The Kentucky Woodland Owners Association is an organization for private forestland owners. The association meets routinely with key leaders to discuss issues and concerns facing landowners.
What are the concerns of private forestland owners?
Traveling Kentucky highways we see farms producing prize-winning corn and soybeans. But the hills behind those fields are often covered by scrubby, nonproductive forest trees. This is the result of harvest methods that take all the most valuable trees while leaving the weak ones and the nonmerchantable species.
How long would a farmer be in business if he consistently sold all his best cattle and kept only the runts for breeding stock? But this is what has been going on in Kentucky woodlands for over 100 years!
Put simply, forest landowners have often been manipulated and exploited by interests seeking their own quick profit. Nonlandowners have been making the decisions for you about your timber taxes, erosion control and wildlife protection, freedom to harvest your timber, markets for woodland products, log prices and legal liabilities for land use. There has been no organization speaking for the landowner, until now.
KWOA is the voice of all woodland owners in the commonwealth. The association networks with woodland owners associations in 27 other states in order to inform landowners of important forestry issues.
Here are some key issues that landowners are facing today:
- Environmental regulations and land taxes are increasing
- Timber markets are limited and dominated by a few big buyers
- Few voters understand rural landowner concerns
- Government assistance programs for forestry are being cut dramatically
Since 1994, the Kentucky Woodland Owners Association has been working so you can:
- Protect your right to practice forestry
- Start earning a steady income from your forest
- Heal the trees in your forest for long-term production
- Bring your forest and wildlife back to ecological health
For membership information contact:
Kentucky Woodland Owners Association
Hutton and Loyd Tree Farm
1483 Big Run Road
Wallingford, KY 41093
606-876-3423
