Jaugust124 said:
Hey Everyone,
I am just starting to get my wood pile going for next season and am planning on purchasing a Jotul Rockland 550 this week and having it installed hopefully next week.
Having read posts here for awhile I see people burning pine with no issues, but how long should it season before burning? I always thought pine was a no-no, no matter how long it seasoned. Is this an old school way of thinking? And, how does it compare btu wise?
As a side note, I hooked up with a local tree service and he told me I could have all the firewood he dumps on his property. I just have to go and get it. He told me he can't even give it away, so take what I want. I went to check it out with a buddy of mine and he has TONS of wood. Probably about an acre or more loaded with stuff he has taken down. The only problem is there is no reason or rhyme to his dumping methods making it hard to get a vehicle around and some of the logs are massive. Too big for me to mess with. I plan on getting in there next week to start working on it.
Late to the party as usual . . . but I'll chime in anyways.
As others have said, pine is fine . . . in fact somewhere here I actually wrote a little poem about burning wood . . . Wood is Good or some other stupid title. Basically the gist of my amateur prose is that as long as your wood is seasoned you can pretty much burn anything in your stove. Seasoning is typically considered to be a year . . . although with some softwood and soft hardwood the time can be shortened a bit and with some more dense hardwoods such as oak you need to season it longer . . . some folks here go techy on us and use moisture meters to determine the moisture content of the wood . . . I just make sure to buck, split and stack my wood a year or more in advance and have good luck.
I should back up and say while burning softwoods such as pine is fine, there are some things you should not burn in your stove . . . pressure treated wood, painted or stained wood, trash, OSB, etc. . . . and of course unseasoned wood which a) will blacken your glass really fast, b) not allow you to get your full potential of heat out of your stove, c) will lead to much anger and gnashing of teeth as you struggle to get a fire going and d) perhaps most importantly can lead to excessive creosote build up which in turn can lead to a chimney fire.
So to answer your questions . . . yes, you can burn pine . . . I do myself . . . usually every winter a few large branches come down from the snow and ice.
I like to season my pine for a year . . . some folks have good luck seasoning it as little as 6-9 months . . . it helps to have it bucked up to stove length, split if necessary and stacked for good air flow.
Yes . . . pine = chimney fires is old school thinking. We've had some debates here as to why this may be . . . one theory is that oftentimes seasoned wood is lighter in weight than fresh cut wood . . . since pine is already a light-weight wood some folks may have tried to burn this wood in their woodstove assuming it would be OK to burn and instead ended up with a lot of creosote which led to a chimney fire . . . there is also a lot of pitch in pine (and ofther softwood) and this resin can burn pretty strong . . . add in the fact that pine tends to throw a lot of sparks and pops and snaps and well . . . folks were a bit shy about burning pine.
Pine is not the best wood to burn in a stove however. White pine for example is not a particularly high BTU wood. I primarily use pine in the Spring and Fall . . . and for kindling. I do not load up my stove with pine for an overnight burn in middle of January . . . it just wouldn't last the night . . . I would get a good, hot fire, but it doesn't have the lasting power as other, denser woods.