Stacking Wood On Ground

There are three answers:

1. Many people here do stack on the ground. Fast forward 2 - 3 years, when your stacks are seasoned enough to burn, those pieces on bottom will be wet (if a good species) or rotten (if a poor species). People report just re-stacking the wet stuff on top of stacks for a following year, where they'll have a chance to dry another year or three. It's never considered the ideal route, but people do it.

2. I stack on shipping pallets, which I find for free. I can get pallets from landscape nurseries, Lowes, Home Depot, the grocery store, you name it. You just have to go, find a manager, and ask. You will find free pallets, if you check a few places, here and there.

3. Many people here lay down to straight saplings (pref. Cedar), and stack on those. I think I'd have trouble with my stacks falling over, if I used this method, but to each his/her own.

I've been doing 1. Lost my source of pallets and they do get to be a pain. The ones on the bottom are wet but haven't deteriorated much, yet.

If you have access to straight saplings, they'll serve well for stacking your firewood. We've been stacking on gum saplings for years, they last a long time. When they eventually rot I take the little tractor and saw to the woods and cut new ones. Drag 'em to the yard and roll in place.

Joful said:

I stack on shipping pallets, which I find for free. I can get pallets from landscape nurseries, Lowes, Home Depot, the grocery store, you name it. You just have to go, find a manager, and ask. You will find free pallets, if you check a few places, here and there.

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+1

Most times on a drive by (lumber yards) I see old pallets in the "free" pile. I stop and throw a few in the back of the truck and then stack them up until I need them. They last a few years then they go in the outside fire. Not sure what I'd do without them.

x3 for pallets

Pallets, up on cinderblocks at my house.

We found a supplier of plastic pallets not too far away for $5 each. My wife and son have about 130 now for stacking round bales of hay on in sheds. They're strong enough to hold round bales 4 high.

We're using landscape timbers that we've had for a while for stacking new splits. I noticed that Lowe's is $4 a piece.

I like this little note at Lowe's: "Not intended for ground contact", it's a landscape timber where else is it normally going to go besides in contact with the ground?

Pallets.

My first year I used pallets & landscape & cinder blocks, as I had quite a bunch of bricks.

Still using the bricks, the move pretty easily. I'm on my 3rd load of pallets.

If you can get a piece of house wrap and put that one the ground that will help keep the wood dryer. You won't get ground water soaking in, but you will absorb rain water that sits on the house wrap. That usually evaporates quickly if your stack is located in sunlight and a breeze.

Yes - those timbers will likely go on sale in the spring. Keep an eye out for a deal and buy plenty.

Also, as mentioned, pallets are free if you ask for them and with a little diligence you can find a resource that will save them for you if you are good about picking up the stash.

To answer you question about what to do now: I split and stack in the spring and have large piles of rounds laying on the ground all winter. Sometimes these pile lay around for a year before I get to them with the splitter with no signs of rot. A year or less will be no problem for a pile of rounds or splits. No need to stack twice.

Pallets are perfect. They are free. They keep the wood elevated so air can get underneath the stack. They allow water to run under them, keeping the wood dry.

I would do all I could to avoid piling wood directly on the ground. It really makes a difference.

I also found some cheap plastic pallets here - they work great and won't rot. Wood pallets are good, but you don't really want those on the ground either or in a year or two they will be a rotting mess of wood too wet to burn & nails - unless maybe you have a gravel area to put them on. But I do also use wood pallets - but get them off the ground by putting a fair sized split under each corner. Rotate those few splits out each year, they won't be as soggy as a the bottom layer of a pile on the ground will be. Then if you can't get pallets, the next choice would be small diameter long lengths of wood (poles) on the ground lengthwise, pile on top of those, same as you wood the lanscape ties. You should be able to find used pallets though, should work out even cheaper than the $1 ties.

Wood pallets.

Those of you stacking on landscaping timbers, are you just laying two of them down and making your stacks on top of them perpendicular? I mainly stack mine on a pretty thick bed of gravel. I'm not worried about the rot as wood for me is endless, but keeping the bottom stacks lower moisture would be nice.

Following the contour of the ground, rocks, etc, is easier stacking directly on the ground.

My yard is very rocky and I like to garden, so I am always piling up rocks as I prepare a garden bed. Some beds I have turned over ten times and I STILL get lots of rocks. I move the rocks to the wood stacking area, spread them in 8 ft circles (I have round stacks) and stack on rock. It takes some attention to make the bottom layer of wood stack securely, but from the bottom up I stack as normal.

I know this doesn't help the OP now, but it is a long term, permanent solution because the rocks will last forever.

I can't leave untreated wood on the ground.
Termites are in it almost overnite.

I left out in the woods a ways a 1/4 cord of maple stacked on small pine timbers in late Fall and termites were in the bottom three rows by April.

Oak seems to stand up to being left on the ground better than maple and cherry even when the termites don't get into it.

billb3 said:

I can't leave untreated wood on the ground.
Termites are in it almost overnite.

I left out in the woods a ways a 1/4 cord of maple stacked on small pine timbers in late Fall and termites were in the bottom three rows by April.

Oak seems to stand up to being left on the ground better than maple and cherry even when the termites don't get into it.

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I have the same problem. I left a pile of fresh hickory and ash rounds on the ground in June and when I went to split them in September, termites had bored through several layers of large rounds already and the ground where they were sitting was bone dry on the surface. I know the OP mentioned cost as a factor in determining what to do here but I figure if you are able to do something right at the beginning, it usually saves a lot of cost and headache down the road. The first few years I was stacking wood on makeshift pallets and so forth before I finally built some racks which have eliminated most issues I had with insects, pests and stacks falling over.

Here's what I did:

1) Found someone giving away a truckload of those flat red patio blocks on Craigslist. I laid them down on the ground to form a support base under each rack that wouldn't sink into the dirt.
2) Bought cheap pressure treated 2x4s to make multiple 8'hx4'wx8'L racks with side posts to support about 2 cords vertically each.
3) Put it all together and placed on the patio block base which is then liberally hosed down with termite/bug killer every time I get ready to refill the stack.

This set up has kept the wood bone dry even at the bottom, no termites and less pests overall and I haven't had to re-stack anything that has fallen over like I did several times in the first few years. In the spring, whatever racks are empty I tip over, rake up the mess on the ground, reapply bug killer, turn the rack upright and refill with new splits. Maybe this might be helpful...

Typ0 said:

yeah well there are a lot of posts in this thread that aren't very helpful.

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Really? Which ones would those be & why?

BobUrban said:

Yes - those timbers will likely go on sale in the spring. Keep an eye out for a deal and buy plenty.

Also, as mentioned, pallets are free if you ask for them and with a little diligence you can find a resource that will save them for you if you are good about picking up the stash.

To answer you question about what to do now: I split and stack in the spring and have large piles of rounds laying on the ground all winter. Sometimes these pile lay around for a year before I get to them with the splitter with no signs of rot. A year or less will be no problem for a pile of rounds or splits. No need to stack twice.

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Yeah with all the deflation in the economy lumber prices are dropping like a rock. There should be some real nice deals on anything timber.