By Gary Miller
North Myrtle Beach, SC – Approximately 148 members and guests of the Appalachian Lumbermen’s Club (ALC) attended the organization’s recent annual Spring meeting, held at the Avista Resort, located here.
Everyone who played golf on Saturday had to play their own ball; and there were four flights – A, B, C, and D. The order of the winners for A Flight were: Josh Turner, who came in first and shot a 76; Mark Pierce, who came in second and shot an 84; Eddie Phillips, who came in third and shot an 84; and Ray Turner, who came in fourth and shot an 84.
The winners of B Flight were: Stephen Counts Jr. who came in first and shot an 88; Marijo Wood, who came in second and shot an 88; Peter McCarty who came in third and shot an 89; and Linwood Truitt who came in fourth and shot a 92.
The winners of C Flight were: Clark Delabar, who came in first and shot a 95; Lee Lybrand who came in second and shot a 95; Jeff Dougherty who came in third and shot a 96; and Rodney Lawing who came in fourth and shot a 96.
The winners of D Flight were: Dave Sondel, who came in first and shot a 98; Jason Grey, who came in second and shot a 99; Jonathan Schmertzler, who came in third and shot a 100; and Will Schmertzler, who came in fourth and shot a 101.
The lumbermen who got closest to the pin on each Par 3 included: Ray Turner on #3; Mark Pierce on #6; Rodney Lawing on #12; and Clark Delabar on #15.
The longest drive winner for the women was Marijo Wood on hole #4; and for the men, the longest drive winner was Linwood Truitt on hole #7.
Early bird attendees of the meeting were treated to a cocktail party on Thursday. There was also a cocktail party on Friday; and all that attended the cocktail party and dinner on Saturday seemed to enjoy it. Additionally, the ALC hosted a Kentucky Derby party on Saturday evening which provided members and guests an opportunity to dress up in Derby fashion and watch the horse race on a big screen TV.
Some comments offered by a sawmiller concerning market conditions in early May were: “I think, overall, the Hardwood lumber market is worse than it was six months ago. We cut mostly Red Oak, Poplar, White Oak, and yellow pine in 4/4 through 8/4 thicknesses. The species that is the easiest to sell presently is Poplar, and specifically Poplar in 4/4 thickness in the common and better grades. I noticed the pallet industry has slowed down some in the last month or so because the pallet plants we sell to are not buying as many of our cants now as they were in the past. Lastly, I’d say the prices of Southern yellow pine lumber are soft right now.”
Another representative of a sawmill operation that attended the ALC Spring meeting held here explained, “We manufacture 4/4 through 16/4 in Poplar, 4/4 through 8/4 in Red Oak, 4/4 in White Oak, 4/4 in Hickory, and 4/4 in Ash. We have our own dry kilns, and we sell our upper grades of lumber to customers kiln-dried. We noticed the Hardwood market for lumber slowed down a few months ago and I believe selling Hardwood lumber and cants this summer is going to be very challenging because there will be more lumber and cants available on the market to sell this summer. The Hardwood mills in many parts of the country have gotten a lot of rain in their area over the last five or six months; therefore, many of them were not able to get as many logs delivered to their operations as they wanted. Soon the weather should be better, and the mills will have plenty of logs, which means that soon there will be more Hardwood lumber, cants, etc. on the market.” This same Appalachian lumberman mentioned that 4/4 White Oak in the upper grades, kiln-dried is his firm’s strongest selling item. He also said that Poplar green prices are high and there is not a lot of money to be made on selling kiln-dried Poplar because presently there is not a lot of spread between the prices of green Poplar and kiln-dried Poplar. “Of course, sawmillers like most of the prices they’re getting for selling their Hardwood lumber green right now but for those of us that sell mostly kiln-dried lumber, it’s presently hard to make any money on the kiln-dried lumber we produce and sell.”
A third Appalachian sawmiller made these remarks, “Compared to six months ago I’d say the Hardwood lumber market is going downhill. We have our own trucks for delivering our Hardwood lumber, cants, and switch ties; however, many contract trucking companies have called our office in the last few months looking to haul some loads of lumber, cants and/or switch ties for us. We do not need their services at this time.”
In closing this sawmiller explained, “At our sawmill we cut mostly Red and White Oak, and Poplar in 4/4, 5/4, and 6/4 thickness. Counting all our Hardwood products, we manufacture about four million board feet a year. The main thing we’ve done at our operation is we just installed a new dry kiln that can hold about 150,000 board feet per charge.”
The next event for the ALC is September 12.
More details are available at www.lumberclub.org.
