selling it how much do they want for it and how quickly they want to dispose of it.
As a buyer following Les's advice seems very good in respects to work out what it is worth

[yashin57]

Thanks to those who answered the question I asked.

[Paul Hannaby]

This may be of interest -

Raw timber volume is often calculated with the hoppus rule, which allows for the wastage of converting a log. The formula for this is - measure a quarter of the girth of the log midway between the ends in inches, square the result, multiply by the length in feet, and divide by 144. This gives a volume in cubic feet. Then you just need to figure out a price per cubic foot.