western red cedar tree drawing

Clear Wide Plank Cedar Wood Is Worth A Small Fortune If You Can Find Or Grow It

For more than 200 years, the virgin coastal forests of western North America provided a seemingly endless supply of Western Red Cedar. Now it's all but gone, the last commercial tract timberlands cut and harvested over 30 years ago. Only a few of these magnificent trees stand in preserves protected by governments in parks up and down the west coast.

This has created a shortage of wide, long length red cedar wood, especially wood that is knot-free and clear-grained.

Clear grained cedar is the highest quality grade available, free from growth characteristics (knots) that affect appearance or performance (finishing). It typically sells for $5 per board foot.

You can earn over $500 a tree in 30 to 40 years growing cedar clear wood. High-density plantings naturally prune branches from the trunk of each tree as it grows in the plantation. Trees spaced farther apart will form wood imperfections from branches left to grow on the trunk. At harvest, 30 feet cedar sawlogs are cut from the trees, which average 12-inches in diameter. Sawlogs are sold as knot-free clear wood, which will fetch top dollar.

Natural Habitat

Western Red Cedar grows predominantly on the coastal sea shores of British Columbia, Washington and Oregon States. This tree can grow tall, reaching heights of over 300 feet in especially wet and fertile areas. As a tree plantation tree, Red Cedar is an ideal tree species for lowlands that experience occasional flooding from spring runoff or high annual rainfall. Western Red Cedar is also called giant cedar in some regions of the United States, particularly Oregon, where Indigenous people referred to the cedar tree as the "tree of life" due to its medicinal properties.

Cedar Wood Plantations

Cedar wood plantations are perfect for wet lowlands that may not be suitable for a conventional farm or animal grazing. These trees will flourish, help control water levels and grow fast from abundant the water supply. A dry land, pure stand cedar plantation that grows in cultured rows is not recommended, however in the case of a wetland, pure stands of western red cedar grow better without the intermingling of other tree species like Douglas fir.

Rather than growing trees in cultured rows, western red cedars are planted in geometric spiraling patterns designed to accelerate tree growth. Energy fields created by the spirals stretch the cells that make up the fiber of each tree there by lengthening the structure of each tree, so it grows taller. Secondary planting between the trees ensures the overall health of the forest and can create a secondary income from the plantation.

Pacific Yew Tree

The Pacific Yew tree is a small conifer tree that produces little usable wood that is free of knots, incursions, or voids so as a timber tree it has no value. As a woodworking product however, it is exceedingly valuable – a wood workers dream some call it.

In 1971, researchers identified a chemical compound in Pacific Yew called paclitaxel. It was later approved for use against ovarian and certain types of breast cancer and is sold under the trade name Taxol®. It is now also approved for use against an AIDS-related cancer. Much of the Yew growing on the coast is sold to pharmaceutical companies.

Red Cedar Wood

Western Red Cedar wood is considered the most valuable of all softwoods because of its fine, straight grain, color, flexibility and strength in proportion to weight, however, the most important property of cedar wood is its high impermeability to liquids and its natural phenol preservatives, which make it ideally suited for exterior use in wetter climates. Cedar wood lasts for years in a West Coast climate, but it wears and ages prematurely in a humid climate, turning grey after just a few years. This water impermeability has made cedar wood an ideal roofing material for homes of the Pacific Northwest for more than two hundred years. Cedar shakes are lightweight, strong, and water resistant, require no wood treatment, look beautiful and can last 30 years or more. These qualities also make Western Red Cedar ideal for cladding and siding, decks and trim.

Red Cedar Insulating Properties

Western Red Cedar also has natural insulating properties offering approximately one "R" of insulation per inch which explains why native lodges were made from thick old growth cedar logs. The first log cabins of the people who first settled the west coast were also fabricated from these insulating logs.

The following comments were collected from a national wood products discussion forum.

Comment from contributor A:

This wood is my absolute favorite of favorites. Quite simply, it has a richness that speaks to my senses like a fine cognac long aged in French oak barrels, or perhaps your preference is Grand Marnier. My kitchen cabinets are made from Pacific Yew, as are many of our doors here at West Wind Hardwood, and upon returning from time away, I am always struck by how extraordinary this richly colored, unique wood is.

Comment from contributor B:

I Love Western Red Cedar; my all-time fave in softwoods - got a big pile of it stacked. I mainly use it for flutes and frame-drums but also scroll feather designs on the scroll saw and recently started making half-turned cedar log lamps on my lathe as well as other turned pieces, candle sticks and votive/tea-light holders.

Comment from contributor C:

I inherited a farm property in Campbell River, B.C on Vancouver Island. We hadn't been up there since I was a kid. The house was nice, the property even better but what surprised us most was what was stored in one of the outbuildings; it was caulked full of 30 inch wide, 2-inch-thick cedar timber stacked high to the rafters. Some of the planks where over 40 feet long. We ended up selling the whole lot for a stunning amount of money – in fact we had a bit of a bidding war on our hands as word of this spectacular find spread throughout the town.

Hire Us

Hire us to build a turnkey Western Red Cedar Tree Plantation on your land anywhere in the world. Our team will travel to your location and layout the Crop Circle Tree Plantation, marking the spots where trees are planted to make a perfect spiral, which is essential to promote fast tree growth. You can plant the trees yourself or hire us to do the planting for you.

Contact Us For Pricing

The best time to plant red cedar trees was 20 years ago.
The second best time is now!

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