How We Get Our Firewood

Very honorable. Good karma for you.

I'll be honest here. Unless I was years ahead of the game in terms of wood supply, etc. I wuld never give a stick of wood away, but I'm not, I'm just struggling to make it through season 1. Plus were I to be the giver away of gold...I'd insist on a pan full of very large blueberry muffins every sat morning. ..Sorry all I just love blueberry muffins...

I guess I "harvest". Although that sounds way too "manly" for what I do.

My yard is a little over a half-acre and the whole back side of it (longways) is a wooded easement that the power lines run through. It's full (or was full) of black locusts. The good thing about black locusts... they burn really well. The bad thing... they fall on your house a lot.

I've been cutting them down (read "paying someone to cut them down") since the day I moved in. No... since the day before I moved in, since one of the first experiences with my new house was having my neighbor offer to cut off a huge limb that almost took out half the house I had just bought.

Since then my house has been hit by three (or so) more falls. After the latest, I got sick of wondering when the next tree was going to fall on me and paid someone to fell about 5 or 6 of them. Now I have a backyard full of logs that I eventually have to get around to splitting and stacking. Not that that's gonna happen any time soon.


WATYF

5 acres only lasted you two seasons???


WATYF

Update on my scrounging... picked up a 1/3 cord of oak last week from tree service cleaning up around power lines down the street from me. They were back today and I went home at lunch to get first pick of the wood. Scored! Probably close to a cord of all oak. Bucked into 14"-18" rounds anywhere from 4"-5" limbs to 18"+ rounds. Took 2 trips with my truck.

Now my drive looks like a wood processing area. I love it! And this is from a guy who is used to paying for 90% of his wood. Too bad Oak can take 1.5+yrs to season. This stuff will be a reserve for the end of 2009/2010 winter and then good for the next winter 2010/2011.

Happy hunting... I mean scrounging!

I harvest from my own property. We have over 10 acres. Unfortunately it has tons and tons of pine. yes I know that it is OK to burn but it takes twice as much work and wood as hardwood. I do want to thin the pine so the desiduous trees can grow in. I will be burning a lot of pine for many years.

I hear ya. From a wood burning perspective it makes perfect since. I should be squirreling away wood myself but then I'd have to double or triple my storage area from holding 5 cord to 10 or 15 and I just don't think I want to do that (for a variety of reasons). So I'm expecting to burn about 4 cord this year have 1 extra "just in case" and share the wealth after that. Come spring I'll be talking with my tree guy friend once more and I'll have ~9 months to season what comes down the pike.

Tfin AKA Todd does not waste wood. He is as meager as the next poor man.....I know him ...So please try to understand his situation

Nobody was criticizing. I am trying to understand his situation as well. I've heated my house cutting off 1.5 acres of woods for 6 years and probably could for another 5 before you noticed serious clearing. 5 acres should last many years unless it's a special condition- poor soil, immature forest, softwoods that he doesn't want to use for some reason, etc.

I do live quite close to a natural forest ...so I shall try and get a permit for down and dead wood...

My town issues permits for doing just that. I wish I lived closer, I'd gladly share, my cup runeth over.

hey man... I wasn't trying to be rude. I didn't know there was any "situation" going on.

I'm looking to get 5 acres myself in the future, and I figured that would last me a good long while (decades) if I kept it up well. I only have a half acre now, and the wood from the few trees I've cut down has already lasted me a few years. I guess I was just curious why he couldn't use 5 acres after only two seasons.


WATYF

Whoa everyone.......suppose I should clarify here. :gulp: The only situation is that the 5 acres I was refering to is my mother's and stepfather's property where their house resides. Oh believe me, there's PLEANTY of trees there (mostly all oak too). Its just that they're not going to allow me to take to many more, because they want to keep it "forested".

They may let me take a couple more here and there, but not enough to supply my wood needs year after year.

Actually I burn around 28 cord per year, so I need a LOT of wood. j/k ;-)

how many stoves are you running to burn that much wood :question: ...ZZZim

20.... he has a stove in every corner of every room. He uses the excess heat to power his do-it-yourself thermal-nuclear reactor.


WATYF

Now you've got it! About 1.4 cord per stove. :coolgrin:

no really Tfin how do burn so much...I m thinking Im really in trouble cuz I only have about 6 cord of ash cut and ready for a North Dakota winter ,,1500 sq ft ranch to heat..with a new soap stone heritage..I would think your temps are warmer than ours requiring lower consumption....hey wait a minute here...you aint getting subsaties on that wood are you...???just kidding...burn baby burn...ZZZim

he was joking (jk means "just kidding")

6 cord of ash is a LOT of heat. Most folks normally use 3.5-5 cord of hardwood a year, so you're probably in great shape.

NH doesn't do that, I asked!

Rick- You mean "in exchange for 28 cord of wood". At $400 per cord here, that'd be like $900 per mug. Sounds about right.

I could come down as low as $750. A man's got to eat (heck- I might put 20 mins work into it exclusive of the firing process- throwing, trimming, carving, handle, glaze, and a Patron on the rocks with lime... that part might be what kills my efficiency).

Zim, as AP eluded to I was just kidding about the 28 cord per year. I actually have 4 cord ready to go, but should only burn around 3 of it.

Believe you me, it gets plenty cold here in Maine! My ranch is a shade smaller than yours and is well insulated. My stove is right in my living room and keeps us nice and toasty all winter long.

You should do fine with 6 cord of ash. Happy burning!

well thats good ,cuz i havent burned for about 10 years and couldn;t remember about how much we used...but i know it wasn;t a whole forest full...I havent found anyone to drop any off in my yard yet..but there is a lot of fall yet...still a chance ;-) ..burn baby burn ...ZZZZim