Another ten years and our sixteen to eighteen inch trees are now getting very valuable, producing some veneer quality logs.  Thirty feet now exists between crop trees, though numerous young trees are sprouting up into the forest from natural seed sources.

Another decade and our best crop trees are exploding with added value.  This forest now looks like a natural stand, all traces of the original plantation have vanished.  Thinnings are becoming quite profitable, though the stands primary value is the residual crop trees still growing for the future.



HOW LARGE IS MATURE?
What the final size of our crop trees will be - is yet to be seen.  We are now growing our best trees to thirty or even thirty-six inches in diameter, but we may extend that even larger.  The resulting timber is incredible - well worth the wait.

To achieve optimal growth rates, you need to watch your stand.  Regularly measuring the diameter of selected crop trees is an excellent way to monitor your forest.  Every time a tree is cut, examine the growth rings and observe the available information displayed there.  A forest owner must know the diameter growth of their crop trees.

Growth in height is not nearly as important as diameter growth.  Most of the value in a tree is in the lower seventeen foot log.  Even a tree with a good eight foot log could be a valuable crop tree. 

The combination of diameter growth and height growth will determine the shape or form of your tree.  A young tree starts out about as wide as it is tall.  As it grows taller, its leaf spread still needs to grow steadily as it gets taller.  Crop trees should always have room to expand their crowns. 

The one third, one third principle:
Green leaves should extend down from the top of the tree at least one third of the tree's height.  Once trees exceed twenty feet tall, their crown width should be at least one third (to one half) of the trees total height.  Trees with narrow crowns, with green leaves just at the top of the tree are in severe distress from overcrowding.  Tree with broad crowns reaching close to the ground are usually not desirable for timber crops

When your trees are crowded together so they limit their lateral growth, thinning is needed.  Thinning in a forest should work to attain optimum diameter growth on crop trees while improving the form of crop trees to maintain a healthy crown of leaves.

Another one third principle is: when pruning a tree, never remove more than one third of the live branches at one time. 



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