The timber was falling in 2007 in Coos and Curry counties — at least a little more than in the rest of the state.

Overall, Coos County timber harvests are down about 17 percent from 2006, but on the Elliott State Forest the numbers are up.

In 2006, the state cut 22.5 million board feet on the Elliott, at a value of $11.8 million. The 2007 harvest increased slightly to 23.7 million board feet, at a value of $13.3 million. Coos Bay District Forester Jim Young said the spike is a product of timber companies harvesting on sales made in past years. A timber company has a two- or three year window to harvest a sale. The companies pay for the logs when they harvest trees rather than at the time of the timber sale, he said

Most of the timber off the Elliott is going to the plywood market, which is somewhat stronger than the lumber market. But with the harvest hike, last year’s harvest still falls below the Elliott’s 10-year average of 27 million board feet.

 “The difference is primarily driven by endangered species constraints,” Young said.

In particular, Young said, it’s because of the marbled murrelet.

The Elliott wasn’t the only area seeing a hike in harvests.

Curry County was among just five Oregon counties to avoid a decline in cut, the Oregon Department of Foresty said in a press release. Overall, Curry County’s harvest increased about 3 percent.

“It’s not a huge increase,” Oregon Department of Forestry forest economist Gary Lettman said. “It’s good news that harvests are holding up in that area.”

 Hood River, Linn and Yamhill counties also bucked the downward trend. Statewide, timber harvests still are declining.

In all, loggers cut 3.8 billion board feet in 2007, compared to 4.33 billion in 2006, a decrease of 11 percent, a forestry department press release said.

On Tuesday, the department released its 2007 annual timber harvest report, which provides details of last year’s harvest.

Lettman said some aspects of the market prevented the slip in the 2007 harvest from being worse.

“However, with relatively strong plywood demand and non-residential construction, and fewer log imports from adjacent states, Oregon timber harvests declined less than half of the percentage drop in national housing starts,” Lettman said.

Declining harvests from private forest owners account for much of the decrease. An 11 percent decrease in volume from forest industry landowners was paired with a 43 percent decline in harvests on non-industrial private lands. Federal harvests accounted for less than 10 percent of the cut.

Lane County continues to lead Oregon’s counties in harvesting, despite a 15 percent decrease to 504 million board feet in 2007. Douglas County was second with 479 million board feet, while Clatsop was third at 338 million and Coos was at 303 million board feet.  The western Oregon region’s harvest decreased 11 percent.

That is a much different scenario than what is being seen in eastern Oregon. Lettman said that region of the state at one time provided 31 percent of the state’s harvest. Now it provides just 11 percent. Lettman said there are only 10 sawmills left in the eastern counties. With fuel costs rising, the increasing distance between where the trees are cut to a sawmill is making logging very expensive for producers.

The ODF 2007 Annual Timber Harvest Report is available online on the department’s Web site at www.oregon.gov/ODF/STATE_FORESTS/FRP/annual_Reports.shtml.

(Staff Writer Jolene Guzman covers forestry and veterans issues for The World. She can be reached by calling 269-1222, ext. 235; or by e-mailing to jguzman@theworldlink.com.)