Log and timber prices: what the official price series record

Prices on this page come only from agency price series, quoted as the agency published them. No figure here is an average or a typical price that the agency did not publish. Each series measures a different thing, so the numbers do not line up across rows: one is a price per cubic metre in pounds, the others are dollars per thousand board feet or per cord.

Contains public sector information published by Forest Research and licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

What each series measures

Series	What is priced	Unit, currency, period
Forest Research, Coniferous Standing Sales Price Index	Timber sold standing, where the buyer harvests	£ per cubic metre overbark, year to March 2026. Sales by Forestry England, Forestry and Land Scotland and Natural Resources Wales.
Forest Research, Softwood Sawlog Price Index	Sawlogs with a top diameter of 14 cm or more, sold at roadside	£ per cubic metre overbark, six months to March 2026, same three sellers.
Forest Research, Small Roundwood Price Index	Chipwood, pulpwood and woodfuel roundwood, sold at roadside	£ per cubic metre overbark, six months to March 2026, same three sellers.
NYSDEC Stumpage Price Report	Standing timber, prices given voluntarily by buyers and sellers	US$ per thousand board feet for sawtimber, per cord for cordwood, per green ton for chips. Winter 2025 report, number 106, four New York regions.
Vermont Stumpage Report	Stumpage for each product, with the number of harvests reporting	US$ per thousand board feet (International 1/4 rule) for sawlogs, per cord for pulp and firewood. First, second and third quarters of 2023, three regions.

Forest Research timber price indices

Forest Research describes the indices as measures of timber price inflation, built from sales of timber from publicly owned woodland in Great Britain. It publishes them twice a year, with data to March out in May and data to September out in November. The release for data to March 2026 came out on May 28, 2026, and the agency lists November 19, 2026 for the following one. The indices are shown in nominal terms, meaning the actual prices at the time of sale, and in real terms, which remove general inflation using the Office for National Statistics GDP deflator. The release says standing timber, sawlogs and small roundwood are distinct markets that can move differently, and that the data are averages for past periods, so they may be slow to show turning points.

Index	Published average price, nominal	Change the release states
Coniferous Standing Sales, year to March 2026	£35.17 per cubic metre overbark standing, against £31.16 in the year to March 2025	11.7 percent higher in real terms, 15.7 percent higher in nominal terms, compared with the year to March 2025
Softwood Sawlog, six months to March 2026	£55.30 per cubic metre overbark, against £59.70 in the six months to September 2025 and £77.55 in the six months to March 2025	31 percent lower in real terms, 28.7 percent lower in nominal terms, compared with the six months to March 2025
Small Roundwood, six months to March 2026	£45.87 per cubic metre overbark, against £44.55 in the six months to September 2025 and £48.43 in the six months to March 2025	8.4 percent lower in real terms, 5.3 percent lower in nominal terms, compared with the six months to March 2025

The release also gives two sawlog sub-indices: in real terms the Spruce Sawlog index was 40 percent lower and the Other Conifer Sawlog index 1.8 percent lower than in the six months to March 2025. The agency's timber price indices page carries the data sets and a methodology report.

New York stumpage report

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation says its report is published twice a year and gives the prices paid for standing timber in the previous six months, supplied voluntarily by buyers and sellers, split into four regions: Western/Central, Adirondack, Delaware/Catskill and Hudson/Mohawk. It says the report is only a guide, because the value of standing trees depends on timber quality, volume harvested, access, market demand, size, species and logging equipment. The Winter 2025 report gives each species as a low price range, an average price range and a high price range, each with a median in brackets. The table shows the Western/Central region, where the report uses the Doyle rule, for the species it lists as most common. Pine, white has asterisks in the report because fewer than 20 survey responses fed those figures.

Species	Western/Central prices, Doyle rule
Ash, white	Low US$75 to US$792 (median US$300); average US$340 to US$1,013 (median US$550); high US$496 to US$1,462 (median US$700)
Cherry, black	Low US$75 to US$806 (median US$350); average US$150 to US$1,095 (median US$500); high US$300 to US$1,595 (median US$600)
Maple, red (soft)	Low US$50 to US$423 (median US$248); average US$125 to US$787 (median US$400); high US$300 to US$1,196 (median US$500)
Maple, sugar (hard)	Low US$75 to US$832 (median US$550); average US$300 to US$1,013 (median US$700); high US$500 to US$1,462 (median US$900)
Oak, red	Low US$75 to US$738 (median US$500); average US$250 to US$1,100 (median US$600); high US$375 to US$1,462 (median US$728)
Pine, white	Low US$40 to US$194 (median US$75); average US$60 to US$198 (median US$100); high US$80 to US$248 (median US$150)

All of these are dollars per thousand board feet. The report's definitions say a low price range is the range of the absolute lowest prices paid by survey respondents, an average price range is the range of the average price paid for middle quality timber, and a median means half of the reported prices are higher and half lower. The state's stumpage price reports page keeps earlier reports from 2021 on.

Vermont stumpage report

The Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation says its report continues the one UVM Extension produced for many years, keeps its three regions and quarterly layout, and publishes, in the 2023 report, the number of responses for each species and product. It warns that the prices are general indicators only, that a count of 1 or 2 calls for more caution, and that individual woodlot conditions play a large part in the price possible. The combined first, second and third quarter 2023 report gives these figures in US$ per thousand board feet on the International 1/4 rule, with the number of harvests reporting in brackets. The table shows sawlogs only.

Sawlog	North	Central	South
White ash	US$310 (3)	US$358 (2)	US$260 (9)
Soft or red maple	US$192 (3)	US$129 (2)	US$133 (4)
Red oak	US$200 (1)	No data	US$165 (2)
White pine	US$125 (2)	US$125 (2)	US$141 (7)
Spruce or fir	US$136 (3)	US$109 (2)	No data

The same report lists firewood at US$13 per cord in the North with 7 harvests, US$13 in the Central region with 3, and US$7 in the South with 11. It says grey cells have very low response rates and are of very limited value, and that the figures show relative stumpage value and do not measure the market price of any later sale. The department's stumpage price reports page lists quarterly reports back to 1981.

Units

Unit	What the sources say it is
Board foot	A unit of wood volume in a tree, log or board. A piece 1 foot by 1 foot by 1 inch is the usual shape, and any shape holding 144 cubic inches of wood counts as one (NYSDEC glossary). MBF is a thousand board feet.
Cord	Wood cut for fuel, pulp or chips, equal to a stack 4 by 4 by 8 feet or 128 cubic feet (NYSDEC glossary).
Cubic metre overbark	Volume including the bark, the unit of all three Forest Research indices.
Green ton	The unit for chips in the New York and Vermont reports.
Log rule	A method of calculating wood volume from diameter and length. NYSDEC names the Doyle, International 1/4 inch and Scribner rules and says each gives a different volume for identical trees.