Unwanted Black Walnut trees

[newsreader]

I have quite a few good size Black Walnut tree on the property I moved to recently. I'm an avid gardener, and these trees & their plant killing toxins ( and messy nuts & branches) just don't fit into my current & future landscape plan. Someone on the rec.garden newsgroup suggested I look for a local woodworker or carver who might be interested in removing the trees to use the wood. The 2 biggest trees are probably about 2' diameter at the base, and taller than my 2 story with attic house. 2 more are about 18" @ base.

Any suggestions where to look for such a person, other than usenet? I'm located in Howard Co, MD

David

[Patriarch]

newsreader wrote in news:gcOdnVD308vDhAXZnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]:

You might also post this in rec.crafts.woodturning. Turners are notorious for scrounging free, 'problem' wood. And they do things with tree parts that flat woodworkers can't easily use.

Patriarch, on the west coast...

[newsreader]

Thanks for the tip, crossposted there as well

[Frank Boettcher]

DAGS for portable saw mills. Call the dealers to find out who has them in your area. Contact them to see if they would be willing to take the trees. There is an individual in my area that does that.

Frank

[Allen Epps]

David, I'm right next to you in Catonsville. A gent at work and I may be interested. Are they fairly simple to drop or do you valuable stuff in the way?

Allen

[Wayne K]

[newsreader]

An Arborist who came by to see the trees convinced me that I would be foolish to remove these old healthy trees. He pointed out there are quite a lot of ornamentals that could be planted under them.

He suggested I hire a few day laborers during the annual heavy nut dropping season, pay them a couple hundred dollars, then take all the money I saved by not paying for tree removal, and use the savings for a trip to Hawaii.

He also pointed out that 2 of the larger trees have some substantial hollows in the trunk, making them not very valuable for cutting boards, in his opinion.

I reckon I will keep them for a while.

David

[fredfighter]

He's probably right. Although black walnuts can have large limbs the wood from limbs tends to be unstable and unsuitable for boards. Turners may still be interested so keep that in mind when the trees eventually do come down.

And black walnuts are VERY tasty.