Foresters are the only professionals trained specifically to manage forested lands, yet currently most timber sales on private lands never involve a forester!  Forestry begins on the land, which is real estate.  Real estate is managed by the owner(s) or authorized manager(s) of the real estate.  In the United States, the U.S. government is the largest single owner of forested lands. The USDA has long understood the many positive values gained through the employment of foresters.  Almost all private forest landowners have the opportunity to realize these same advantages the USDA does by hiring a forester, but many do not know that assistance is available. The first step toward conservation is to enlist quality assitance. For more information regarding quality assistance, email me: Geoff@timberlineforestry.com.

Timberline Forestry Consulting LLC provides work only under the highest ethical standards. Ethical ideals associated with the business are as follows:

I believe in being fair, honest, and ethical.  I do not intentionally participate in activities in which I am aware there is any form of conflict of interest.  My sole interest while providing forest management assistance is reaching my client’s goals using guidance based on my years of education that have built my expertise as a forester.

I believe in providing the highest possible degree of quality in the services that my firm offers - I would prefer to serve clients that agree with me that quality should be the first priority, and production, while also important is the second.

Other important related issues:

Goals and objectives:  What’s the difference? Goals are what are what you’re trying to accomplish. Objectives are what you set in place to ensure that the goals are met. If deer hunting improvement is a goal, then improving deer habitat is an objective that would reasonably meet the goal of deer hunting.  If timber revenue is a goal, then improving the quality and structure of a forest stand is a rational objective put in place to meet that goal.  These are very basic examples, but it is important to keep the goal in mind throughout the process.

A popular term with the media, ECOSYSTEM MANAGEMENT is a hoax, literally impossible to conduct under any form of forest management other than that of a closed system laboratory, and that is the reason I do not use the phrase throughout this web site.  Ecosystems are essentially undefinable in size and change too quickly and/or are too advanced to be able to manage all of the extremely complex interconnections at the same time. Forest management is more accurately described as an adaptive management process.  Silviculture is the cornerstone of forestry.  Outcomes of natural events and prescribed treatments have been examined carefully over time. Experience gained from those observations is helpful in having an understanding of what treatment, if any should be prescribed to meet the client’s objectives.

The company I keep: I am very particular about my membership in professional organizations: I will only continue membership in any association as long as that association is aligned with my principles.  While I respect the organizations of which I have included in my links page for their postiive attributes, at the time of this update (3/09), I have restricted my membership to the Michigan Forest Association (MFA) only.

I was formerly a member of The Forest Steward's Guild (FSG), which was headquartered in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  The Forest Steward's Guild was an impressive professional organization created by a group of foresters for foresters who didn't share some ideas with the mainstream professional association, the Society of American Foresters (SAF).

The Forest Steward's Guild provided a much needed support network for those professionals who really were in the forefront of applying conservation in the field of forestry.  It was the only organization in which members agreed to follow a principle I still continue to practice: “A forester’s first duty is to the forest and its future. When the management directives of clients or supervisors conflict with the Mission and Principles of the Guild, and cannot be modified through dialogue and education, a forester should disassociate”.

This was in sharp contrast to the SAF, whose membership includes timber buyers.  Unforunately, some time after the Forest Steward's Guild renamed itself the Forest Guild, the membership began to change from primarily private consulting foresters to include those who were employed by government and non-profit organizations, who as members, either weren't in a position to disassociate with their employers (government employment doesn't allow for that by design), or those whom the statement didn't apply to (such as non-profits who aren't actively managing the forest).  After a period of consideration, I felt this weakened the ability of the organization to the extent that it was no longer worthy associating with them.  I will continue to associate with current and former members who have the same level of commitment to conservation as I do.

The only true consulting forester is one who never has an interest in buying timber, and does not work for anyone who does.  Consulting foresters help landowners sell timber, they don’t buy it! Timber buyers who mascarade as “consultants” are working for their employer’s interest, which is counterproductive to the landowner’s objectives and therefore the goals may not be met.

Forestry continues to be the only industry that legally trades real estate under situations that involve conflicts of interest. 

The definition of a “forester” and that which is the legal description have two different meanings.  A forester is someone who takes care of the forests.  A person who is a registered or licensed forester can willingly degrade the forest, but current licensing laws don’t differentiate between the two. The problem of establishing laws to ensure the forest landowner community is served properly is very complex, which is the main reason that more often than not, the outcome of such laws result in inefficiency of the management process and in some cases, make forest management financially impractical (for example, small forest landowners in California may spend more on the paperwork required by their forestry laws than what their timber sale is worth!).

Although it seems like every timber buyer on the planet is offering “TOP DOLLAR FOR STANDING TIMBER”, no timber buyer will actually offer a landowner anything remotely near that price unless they have made a mistake in calculating what the timber is worth! There is only ONE way to assess what “TOP DOLLAR” is, and that is through careful management of the woodlands and by selling timber using a sealed-bid marketing process.  Unfortunately, there are factors such as small acreage, low total stumpage values, large distance to mills, etc., which make some timber sales hard to sell using this approach, so proper negotiation of the selling price is imperative.

There are services available to landowners that will offer to sell their timber for them using the sealed bid process, but without the careful land management, top dollar may wind up being the bottom dollar, because if your forest is mismanaged, it can be a liability after the sale.  Never forget that both the trees you sell and the trees that remain are each a part of the overall value!

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