My friend had a bunch of 100 year old pines lining his driveway. These were big trees over 100 foot tall and three foot in diameter. He had them all cut down as they were at the end of their usable life anyway (one was just starting to rot from the inside so his timeing was pretty good). He had a sawyer come to his house and rough cut everything there. He just air dryed it by stacking with "stickers" between each layer. He got enough lumber to make a 40 x 40 garage as well as a 30 x 30 barn using the rough cut for all the framing, rafters and joists. (He bought T-111 for the siding on the 40 x 40 but used the rough cut board and batten for the 30 x30). Bottom line was he got an awful lot of lumber out of those trees and the drying wasn't even an issue. Well worth it if you have the trees, inclination, and a little time.