Burning Bark?

When the Ash started flowing in because of the Emerald Ash Borer the bard will just fall off the wood as it's split. I had a huge pile of it. I tried to burn it but found it too much work for what it's worth. Next I threw it back into the empty trailer and hauled it to work and shoveled it in the dumster. Now I've got even smarter. I take the spliter to the woods and leave the bark there. Out in the woods now I'll throw it around where I'm working to make a nice working area for walking on. If I had a chipper I would consider mulching it. Bark makes the best mulch while wood doesn't.

I just compost the bark. I even pull off loose bark while splitting since I think it hampers the seasoning process. If it is firmly attached, I leave it on. The underside of thick red oak bark I noticed always seems wet and the sapwood under it is damp too even after months in a stacked line.

pen said:

For my taste, saving bark to burn is a waste of time. It, by itself, does not burn as a piece of wood does. That said, I just keep a pile of bark by the wood piles as I am stacking them (or unstacking them), and after a few loads of wood, load the bark into the wheel barrow, head to the woods, and make a deposit.

Now, if I didn't have a place to dump the bark, I'd probably consider letting it dry out, and throwing it in the stove a bit with each reload just to make disposal easier.

pen

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I do the same with my bark it goes over a hill.

nate379 said:

Yes. Some info here:
http://www.usibelli.com/Coal_Wishbone_Hill.php

My folks live in Northern Maine though, that's where I grew up.

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Learned a bit about the coal mining this summer while visiting my sister . . . she mentioned the "coal train" passing by and how they hear it from their home.

My loose bark gets used for mulch in the woodsier parts of the yard, under shrubs, etc. I guess about half of all bark that comes home with the firewood holds on long enough to make it into the stove and the other half falls off and becomes mulch.

What falls off goes in the woods. What doesn't goes in the stove.

Flatbedford said:

What falls off goes in the woods. What doesn't goes in the stove.

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I share the same philosophy.