Poll: Do You Cover Your Main Supply of Firewood?

big stack out back is never covered. small stack close to the door holds about 1/2 cord and is covered with a tarp secured by bungees.

Have four rows under a 24' x 12' wood shed that is 75' from the house.
The south side row is exposed to the sun thru store front glass.
(Our cat's favorite spot in the winter.) ;-)
And once the heating season is over the next rank is brought to the front.

Dave

I live in the city, so not really much of a place to store huge amounts of firewood, at least, not without code enforcement getting on me...

Actually just starting to build up supplies again, the ban on transporting firewood led to high gas bills for a while. On the back wall of the house, it's kind of covered under the eave, but not too well... The majority of it will be in the garage, can hold enough for about 2 winters in there along the one wall. So yeah, you could say covered. Up at the cabin, in rickety woodshed, so covered.

BAN ON TRANSPORTING FIREWOOD?????

DavidV said:

BAN ON TRANSPORTING FIREWOOD?????

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The Emerald Ash Borer somehow made its way from Asia to southern Michigan, where I guess it's killed most of the ash trees by now. It's like those various beetle larva that leave trails under the bark of older firewood, except it does it to live trees. It's working its way into Ohio and Indiana. All the affected counties are quarantined, and in Michigan at least you can't transport firewood between counties in most of the lower peninsula or transport firewood into the upper peninsula (only isolated EAB sightings there so far) or Canada. Luckily the EAB seems to only attack ash trees, but all species of firewood are controlled just in case and for simplicitly.

BTW - EAB has been seen in Maryland. Cross your fingers.

Oh, and to answer the original question: Here in MD I have 4 stacks: one is open, one was open all summer but is now tarped, one is under the deck and sort of tarped, and one is under a screen porch (so covered like a woodshed). In MI I'm accumulating firewood much faster than I can burn it (yes, a tragic problem %-P), so everything gets tarped or stacked under the porch in the hopes that it will last quite a while. I also keep maybe 2/3 cord in the garage for easy access.

I keep it partially covered. Old shower curtains do the trick. I rebuilt a covered patio this year so next year the old fiberglass corrugate roofing will make for a more permanent setup. This corrugate is thick as heck, nothing like you find at home cheapo today. It's about 50 years old and was apparently made by the energizer bunny.

DavidV said:

BAN ON TRANSPORTING FIREWOOD?????

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Here in Southeastern Michigan the Emerald Ash Borer is killing all Ash Trees.

http://www.na.fs.fed.us/spfo/pubs/pest_al/eab/eab.pdf

There is no stopping this bug yet, in areas out side yet near the Quarantine, harvesting all valuable Ash trees has been suggested before the EAB moves in and the Quarantine is extended. All 700 million Ash trees in Michigan and 8 billion Ash trees in the United States are at risk . If the spread of EAB is not controlled, it could eliminate ash trees as a species from North America.

http://na.fs.fed.us/fhp/eab/
http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/plaveg/protect/pestrava/ashfre/agrplae.shtml

More than 3000 square miles in southeast Michigan are infested and more than 5 million Ash trees are dead or dying from this pest with no end in sight.

http://www.michigan.gov/mda/0,1607,7-125-1568_2390_18298---,00.html
http://www.entm.purdue.edu/EAB/
http://www.ohioagriculture.gov/eab/plnt-eab-regulations.stm

I can not move any logs, branches, ash nursery stock, chips or other wood to minimize any potential movement of the EAB. into or out of the county I live in. We are under a Federal USDA Quarantine. I do not usually scrounge wood more the a few miles from home so it is not affecting me yet.

I could be burning tons of Ash in the future as property owners clear these standing dead Ash.

