I got one (tree service)

Great News PSYS

So have you thought about what size you can handle? Have you replied yet? Do you have a plan?

I get a permit to open air burn in the winter to get rid of the brush. Good beer time!

Good luck and sharpen the maul!!

I don't think you will be seeing any brush. When I had hooked up with a tree service my guy chipped everything under 4 or 5 inches in diameter. He only brought the big stuff that would require him to pay a dump fee. I would imagine that any commercial tree service would operate the same way, brush/limbs just takes up too much room/time for a crew to truck anywhere - chip it and you are done.

Of course you are still going to be busy - I used to get some really HUGE and oddly cut butts/stumps.

Nah, the crews get it cut and get it out there as fast as possible - brush/limbs slow that process, hence the chipping. The wood from the trees for these guys is just waste - more money to be made dropping trees then processing them!

You might want a good face to face with him now to work out any minor details and that you are serious. Find out what beer they drink

Bacffin said:

You might want a good face to face with him now to work out any minor details and that you are serious. Find out what beer they drink

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Yeah good idea, if not you could be in for a rude awakening when he puls up with an 18 wheeler and unloads it before you get out of the house.....

Ram 1500 with an axe... said:

Yeah good idea, if not you could be in for a rude awakening when he puls up with an 18 wheeler and unloads it before you get out of the house.....

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And what is wrong with that

PSYS said:

Well, after getting the load of wood from a coworkers land last weekend, the biggest rounds I measured varied from 18" to 25". I replied and let him know I don't think I'd be comfortable taking anything larger than 25" (diameter) at a maximum.

I have a few utility carts and my plan would essentially be to cut it into the standard 16" - 18" pieces curbside and then tote it to the side of the house or backyard where it can be split. If he's droppin' a tree when there's several feet of snow on the ground, I'd be forced to chop it curbside and simply it stack it on the side of our house.

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You definitely should find out about what length they will be and how they will be delivered. Logs to me mean unprocessed lengths up to 20' long. Log length should be laid out up off the ground on stringers. If they are chunks/cut rounds you should ask him to cut to your preferred length or multiples of if at all possible. You can get a big pile of cookies real fast if he delivers you a bunch of 20" pieces and you need to cut them down to 18" for your stove. If they are coming out of a dump truck the dump area is going to get trashed, you do not want him dumping on a paved driveway for any reason. Even rolling them out of a pickup will leave dents in a lawn.

Once cut up, rounds roll real easy if they are in fact round, so getting them across your yard, even if large is usually pretty easy. If you have any slope in your yard take advantage of it. It is much easier to move wood downhill. Other than taking advantage of gravity I would suggest you get the load dropped as close to wherever you are going to process/stack them. Have him dump in your backyard if possible.

Be forewarned that processing wood on your lawn will destroy it pretty quickly. You will be making a lot of dust/chips, chunks of bark and splinters all in a small area. There will be very little lawn left in your processing area if you cut up more than a few pieces. I prefer to saw my logs in my driveway just to contain the mess and for ease of cleanup even though it is extra work getting the wood there. (My backyard slopes to my driveway so gravity is in my favor there).

Bacffin said:

And what is wrong with that

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Read Paul bunions take on it and you will find out.......

Yep , like fwjunky said you won't be seeing any brush. They will chip anything their chipper can handle, so the minimum size branches/limbs will depend on how big a chipper they have. The tree co. that keeps me in wood have never dropped off anything under about 10".
I would expect logs only as handling smaller pieces just slows them down. I suppose if they had to remove something from a very tight spot you may see a trunk cut into rounds...
You will want to give them an upper limit diameter that you can handle & show them where to dump. Paul B is right about the sawdust. I spread out a big tarp before I start cutting on the pile. It catches maybe 3/4 of the dust and the rest is raked-up, then I hit the area with a leaf blower. I don't do that on my lawn anymore.
Maybe ask them not to bury you in undesirable species like willow, cottonwood or old rotten stuff. Other than that I'd say don't look the gift horse in the mouth (specific lengths, species…). I'll never complain about a couple junk trunks in a free load of good hardwood logs. Okay the loads usually cost me a few beers, but these guys drink the cheap stuff .

Ram 1500 with an axe... said:

Read Paul bunions take on it and you will find out.......

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Yea, I know. Just being a smart ars!

PSYS said:

GUYS

After sending out e-mails to three local tree service removal businesses, I got a positive response from one yesterday evening!

"Hi Scott,
We received your request for the wood we remove and we would be more than happy to comply!
Anytime we are working in your area and have wood to get rid of, consider it yours!
How big of logs can you handle? We cut down some really big trees.
Also, do you care what type of wood it is?
Thank you!"

