question for midwest craigslisters

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brian89gp

Minister of Fire
Mar 15, 2008
505
Kansas City
Have you noticed an increased interest in firewood this year in comparison to others? This year it seems that wood does not last much longer then 12-24 hours, even the softer stuff such as silver maple. Previous years the wood seemed to stick around for a lot longer before getting picked up. Natural gas prices dropped this year too, so its not like the cost of heating went up.

Just curious as to if this is more local to my area or a bigger trend.
 
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I don't think that this year is any different from last year. I only started burning a couple years ago, so I don't have lots of years where I've paid attention to CL for comparison.

My overall impression matches yours - wood doesn't last long at all. I routinely miss out on opportunities because I don't drive my truck to work everyday and the wood is always picked up by someone the day it's listed.The exceptions being if it's someone with "free firewood" either standing upright surrounded by powerlines or piles of twigs/brush. I've scored once and been jerked around twice in the last year and a half paying attention to CL.
 
I just got a stove last December, so I can't tell you how years past were around here. But I can tell you any wood I've found does go quick. I've only been able to get one CL score this year, I called the day it was posted, half was gone when I called, but he promised to hold the other half for me if I came and got it that evening, so I committed. When I got there it ended up being very large rounds of Sycamore, so I wasn't too excited about taking them as I split all my wood by hand, but since I had committed to it I took them. Thankfully he was willing to help load them, there would have been no way I could have loaded them into my trailer by myself they were so large. I've had to cut all of them into short pieces just to split them by hand. It was probably still worth the trip as it was in my town but wasn't the best score. While we were loading the trailer someone else called asking about the wood. There have been several ads for free wood in Columbia, about a 40 minute drive for me, but it hasn't worked out to get one of those yet.
 
This has been the easiest year ever. I have got them dumping it at my place now(I cant even start my truck and run it myself cheaper). Hang in there a couple April storms and it will be everywhere.
 
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I don't even need to check CL, there is more than I could handle down close to my house. I just stop and ask at the houses, also farmers are a great place to ask. They usually want trees gone around their field edges. Farmer down the road wants all the mulberry cut off his farm, got a few more to go on that one.
 
CL is a joke around here for wood from what I've seen. The odd good scrounge only after wading through a ton of junk. I've never got a single stick from a CL ad. I stopped looking about 2 years ago. Word of mouth & keeping an eye out for easy pickin's and tree crews have got me all I need.
 
Yes, I've noticed that in the KC area. I like to look in at late Friday night and Saturday night. Say between 5 pm to 8 pm. Once in while I'll pick up the next morning, cause its late in the day for some to pick up that night. But even the scrounges have become hit and miss, but its still worth watching and scanning. It takes only one good hit to find the gold mine.
 
Haven't noticed that, but I have noticed that people selling wood have increased.
 
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