Eventually these "family farm" situations reach an heir that doesn't give a damn about history and/or needs some money.
When I was about 14 my grandparents asked if I would ever want the family farm. It turned out my answer was accurate, "no". They sold it and used the money to retire early to Florida. They used some of the money to provide me a student loan. The burden of keeping the farm in the family was removed to a good end with no regrets.
I have tried reforestation on a small scale. Squirrels ate the walnut seeds, the best way to start walnuts to be ready in about 50 years. Bare root walnuts and oaks were planted on two acres in a year with an unusually dry late spring and most died. Only the pines planted for erosion control grew, but later many succumbed to pine borers. If you need some more aggravation in your life start a tree farm from scratch.
When I was a young lad much land in the area I was born in was selling for single digits / acre as it was yellow sand and useless for most conventional farming or even quality timber use as the tree growth rate was quite slow. One entrepreneur has a vision and purchased several acres in one area.
He cleared about 20 acres and planted fast growing pines, each following year he repeated this until he had about 100 acres of pines. During this time he hired local labor (Mostly young ladies at minimum wage) to trim the trees to his liking as they grew.
Five years after starting he opened up his Christmas tree farm and sold the first 20 acres to the Chicago and other city markets. After removal of the trees he replanted the first 20 acres, second year repeated the same on it. It became a repeating function. In retrospect he was quite successful and I believe quite wealthy, as he continued to purchase more land and expanded his tree farm!
I doubt you want to invest the seed money or work required to do this but there may be other possibilities, Rifle range, rental of camping sites, Nature trails, etc..
I dislike the ACUB program as far as I can understand it now. They are not happy to just buy a noise easement. They put all kinds restraints on it. (can't have more than one house per hundred acres, etc.) Then there is the brokerage fee. $125 and acre goes to a wildlife fund. And some other hanger's on who have to have their wheels greased.
I have thought of planting a vineyard. I know nothing about vineyards but that has never stopped me before.
and I thought of holding giant rock concerts there. Woodstock 2.0 anyone.
Speaking of Christmas trees....I grew up on this farm and we used to regularly catch people roaming around in December looking for the perfect tree. We didn't really care about the trees and probably would have given one to anyone who asked, but they would leave the gates open and the cattle would wander around.
Long before the Asian blight hit the chestnuts in damp growing conditions were already suffering from a root fungus. Work is underway to try to find immunity but no trees are available for public planting.
Thanks, I have vaguely followed the work on restoring the Chestnuts. Was hoping to get some and help start the process in the public. I have some dry ground when they are available, If I live long enough. I am optimistic enough to plant a tree whose shade I will never rest in.
I sent you an e-mail about a Canadian woodworker who has a Vacuum kiln that dead pack the lumber, puts in under hydraulic pressure and heats it with a huge microwave. Interesting stuff. I never heard of such a thing. It was on YouTube. If anyone is interested I will hunt it down again.
I don't do Utubes. They consume too much of my limited Gbites of monthly allotment on my rural internet connection. I am located on a gravel road of the Information Highway. Which brings to mind a visit by a tech rep from England. We had time to kill before a flight and he was a photographer. We toured our country side photographing churches, log houses and barns and old cars. When we turned onto a gravel road he allowed that he had never been on a gravel road. Welcome to E. TN.
Sorry you can't see it. The guy has a vacuum kiln that looks big enough to put a tractor trailer lad of wood in. Well maybe a half a load. Green Lumber is dead stacked with no stickers, rolled in, put under pressure by hydraulic presses, and a vacuum is drawn. Then the wood is heated with microwaves. Claims he can dry wood in about a 1/4 of the regular time and that the success rate is very high. Very low loses. Very sophisticated set of controls.
I didn't know such things existed and he claims his is fairly small and at something like $50K is very affordable. The speed and success rate with very important to him. He could shuffle loads through the kiln in days instead of weeks. Very important for him because he processes a lot of slabs.
You have vastly more experience with lumber processing than I do and perhaps this is old hat to you, but it was interesting.
Let us suppose a modest vacuum was all that was necessary so that only 20 psi would be pressing on the inside of the container this lumber is in. Estimate the staggering force that would be on this container and how strong it would have to be built.
Dead packed? Apparently then he is only drying through the lumber ends?
Applied pressure? Don't understand what this part does.
Vacuum drying is not new. Adams Lumber in Morristown did(and maybe still does) vacuum dry their large turning squares. It is fast, and expensive.
Vacuum drying is not widely used because the capital costs and operating costs are typically unfavorable compared to conventional drying.
A modern kiln can dry 4/4 poplar and other easily dried wood, in a few days.
I definitely understand limiting your data usage. It's a shame you can't watch this video because I think you would totally get it.
He's doing nothing new really. He saws logs into various thickness and then dries it. Some loads (depending on species and thickness) can take weeks instead of much longer. Other loads much quicker. He says his loss is normally only 1% versus a higher percentage from standard kiln operations.
The hydraulic press on the stack is to keep it flat until dry. He says the moisture is removed from the inside - out and flows out of the ends. He claims the finished result is stronger wood and not as dark as you'd get from a standard kiln.
The big microwave generator he uses is the heat source since the wood is under vacuum. Under vacuum water boils at a much lower temperature. He can control everything from a touch screen. This allows him to control heat, heating time, vacuum time, and other things during a cycle.
Like I said, if you were to see the video I'm sure your questions would be answered. Personally, I liked the modifications he's made to his two bandsaws. For a one man operation he seems to have things working well.
