SUPPLY OF PULPWOOD 



It may be desired to arrive at pulpwood figures from the 

 various tables given, some of which are in board feet and 

 others in standard cords. 



Volume of sawtimber trees is expressed in board feet. 

 Pine trees having a thousand board feet of lumber will 

 yield approximately 2 % cords of pulpwood, if the upper- 

 stem is utilized. An interested person can make his own 

 estimate as to the proportion of sawlog volume that is in 

 trees of suitable size for pulpwood. For example, Harnett 

 County is estimated to have 300 million feet of pine saw- 

 timber (Table 5). If the assumption is made that 40 per 

 cent of this volume, or 120 million board feet is in di- 

 ameters suitable for pulpwood, and 1 M board feet will 

 produce 2 % cords, the material suitable for this purpose 

 would amount to 330,000 cords. This does not include ma- 

 terial below 8 inches, d.b.h. 



The under-sawlog-size pine volume in Harnett County 

 (Table 9) is 316,000 cords: Theoretically, all this material 

 might be suitable for pulpwood. The total pine pulpwood 

 supply for Harnett County is thus figured at 646,000 

 cords. All this material may not be available, due to inac- 

 cessibility and scattered condition of individual trees, but 

 comparison may be made with other counties. 



Hardwoods are being used increasingly for pulp, but the 

 present supply far exceeds the demand. Under-sawlog-size 

 hardwood volume represents trees 6"-12" d.b.h. This is 

 only slightly less than the range of pulpwood size under 

 present usage. Harnett has a total hardwood under-sawlog 

 volume of 538,000 cords, to which can be added the sound 

 wood in rough hardwood culls. 



Table 13 adds the cordwood in culls and tops of saw- 

 timber hardwoods to Table 12. The upper-stem and limbs 

 of hardwoods are not being used commercially at present, 

 and may be considered as additional cull material. 



THE CULL PROBLEM 



Cull tree volume is nearly 90 per cent hardwood, and 

 North Carolina has the astounding total of nearly 40 mil- 

 lion cords of this material. These unwanted trees could sus- 

 tain pulp, fibreboard, or chemical wood industries if the 

 sound wood could be brought out of the forest in a practi- 

 cal way, and if the industries needed it and were adapted 

 to processing it. 



Many people, in times past, have called for industries to 

 use hardwood culls, topwood, low-grade, and mill waste. 

 One authority recently made this statement, "Markets for 

 non-sawtimber hardwoods is the most urgent single meas- 

 ure needed for improving the value of North Carolina's 

 timber stand." 



So long as wood is abundant, intensified utilization 

 should" not be expected. This holds true, even in the rela- 

 tively short period of American lumbering. First, the lum- 

 bermen were interested only in the big clear logs ; over the 

 years, they have lowered their demands until today they 

 will take knotty pine tops and formerly-despised species. 

 Ten years ago, many Southern pulp mills would take only 

 pine; later they accepted gum, and now some are begin- 

 ning to take oak. As timber of the desired kinds decreases, 

 industry learns to use other kinds. It becomes less waste- 

 ful. Forestry does not begin until scarcity arrives. 



Decline of sawtimber volume and of pine may be a par- 

 tial blessing if it means the utilization of all kinds of 



hardwood material. Why not encourage the same result, 

 without allowing sources of pine seed to become badly de- 

 pleted, by establishing the requirement that a certain 

 number of pine seed trees be left per acre 



Where are the culls? Culls were counted by size classes 

 in each sample county. No volume determinations were 

 made for individual trees. On a per-acre basis, Bertie, Cur- 

 rituck, Halifax, Gaston, Randolph, Buncombe, and Jack- 

 son led among the 21 sample counties. Culls are well dis- 

 tributed over the state; within a county they will be con- 

 centrated wherever hardwood stands are found. Heavy ac- 

 cumulations of cull are found in the big river swamps of 

 the Coastal Plain. The Great Swamp of Currituck, al- 

 though logged some years ago, appears to be one big jun- 

 gle of culls and low-grade material. Culls are even more 

 scattered in the hardwood stands of the Piedmont and 

 Mountains. 



TIMBER HARVESTING IN NORTH CAROLINA 



Five out of ten trees cut annually in North Carolina go 

 to the sawmills. Three out of ten are made into fuel-wood, 

 principally for farm heating purposes, as North Carolina 

 has the second largest farm population in the Union. 

 Pulpwood and veneer account for most of the remaining 

 trees to go down before the axe and saw. Table 14 tells 

 the complete story of 1943 forest drain, for the four re- 

 gions and for the state. 



While Table 14 represents 1943, a war year, neverthe- 

 less cutting was only about 10 per cent higher than the 

 average for 1937 through 1940. 



This table is from Forest Survey Release No. 18, "N. C. 

 Forest Growth and Drain 1937-1943." 



The last 3 columns headed "All sound trees — 5.0" d.b.h. 

 and larger" includes the following classes of cordwood 

 material: Complete trunk of sawtimber and under-sawlog- 

 size trees to a minimum 4" top; sound wood in hardwood 

 limbs 4" or larger. 



Study of the Table reveals that the proportions of trees 

 cut for lumber, fuel, pulp, and veneer are about the same 

 in each region as they are for the state as a whole. Minor 

 deviations arise from the heavier cutting of fuel wood in 

 the Piedmont (because of the greater farm population) 

 and also because less veneer is cut in the Piedmont and 

 Mountain regions. 



There exist big differences in the money returns to be 

 realized from different tree products. There are two kinds 

 of returns, those to the timber grower, and those to the 

 business economy through which people earn livelihoods 

 in manufacturing, transporting, and the providing of va- 

 rious services. 



Generally speaking, North Carolina does not get the best 

 all-round return from its lumber industry, since a large 

 part of the production ends up as plain lumber, a com- 

 modity not far removed from the raw material stage. 

 Much of the output is shipped from the state. A thousand 

 board feet of lumber would have had an average selling 

 value of $45 to $50 in the last few years. This is much 

 higher than previous years and has enabled sawmill men 

 to pay surprisingly high stumpage prices ranging from 

 $10 to $20. 



A thousand board feet of logs going to a veneer plant 

 will be manufactured into veneers worth around $200 or 

 more. If a thousand board feet of logs went to a pulp mill 



(19) 



