Does anyone actually know the rate of seasoning for different parts of the country?

[joefrompa]

Hi all,

It seems this has never been mapped out, but shouldn't we have a "wood seasoning zone" chart? I'm beginning to realize that some of you guys are burning 8 months a year, living in wet and snowy climates for most of that time, and don't get alot of 85+ degree days ever. And season your wood outside for "1 year" and you are good.

And here I am with 6-7 months a year of 70+ degree days, greater sunshine, less wetness than alot of guys (pacific northwesterners anyone?), and I'm supposed to be seasoning for the same block of time?

Truly, I realize seasoning is totally dependant upon species of wood, when the wood was cut down, where it's located, sunshine, wind, etc etc....

But so is everything else in life dependant.

Anyway, I'm frustrated with this today so I felt like venting. For a forum full of obsessive compulsive wood people, we have precious little tracked data on seasoning, seasoning rates, etc....and for a forum full of people who scoff at "old wives tales" about burning wood ("Pine will cause chimney fires", "Green wood burns longer so add it to lengthen your burns"), it seems like I read the following sentence 98% of the time:

"Season it for a year and it'll be good unless it's oak"

Is that the best we have?

 

[snowleopard]

Interesting ideas. I think it's a bit like people passing down recipes who don't write them down because, " . . . it's accordin' . . ." So much is microclimate as well as macroclimate. I think along with that "wait a year" advice there's a lot more information larded in:
stack it in single rows, in a sunny, windy location; get it up off the ground; cut your trees before the sap rises; split them asap; shorter wood seasons faster; don't cover it until it's seasoned/cover it during wet spells; run your rows E/W but whack it to keep it from falling over/run your rows N/S so they don't shrink unevenly. We're all expected to winnow out what applies to our situation, adapt as best we can, and learn from experience--our own and others'.

Our HH data was compiled in Australia w/Australian woods. Does this translate as broadly as we all seem to like to think? Maybe/maybe not.

Even from one year to the next seasoning is probably not completely consistent for any given individual's wood piles. Best moisture meter advice I've seen on here was, "If you think it might be too green, it is." If one year seems dubious (except for oak), give it two.

 

[joefrompa]

Hey Snow,

Thanks for the response. I guess what's frustrating me is that my own experiences (which isn't alot!) show seasoning is vastly accelerated during 60+ degree days with a bit of air movement compared to temperatures near freezing. Sun or no sun. I'm seeing pine season in 3 months at the current rate, for example. And my elm seems to be on a similar trajectory, given 3 months of warm weather with a bit of air movement. Similarly, I saw ash that I had split 2 months prior, but during winter, still struggle a bit to burn. Ash!

Now, a good number of the pros on here are in seriously colder locations than I am. So I'm wondering just how much different is my climate than many of the pros.

Joe

 

[zzr7ky]

“Season it for a year and it’ll be good unless it’s oak†- Hey 98& is pretty darn good!!

I found that after the first year of scraping by with less a cord of dry wood, and about 3 cords scrounged-mongrel-wood. the second year was much better. By the third year, the Oak from the 1st year was dry, and I just rotate stacks, not burning much of anything less than 2 years old. If you have room it really can be pretty simple.

Air circulation and sun load are big factors that I consider. I try to avoid the whole OCD thing...

There are folks here with detailed charts, inventory data and the like.

Mike

 

[-PB-]

Joe,
Great question, interested in hearing responses from the experts. Bump to the top.

 

[midwestcoast]

I can't think of another purpose for which the drying factors would all be included and mapped, but I bet someone has done it somewhere. Can anyone think of a purpose for which that may have been done?
Averages for Humidity, temp, wind speed, sun for stations across the country all weighted accordingly, totaled-up & mapped out would give a good reference. Sounds like a project for ya Joe!

 

[Backwoods Savage]

It would have to involve a lot of information to get anything that would be somewhat accurate. For example, let's take this spring. Last year in these parts all the corn was planted by the first week of May and the beans went in soon after. This year, like other areas, we are awfully wet and very little corn has been planted. With these conditions, it will also have an effect on drying of wood.

Last year we had our wood split and stacked long before April hit as we had some fantastic weather for that time of they year. The point is, every year can be a lot different so the length of time it takes to evaporate moisture from wood will also vary. That is why we use the rule of thumb ideas as in giving wood a year to dry and some wood giving 2 years while others need 3. Does that always hold true? Absolutely not!

I know for a fact that some folks out in western Iowa will have their wood dry a whole lot quicker than the folks in the New England States. Or compare the folks in Wyoming with the folks who live near Seattle. Of course they also have some different woods out there than we have just as there are some different woods in New England than we have in Michigan.

If you stick to the rule of thumb method, you won't go wrong. Get 2-3 years wood ahead and your worries about if the wood is dry enough or not will vanish. You will know it is good wood. My feelings are that if someone wants to burn wood then they need to do what is necessary to do it right and part of that is assuring that your wood is right. We do all we can to try to prod folks into getting their fuel ahead of time so it can dry but there are only so many ideas we can present.

 

[jimbom]

Read pages 4-1 through 4-5 in the Wood Engineering Handbook for a little background

http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/fplgtr/fpl_gtr190.pdf

Then go to the weather records for your locale and get the average monthly temperature and relative humidity.

How long it takes to get to the points found in the handbook depend on your specific wood, split size, storage practice, and seasoning conditions. I read somewhere that well seasoned firewood may be 5% or so more than the number listed in the handbook. I am not sure why, but it might have something to do with relative humidity cycles.

