Fuelwood Price Increases for 2007
DIXIE NATIONAL FOREST
TO INCREASE FUELWOOD AND CHRISTMAS TREE PRICES
New prices to take effect in 2007
CEDAR CITY, Utah – The Dixie National Forest will increase fuelwood and Christmas tree prices effective January 1, 2007.
Fuelwood prices will be $10 per cord, with a two-cord minimum. Christmas trees will be $10 per tree, with an additional charge of $1 per foot for trees taller than eight feet.
The new prices reflect an increase of $5 per cord and $5 per Christmas tree. The additional revenue will help cover the costs of administering the forests’ fuelwood and Christmas tree programs.
Permittees remove about 2 million board feet of fuelwood each year from the Dixie National Forest alone, said Phil Eisenhauer, Dixie National Forest forester.
Woodcutters remove most of that fuel from timber project areas and along forest roads, Eisenhauer said, aiding the forests’ hazardous fuels reduction and fuelbreak maintenance efforts.
Popular Christmas tree species like white fir often burn intensely and carry fire rapidly through tree stands, said Kevin Greenhalgh, Dixie National Forest fire management officer. They also tend to encroach upon areas that are traditionally meadows or ponderosa pine forests.
Removing Christmas trees from traditional mixed conifer forests is also beneficial, Greenhalgh said, because trees that size might help carry a ground fire up into the canopy of a mature stand of trees, creating a crown fire.
For more information about fuelwood and Christmas tree permits, please call the Dixie National Forest in Cedar City at (435) 865-3700.
-USFS-
It really bothers me that you increase the fee for fire wood. My feeling is that it costs me more to clean up the forest. Maybe the forest service should pay the wood gatherers for the cleanup service.
Comment by Anonymous — January 31, 2007 @ 1:23 am