PORTLAND — Oregon’s timber harvest dropped below 4 billion board feet in 2015, snapping a two-year run above that benchmark, according to statistics released Monday by the state Department of Forestry.
The 3.79 billion board feet harvested last year represents an 8 percent decline from 2014, and that harvest was slightly lower than 2013.
Brandon Kaetzel, a top economist at the department, said the decrease was largely driven by a slowdown in exports to Asia. Moreover, an increase in Canadian lumber hurt demand for Oregon logs and an active fire season caused problems.
One board foot of lumber is a foot wide, a foot long and an inch thick. It takes 10,000 board feet to build a roughly 1,800-square-foot house.
Sixty percent of Oregon’s forest land is federal. Industrial and family owned lands comprise another 34 percent and the rest is divided between entities such as the state, counties and tribes.
The statistics show the harvest slumped across all ownership types, except state-owned.
Douglas County remained the state’s top producer in timber volume, though its total fell to about 560 million board feet. Neighboring Lane County was next at almost 553 million. Both counties topped 600 million in 2014.
Though most timber-rich counties saw a decline, some defied the trend. Klamath County’s harvest jumped to 131 million board feet — 27 percent more than in 2014.
Oregon’s timber harvest is less than what it was before environmental issues such as the spotted owl led to reduced logging on federal lands. The harvest peaked at nearly 10 billion board feet in 1972 and has not exceeded 5 billion since 1993.
The harvest, however, has recovered from a recession-low 2.7 billion board feet in 2009.