 

[DonNC]

I plant to cover mine with clear plastic and cut a hole in the center of the "tent"...but not directly over the wood. The bottom ends of the "tent" will be off the ground. It is my hope to dry the wood faster than normal like this

 

[gibson]

My solution, buying year to year. I tell the tree guy not to deliver me any oak. I get maple, ash, and a little bit of red oak. The maple and ash are always ready to go. I use the oak for the overnights in Jan - Feb. I burn wood seasoned one year starting in Nov.

 

[CTYank]

As an exercise, could you please define "rate of seasoning"? Because it's meaningless, on the face of it.

OTOH, rate of air-drying depends most on temp, airflow/access, size of pieces, species. Some conifers and most all oaks are problem cases.

You can find tables of equilibrium wood MC for temp and RH, which might help some.

Some will tell you to leave stacks exposed to the rains. Your call, but no way here, just cover top only, and leave some space on top- think 2x2s lengthwise on top.

 

[mywaynow]

When you look at temperatures, you need to also consider the rain and humidity that accompanies those hot temps. On the other hand, cold temps are most always accompanied by low humidity. Rain does not make huge differences in seasoning "because the rain runs off the wood and is only absorbed in small amounts", however, if you get constant rain and your wood is not covered, it most certainly will affect seasoning. In order for the center moisture to get out, it must be drawn by the outer skin of the wood, and mostly the endgrain. Also, do not put plastic on the sides of the pile, if you use it. Just the top should be covered. Wood types and when wood is harvested has massive effects on seasoning too. OCD or not, you won't find a fool-proof chart that will have relevancy on this topic. It would be like trying to predict a 5 word answer to a 20 word question asked in 50 states.

 

[oldspark]

Backwoods may sound like a broken record but he couldn't be more right, 30 years or so ago I used to "hunt" for dead wood I could burn right away and it was a pain in the butt, once I was far enough ahead I could cut any thing, dead or alive oak, ash, elm or maple and did not have to worry about how quick it dried. I know some of you do not have the room to stack all that much wood so you have to come up with workable solutions.

 

[snowleopard]

Hey Snow,
Thanks for the response. I guess what's frustrating me is that my own experiences (which isn't alot!) show seasoning is vastly accelerated during 60+ degree days with a bit of air movement compared to temperatures near freezing. Sun or no sun. I'm seeing pine season in 3 months at the current rate, for example. And my elm seems to be on a similar trajectory, given 3 months of warm weather with a bit of air movement. Similarly, I saw ash that I had split 2 months prior, but during winter, still struggle a bit to burn. Ash!
Now a good number of the pros on here are in seriously colder locations than I am. So I'm wondering just how much different is my climate than many of the pros.
Joe

I don't have pine, or ash, or elm, so I don't really know much about how those woods behave, or what to expect in terms of drying. And the data I'm compiling from my own experience wouldn't be very useful to you, I imagine, but I'm happy to share what I learn if you want it. Sometimes that your-wood/my-wood exchange seems to generate more heat than light. I've mentioned paper (white) birch on here and been told it's garbage wood, or not as good as anything that grows anywhere east of the Ozarks, and on and on, and I just keep collecting every stick of it that I can get. Some folks say it grows differently here--shorter summers, more light, who knows, and we end up with a different birch than L48 birch. Again, I dunno. I just keep stacking. I can tell you that wood's not going to season here in three months--but if that was all I had, I'd be splitting it small and laying it somewhere hot to dry.

I guess I'm so focused on my own wood situation that my interest in how fast wood dries in other areas is purely academic. I've seen people from the NM/AZ region mention blisteringly fast seasoning times; that's interesting, but it's not going to keep my house warm this winter. I might get more pertinent information from the neighbor who burns wood, but even that won't keep my home warm. It comes down to being between me and my woodpile and the weather, and applying the most useful information I can find to my situation.

Someone on here wrote that he dumps his wood in a `woodheap', and it all seasons beautifully. His neighbor carefully stacked in single rows, and it molded--the heap was out in the sun and wind, the stacks behind the garage. It almost sounds like you're looking for a formula or computer program that will take all factors into account, predict the weather, and zip out an answer that applies to your wood. The information you'll find here is more of the anecdotal nature: Old Farmer's Almanac Voice of Experience livened up with a dash of Mad Scientist "Wonder-what-would-happen-if-I-poured-in-some . . . ?"

I think what it boils down to is that life is uncertain. We can't cover all the bases, and none of us are going to make it out of this alive. What we do is maximize the odds in our favor, cut the cards, and adapt as best possible to the factors that we can't control. Individually, we aren't going to influence the price of oil, but we can put in wood stoves, insulate and ventilate our houses, and put up firewood for the years to come.

Speaking of the Almanac, I wonder if that has anything in it on seasoning wood. I would suspect it's been consulted for that purpose more than once. As an irrelevant meander, I wonder what the original writer of the almanac would think to see how long it's survived, and to see it online.

 

[Kenster]

I plant to cover mine with clear plastic and cut a hole in the center of the "tent"...but not directly over the wood. The bottom ends of the "tent" will be off the ground. It is my hope to dry the wood faster than normal like this

Don, are you saying that you're basically building a tent out of clear plastic and completely covering your stacks with it? I think most everyone here would tell you that's a really bad idea. Even with a vent hole you're still going to be trapping a great deal of moisture/humidity inside the tent. And you're eliminating the biggest agent in drying wood---WIND!
I'm of the school of not covering at all except for a few days worth of burning material. Of course I'll admit to not having to worry about snow much down here. I'd still not cover it at all until the snows came if I lived up north. And only top cover it then. The rest of the time it should be open to the sun and especially the wind.

Lots of different opinions on top covering or not. Very few of the guys here will ever suggest completely covering stacks with tarps or plastic sheeting.

 

[Bigg_Redd]

Does anyone actually know the rate of seasoning for different parts of the country?

No. And if anyone tells you they do they are either stupid or lying. There's just too many variables.