"I still can't believe it," Carlsen said, looking out over a wide expanse of trees that were uprooted or left dramatically bent by Hurricane Rita's winds nearly six weeks ago. "When you look at this, it makes it tough, especially when you're not making a little bit of money to pay for it."

The scent of fresh-cut pine has lost its appeal for many tree farmers in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama since hurricanes Rita and Katrina damaged about 5.7 million acres of timber - enough to produce nearly 900,000 single family homes. The acreage represents 20 percent of the private, state and federal forest land in those states and 1 percent of the nation's forests.

Katrina smashed into the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29 and Rita roared ashore on Sept. 24. Since then, timberland owners have scrambled to salvage their downed lumber, selling much of it prematurely - in some cases for less than half what they normally would make.

"It's a fire sale," said Ralph Day, an East Texas forestry consultant who has spent the last two months assessing damages in an area of the state known for its thick, piney woods. "It's also a race against time before the wood gets stained and isn't worth anything. The clock is ticking."

The United States Department of Agriculture and Texas Forest Service at Texas A&M University peg the four states' timber losses at nearly $6 billion. In East Texas, the damage was primarily from Rita. The storm damaged as much timber in seven counties as 43 Texas counties produce in an entire year, said Ron Hufford, executive vice president for the Texas Forestry Association.

Unlike agricultural crops, timber is not insured or eligible for special assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The damage hurts the nation's $230 billion-a-year timber industry, from the corporations with massive forest tracts to the single landowner, at a time when lumber is needed to rebuild hurricane-ravaged communities.

Michael Klein, spokesman for the American Forest & Paper Association, said it's too early to say just how storms will affect builders and homeowners, but the landowners are taking a hit right now.

Temple-Inland Inc. announced on Oct. 25 that it took $27 million in losses, both in expenses and downtime from the hurricanes. The Austin-based Fortune 500 company has more than 1.6 million acres of forest in East Texas and Louisiana, which sustained about $7 million in damages.

Limiting losses has been toughest for private landowners, industry officials said. Foresters and loggers are in demand, and harder to find because of the needs of bigger companies. Area lumber mills have all the business they can handle. So many small landowners have salvageable timber lying on the ground slowly rotting.

Carlsen is among the lucky ones. Work to salvage timber on his farm about 100 miles northeast of Houston got under way in late October when a team of loggers went to work putting in as many hours as daylight would permit.

As the job nears completion, logger Glen Brown's crew will have cleared up to 4,500 tons of timber that will become either construction lumber or pulp. Each day about 10 truckloads carrying up to 30 tons of lumber leave for area mills.

"There is a lot more work because everything is broken in half," Brown said. "I've never seen anything like this. I've been working sometimes seven days a week since storm hit."

Carlsen's father began accumulating land for the tree farm in the 1940s. Large sections of the land remain healthy with thick stands, but if the farm is to remain a viable long-term investment he must plant new trees soon.

Though he wouldn't discuss his finances, Carlsen said he's still calculating losses and the expense to replenish trees he hopes will be available for his grandchildren to continue on the family business.

"I enjoyed working here so much that it made me sick to look at it when I first saw it," Carlsen said. "When you look at this, it makes it tough, especially when you're not making a little bit of money to pay for it."

Losses, though still hard to quantify, may be worse long-term for the state's forestry industry, which had infused the state's economy with $21.8 billion annually. Some industry officials worry that landowners will now find new uses for the land.

"We need to ensure policies are in place so that incentive to reforest their land exist," said Trent Ashby, president of the Pineywoods Economic Partnership, which promotes the role of timber to the East Texas economy.

Kent Grizzard, spokesman for the Mississippi Forestry Commission, said regional forestry officials are lobbying for changes to federal aid regulations so timber land owners can receive assistance following natural disasters.

"The immediate needs have to be met, but the long-lasting impact is what makes this significant," said Grizzard, adding that his state enjoys a $13.4 billion annual economic benefit from the timber industry. "A lot of the trees blown down are the recovery effects from Hurricane Camille in 1969."

Back in Buna, one quiet scene underscored Carlsen's dismay: a firmly entrenched pair of four-by-four posts holding the family's tree farm sign, which stood tall over a fallen 90-foot pine tree.

"I'd like to hang a sign that says 'bombed out trees,' " he said. But "we'll get over it. We'll get it cleaned out. You'll see."