A Kuna sawmill operator plans to buy equipment and supplies to expand his livestock-bedding and custom-sawmill business with a little help from federal officials seeking to reduce the risk of fire in national forests.

Diamond Ridge Lumber of Kuna has been awarded $168,200 grant from the U.S. Forest Service Woody Biomass Utilization Grant Program.

Owner Albert Wolske opened Diamond Ridge Lumber in 2000, after racking up more than 2 million miles behind the wheel of logging trucks in six states for companies like Boise Cascade.

Even after eight, years Diamond Ridge is a bare-bones operation. There is the saw. A vintage loader is parked nearby. Logs are piled and scrap lumber is stacked haphazardly around the yard. There is a small storage shed, but no office. During breaks, Wolske either pulls up a log or ducks into his pickup truck.

The Wolske family operated a small custom mill in the 1970s, but Albert Wolske followed helicopter-logging operations and wasn't around much. When his mother got sick, she closed the shop. Opening his own small mill had always been in the back of Wolske's mind, though. When the big logging operations began to close down, he made the move.

For eight years, Wolske has sold custom, rough-cut timbers. The large beams are used in custom homes and other architectural applications like the footbridges that connect paths in Tamarack and the exposed beams at the Birds of Prey Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealership in Caldwell.

Business has been good, too. Wolske says that despite the construction slowdown, orders for his custom-milled timbers have increased 35 percent since December.

He once sold scrap lumber and small, defective logs for firewood, but says that business was "a nuisance" and a big contributor to the local smog problem.

Three years ago, he found a machine that shaves scrap lumber into chips. It efficiently whittles small logs and mill waste into chips that make perfect bedding for livestock. Wolske sells the chips to Kuna Tack in 3-cubic-foot bags. He also supplies an Iowa cattle company that uses the shavings to line its trailers as they crisscross the Northwest.

Wolske plans to use the Forest Service grant money for a dryer - shavings with a lower moisture content are more desirable - and an upgraded bagging machine. He expects to sell 75,000 to 100,000 bags this year. "Once I have the dryer there is no question I'll have more local sales options," he said.

Much of the wood Diamond Ridge Lumber uses comes from the Boise and Payette National Forests. The Forest Service is thinning the area to reduce the fire hazard. Waste wood is traditionally piled and burned.

According to Payette National Forest spokeswoman Sylvia Clark, "the slash piles that would otherwise be burned are ideal materials for Diamond Ridge Lumber, and the Forest Service benefits by reducing the need to pile and burn the material, which reduces agency operating costs."

The biomass program is designed to find innovative uses for small-diameter woody material, including damaged and other low-value trees removed from forests to reduce the risk of fire hazard, insect infestation or disease. In four years the grant has awarded nearly $19 million to small businesses and community groups throughout the United States.

Source: IdahoStatesman.com