What wood is the most available in your area?

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What wood is the most available in your area?


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PA. Woodsman

Minister of Fire
Feb 26, 2007
2,257
Emmaus, Pennsylvania
Just curious as to which trees are the most available in your area for firewood, what species you seem to be able to easily get on a regular basis? In my area especially this year Silver Maple is the most prevelant, probably followed by Mulberry, although it seems to change every season.
 
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We have such a variety, I'm not sure.
Dennis would know better than I for this area.
Our property has White pine, Poplar, Spruce, Maple, Beech (small trees), a few Oak, a couple Birch, and I found one lonely Cedar a couple years ago. There are more, but I don't know what they are.
Sis-in-laws place has mostly Oak and Maple, and she's only 4.5 miles away.
 
Still ash here, from the ash borer caused die off.
 
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We tend to get lots of silver maple (fine with me as it drys fast). Last year it seemed to be honey locust. This year seems to be elm & oak. This is one of several loads of silver in the past month or so. Take all I can get but running behind getting it processed.
 

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There's quite a bit of variety . . . no one species really dominates the woodshed.
 
Oak. Among the biggest and very common.
 
I cut dead trees, so Red Oak is what I take most. The woods here has a lot of Red and White Oak, Shagbark and Pignut Hickory, White Ash and Sassafras. Smaller amounts of other Oaks, Black Cherry, Sugar Maple, Persimmon, Black Walnut etc.
 
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Poplar and maple. I have locust, oak and ash by choice though.
 
i live in Australia in an area covered mainly with Mountain Ash. These are very straight and long. When the first settlers came here they used these trees for the mast for their boats.

This is a hardwood similar in BTU's to Oak. Nice and easy to split as it it so straight with few branches.

Mountain ash 2.jpgmountain ash.jpg
 
Around here I'd say Oak is the most available wood, if you lump all the oaks together. Probably half the trees here are oak - white, red, black, and chestnut oaks are all common here in central PA.
 
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On a regular basis 4 species of Oak,2 Hickories are most prevalant,lesser amounts of Mulberry,White/Green Ash,Honey Locust,Cherry,Walnut,Elm,Eastern Red Cedar,Silver or Norway Maple etc.Roughly 60% of what I cut each year is dead Red or Black Oak,about 10% White/Bur & remainder other species.

I'll cut/bring home anything but Ailanthus though.
 
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It seems to vary here depending on where I am cutting but generally all are within 10 miles of home. Cherry is probably one of the most prevalent around here.
 
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1. Lots of cottonwood here.
2. Spruce & birch about even
3. Some aspen.

Most available is cottonwood, nobody wants it so easy to find it free.
 
Lots of cottonwood, willow, box elder, basswood -- these are easy to get because there are lots of them around here, plus they make bad firewood so people want to get rid of them

But also lots of red & white oak, ash, and silver maple
 
I have probably cut more locust than anything. But the most common trees around houses or in the city would be soft maples both red and silver. In the woods out in the country it would be the red oak family (black and red). Lots of pin oak in the city too.
 
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douglas fir and ponderosa pine up in this neck of the woods
 
Here in Oregon, Doug Fir reigns along w/Western Red Cedar.
 
Bulk of scrounge wood here is Box Elder, Silver Maple ( soft maples) Slippery and Chinese elms , Various Pines. EAB is in there area so Ash will start to become more prevalent for a while. Municipalities generally have been cutting the ash and grinding them up, and of course the quarantine on transport makes things a bit difficult as well. Got to be really quick for hardwoods. I like the Elms and Silver as they dry quick and do ok for I/2 the season, Box Elder is ok as well but usually a pain to process. Got to grab whats available. Presently I can be picky or give to a couple acquaintances that can't deal with large pieces typical of the Silver and Box( bust them to manageable size for them).
 
Lots of maple in the yards, sugar and silver and a few Norway. In the woods I still come across a fair amount of ash along with locust, mulberry and some oak.
 
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Good amount of black walnut here too
 
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I checked off half the list -- oaks, maples, cherries, ash and sycamore are all over the place, as are mulberry and black locust. I have no idea which of those is most common, but none of them rule the forest. I'm not sure how common cottonwood is, because when I do see it I don't pay it much attention.
 
Oak in my area by far - mostly red and some white also. Also a lot of pine in my area and smaller amounts of maple, poplar, and cedar, and even smaller amounts of locust and hickory, but at least 90% of what I burn is oak - mostly red.
 
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