Travis Johnson
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I don't think its fair to base the opinion on stunted trees on the obviously diseased fir in your page.
That is exactly my point...this is NOT a diseased tree. Its a White Fir that grew up in a thicket of other firs. For years it was crowded and overgrown with larger and taller Red and Black Spruce trees in the overstory above it. When I was 16 years old, I came in and logged the Spruce out and left the firs. (1990 or so) Suddenly exposed to the light, it grew and the growth rings show that, unfortunately it also reached its maturity and began to die as can bee seen from the rot in the stump. This is what we call Red Heart here. Its common in all the softwood trees, something we have in abundance. I could cut the other trees around it and find the same thing. It does not matter if they are 1 inch in diameter or 10 inches, they will be red hearted.
Red Heart, is kind of interesting as years ago it never mattered how much Red Heart was in your trees destined for making paper. Then the found that it took far more chlorine bleach to bleach the red color out of the paper. For that reason they started giving a premium price for wood without red heart in it. At the end of that year, that paper mill saved itself 5 million dollars in chlorine costs. I can still get rid of trees like this within the paper industry, just not at the Bucksport Mill.