WHAT CONSTITUTES A MERCHANTABLE LOG 101 



finally, upon the qualities or grades, and price of this lumber. The 

 ratio of board feet per cubic foot (§ 41), the quality and value, all 

 increase with increasing size of log. Due to these factors, logs below a 

 given diameter and length, or total scale, even if sound, become unprofit- 

 able or unmerchantable. This minimum diameter and length, when 

 specified, relieves the logger or purchaser of the requirement of remov- 

 ing such logs from the woods, cutting them from tops, or felling trees 

 which will not yield larger sizes. If he chooses to take these sizes, 

 especially from the tops, the logs are customarily scaled and paid for. 



Defective Logs. Defective logs, which will produce only a portion of 

 the normal contents of sound logs of the same size, cost just as much to 

 log and saw as if sound. But the ratio of lumber secured per cubic 

 foot is reduced in proportion to the amount of cull, and the margin 

 between cost and value shrinks accordingly, until it disappears and the 

 log is classed as a cull and not scaled even if taken by the logger. Defects 

 occur most frequently in large logs, whose quality and value are high. 



A defective log which produces a small per cent of its contents but 

 of clear lumber or high grades may be merchantable, while a rough log 

 with a much smaller per cent of defect may not show a profit in handling. 

 Millmen who log their own timber can base their standard for culls 

 directly upon this margin of profit, and can afford to accept very defect- 

 ive logs for a few high-grade boards. Value or margin of profit, if 

 applied as a standard in selecting or rejecting logs, means an elastic 

 per cent of cull dependent on the character of the log itself. But the 

 logger or logging contractor is paid not by value or grade of sawed lum- 

 ber, but by the scale. Since his costs are determined by cubic volume 

 and size, he would prefer a cubic log scale, but in accepting payment on 

 the basis of board-foot contents, his profit in logging depends instead on 

 the ratio of board feet to cubic feet independent of quality, and is 

 diminished by reduction in scale caused by cull. ■ On the other hand 

 the loggers' costs vary with the distance which the log must be skidded 

 or hauled. A log with a given per cent of sound scale if near the point 

 of delivery will show a profit, while the same log is unmerchantable if 

 located at a greater distance from the track. For defective logs, then, 

 the merchantability is determined, for the millman, by comparing the 

 combined cost of logging and milling with the value of the product, 

 but for the logger it is determined by comparing the price per thou- 

 sand board feet secured for the scaled contents of the log with the cost 

 of delivering it to the point agreed upon. 



Where firms are doing their own logging, sawyers and loggers are 

 frequently paid on basis of full scale disregarding cull. But in contract 

 logging, the scaler usually rejects cull, thus requiring an agreement on 

 the per cent of sound contents which constitutes a merchantable log. 