OK. So, obviously I do not have a tree on my curb as of yet, but at least I'm on their radar which is half the battle.

This may be a silly question, but for those of you in the 'burbs like me, how do you guys handle all of the foliage? I know when we took down the Birch tree in our front yard, it was a pretty big undertaking. I know I can use the larger boughs and branches as kindling, but my wife is concerned that she's going to come home one day and see a several hundred foot Maple tree from the Jurassic period lying in front of our home. She's also claiming that now I've bitten off far more than I can chew...

My reply? ...I guess we'll need to chew faster.

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I haven't done what you've done, but I did call and talk to one of these guys once. The short story is I fell off his radar. However, I got real lucky with three scores close to home.

But here's my caution. Be real careful when you pray to the wood gods. If they decide to make it rain you're gonna' be up to your eyeballs. Try to take a really BIG view for insurance, say, the left half of your back yard to for the "to-split" pile, and the right half of your yard is for the split pile.

I haven't been smart enough to devise a fool-proof plan that insures that the oldest wood stays in front of the newest wood. Every time I think I have it figured out, guess what happens...

You will definitely get somewhere if you maintain and foster your relationship with this guy. Most excellent.

I have a deal like this but I take all he has to dump. Including TONs of mulch (more than I could ever use), pine, cottonwood,etc, in addition to the preferred wood. My advice would be to stay on top of it. If he dumps, immediately sort and at least stack the unsplit rounds. If you have time to split that is great but he can easily dump faster than you can split. Unsplit rounds will rot faster if left as dumped and the weeds overtake them. If you take the mulch you should have a front end loader to either spread it on trails or pile it up to rot. You may come to a point when the less desirable wood takes a back seat and accumulates while you work up the good wood (and you never get to the less preferred). I have grown up with and enjoy working with firewood so its all good for me but I know many would not tolerate the mess.

Careful, Did they actually say they would drop it of? I had a deal with a tree service, and it was a call to where the wood was. I have never heard of wood dropped for free around here. If they haul it, they get paid for it. But not as much as it cost to haul it, so they will let you take it. There is a time limit to get it as well.

PSYS said:

Thanks for the replies, guys!

OK. So, it sounds like the consensus is I shouldn't be seeing any brush which makes me a lot more comfortable. Right now in my neck of the woods, most of the leaves have fallen, but I had visions of a big, bushy, maple tree with all those crappy "helicopter" seed pods saturating my front lawn.

Our backyard has been relinquished to growing food and stacking firewood. Period. My neighbors think I'm insane, but I don't care if I don't have the stereotypical suburban green grass in the backyard. We do not have a patio. We've got three 4' x 8' garden beds and I plan on using the other half of the backyard for a wood shed next year. I wouldn't want to tear up my front lawn at all which is why I want to have a system in place.

Chop/cut the tree into manageable pieces on the curb where it's dropped and haul it to the backyard to be split and stacked.
I'm not really sure what to expect or anticipate so once he drops the first tree, I'll go from there.

As a new woodburner just getting started, you guys have taught me that I need to get ahead of the game and at this point... there is no way in holy heck that I'm going to turn down free wood especially after the e-mails I've sent.

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It sounds like you are serious about being self sufficient - a tree service was a God send to me, easily popped me over the three year mark for cut/split/stacked wood - you will have to hump for a bit but nothing beats a dump truck (in my case, tou may get a grapple load) or five dumped into your driveway

We ended our arrangement on a happy note - he had just had a baby and after my singing the virtues of free wood heat he now takes the bulk of the "waste". It's all good because I am now so far ahead I just take the downed wood on my own property, plus with two little ones of my own now I am not sure if I could keep up with what they were dropping!

Look at at this way - worst case scenerio, you send him an email or give him a call if it doesn't work out well for you - the worst thing that happens is that you have a couple of loads of wood to clean up - no real harm or foul.

The service guys know the "good wood" oak, locust you know the harder hard woods. Wouldn't they want them for themselves?

Paulywalnut said:

The service guys know the "good wood" oak, locust you know the harder hard woods. Wouldn't they want them for themselves?

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The service who gives me wood does not have the space nor the desire to process firewood. He knows the value but also knows the amount of labor to realize the value. The return per unit time is not even close to that for removing the tree. He just wants to get rid of it as cheap/easy as possible.

This is what I got from a tree service.....you may get the same. I told the guy it's not for resale, but to help heat my home....he said "I know exactly what you're looking for, and how big of a saw do you have".....the Wife was home to show them where to dump it.