That ash borer thing sucks. We have a beetle here that is taking down the pine trees....They just lay there and rot. Thankfully they rot fast. I try to cover my wood with black plastic as soon as I get it stacked high enough that I'm satisfied. I have a 20- foot long stack that is only about 3 feet tall that isn't covered...my kids stacked it and I'm not sure I can go much higher with it ....structural issues. I will try to take it up another foot in the middle and then I'll cover it. The only wood that isn't covered with black plastic is under an old solar pool cover. It seemed like a good idea since I had the darned thing. The wood grows lichen and fuzzy brown stuff in the summer but in winter, like now, it's so dry you'd be afraid to smoke around it.

I keep all the split wood in the yard covered (top only). I have a seperate pile of unstackable splits which are various lengths which are off the ground in a pen. When I feel like burning them I grap a few pieces and set them by the stove overnight and they are fine to burn. I have one of those metal racks on the front porch which holds around 190 pieces uncovered. That's the pile I burn from daily and refill on the weekend.

2 wood racks filled.. Another rack being filled with splits from a dead oak thats literally dry. All are uncovered. Smaller wood rack in the garage that will be filled once a good cold snap comes thru...

4-8-4 Northern you have a beautiful woodpile setup! Great pictures!

4-8-4 Northern said:

Except for the weeks worth of wood on my deck, my main stack is completely uncovered. I've been through the "running after the tarps in the wind" thing, and it wasn't fun. Of course, when it rains, the wood gets wet, but this is just surface moisture and it quickly dries up in the wind and sun. After all, if it's exposed to the rain, it's also exposed to the wind and sun. So uncovered stacks have worked out well for me. When I burn it, the wood seems very dry, as long as it's seasoned long enough.

I don't have a moisture meter, but I'd be curious to know if anyone has actually compared the moisture level in wood thats been covered and wood thats been uncovered. It would be an interesting experiment. IMHO, covering wood is not necessary, but I'd sure like to see the results of a scientific experiment.

One last thing. I HATE the look of those blue/gray/green tarps. In my opinion, an uncovered wood stack is a thing of beauty. It blends right into it's natural surroundings.

Here are a couple of photos taken of my wood stack on a rainy day.

http://www.pbase.com/image/70508715.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/image/70508720.jpg

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I have two wood sheds that I designed and built myself (cheaply - the newest one was about $600 for 8' X 16' x 6.5'H (estimated 6 cords capacity)) The sheds are roofed, but were open on the sides, I have now hung tarps (heavy duty silver poly tarps from Harbor Freight) on the open sides, which gives them full coverage but it is simply a matter of rolling the tarp up over a section to get at the wood. The sheds also get the wood a few inches off the ground.

I also have a stack of rounds that I haven't split yet, ~2.5 cords worth (no room left in the sheds), which I have left laying on the ground, but have 90% or so covered over with tarps - I figure the more it dries over the winter the easier it will be to split come spring. Put me in the "fully covered" colum.

OTOH, the wood wasn't covered before I split it and moved it into the woodshed. My wood is a mixture of stuff that I've taken down around the yard, or paid to have dropped (mostly swamp maple), some scrounging, and a truckload of "Log-length" that I think is mostly red oak and maple. Aside from the half cord or so I had left over from last winter, I started splitting this spring, and finished up in September. This means the wood won't be as seasoned as some say it should be, but since I'll be burning it in about the same order I split it in, most all of it should have been seasoning under cover for 6-9 months at least. If I don't burn all I split (I hope not to) then every year after this I should be in slightly better shape.

Gooserider

My seasoned supply for this winter is covered w/ tarps that overhang maybe the top 2 rows give or take, and are then bungied to the end posts of the rack. If there is a dry spell in the forecast, I often take the tops off to increase air circulation as well as let in some extra sunlight.

Unseasoned racks for future years are generally uncovered unless there is a sustained, deluging rain in the forecast lasting several days. Like Disco, I also keep small a supply in the attached garage that is easy access from the stove during snow storms (or when Im feeling lazy when it's dark out). I keep alot less in the garage, maybe 2 days worth which is frequently rotated (burned) and swept, as Im paranoid about pests infesting the garage.