Editor's Note: This article is part of reporter Cade Barker's Wild Southwest Washington series. Find all current installments at https://tinyurl.com/ujkcvepm.
Working forests are often viewed simply as places where trees are harvested, but forestry professionals say they are also essential to supporting healthy forests, local jobs, recreation opportunities and products people use every day.
During a visit to Washington state Department of Natural Resources land on Tuesday, July 14, where an active thinning operation was occurring in Cowlitz County, representatives of Hampton Lumber, Brandon J. Smith Logging and the American Forest Resource Council, explained how active forest management is designed to improve forest health while sustaining the region’s timber industry.
Brandon Smith, whose family has worked in the timber industry for generations, said the operation focused on thinning an approximately 60-year-old stand to encourage future growth.
“We’re purposely leaving the better trees,” Smith said. “That way we’re giving the biggest and best the chance to be even better when we come back.”
Rather than removing every tree, thinning reduced competition for sunlight and nutrients.
“It’s pretty impressive when you core a tree how much growth response you get by thinning and freeing up all that additional light for the tree,” Smith said. “It’s pretty neat when you have thinned something for somebody and you go back 10 years later and log it, third cut it, and the growth rings, how much they expand.”
The harvested timber ultimately becomes products found in homes across the country.
“All of this is going either to our Morton or Randle sawmills,” said Ben Zion, division forester at Hampton Lumber. “Both of those mills are stud mills.”
The stud mills make 2-by-4 and 2-by-6 boards of different lengths.
“The majority of our stuff goes to the home centers,” Zion said. “So, like Lowe’s, Home Depot and Menards in the Midwest.”
The two sawmills both use roughly 80 loads of logs a day, putting out around 180 million feet per year just between the two mills while employing roughly 160 people combined, illustrating the scale of Southwest Washington’s forest products industry.
One aspect of active timber harvesting is it isn’t just gutted and forgotten. Smith believes misconceptions continue to shape public perception of forestry.
“I think a lot of it is just misinformation. It’s people who are misinformed of what actually goes on,” Smith said. “We’re not clear-cutting it and leaving it. Everything gets replanted.”
Beyond producing lumber, working forests also support schools, public services and recreation. The thinning project is actively benefiting schools from local school districts to universities in Washington State.
“This is Washington-grown, Washington-made wood products that not only help employ a lot of people, but also generate revenue for schools, fire districts, hospitals, and a range of beneficiaries,” said Nick Smith, public affairs director for the American Forest Resource Council. “We do forestry better here than anywhere else on the planet.”
Maintaining a stable timber supply is also critical for preserving the region’s forestry infrastructure.
“It comes down to timber supply,” Nick Smith said. “Some mills like Hampton need a stable and predictable timber supply, not only to keep guys up and working, but keep their mills up.”
Nearly every part of every harvested tree is put to use, Zion said.
“I’d say about almost 100 percent of this tree gets used,” Zion said. “The bark and chips will go in as hog fuel for our kilns. And whatever’s left, the residuals from that, the chips and the sawdust and everything like that gets trucked to the pulp mills. So it all gets used.”
Matt Comisky, Washington state manager for the American Forest Resource Council, also noted that working forests help maintain road systems used by hunters, hikers and campers while creating fuel breaks and access for firefighters if wildland fires were to occur.
“The more you reduce or try to eliminate the timber sale program, these recreational opportunities will go away too because there’s nobody that’s going to fund this work,” Comisky said.
