[I got the rope]

Can you still use the wood from trees that have been killed by disease or insects? Or is it only good for fuel?

[ghostcat]

The short answer is yes. All the poles for my tipi for example are beetle kill lodgepole pine that I cut with a permit from a national forest. My father in law built a lodge for a resort that he used to own entirley out of beetle kill timber. it is very usable and a lot easier to harvest than live wood.

[Tailback]

Can you still use the wood from trees that have been killed by disease or insects? Or is it only good for fuel?

You can chip it to make pulp for paper or use it for pressboard. You can still extract the resins depending on the type of tree. In other words there's plenty you can do with an insect infested tree if you get to harvest it soon enough. The same goes for fire killed ones.

[crz]

Depends on how long its been dead. Worms chew holes into it and weaken it. Decay sets in and weakens the fibre. So after a year or two its about useless other than fuel for the next fire. Burned wood will rot slower and can be harvested a little later on. But the chips and waste from burned wood cannot be used for making things like pulp for paper as its charred and it will not bleach out and will get stuck in the paper machine system. If I send just one charred log into the paper mills and it gets dicovered, they will jerk my contract right then and there. The rotten wood from insect killed wood has weak fibre and will not hold together for the paper process..although it sometimes works alright for other paper products like tissue paper. Most inspectors who inspect homes under construction will not pass the inspection of homes built from insect damaged wood if its to far gone.