The Ideal Steel is loving white pine

[JA600L]

This is my first year using pine. I love it. It lights off quick and makes good long heat. I'm not sure how much of that is the stove, but it really is a great firewood. This is coming from somebody with a 3 year supply of locust, oak, ash, cherry, hackberry, and mulberry.

The pine is a lot more work to process and doesn't stack as nice, but I would love to have more of it. The drying time is the best part.

My question is what are the pine/spruce variety to look for or avoid in Pennsylvania? Any that are easier to process than white pine? I split by hand.

 

[D8Chumley]

Subscribing... I got some 1.5 year seasoned white pine I've been using at various times this season but that's the only Pine I have. Had about 3/4 cord, probably used about half this year. I also would like to get more, good stuff

 

[Ctwoodtick]

This is my first year using pine. I love it. It lights off quick and makes good long heat. I'm not sure how much of that is the stove, but it really is a great firewood. This is coming from somebody with a 3 year supply of locust, oak, ash, cherry, hackberry, and mulberry.

The pine is a lot more work to process and doesn't stack as nice, but I would love to have more of it. The drying time is the best part.

My question is what are the pine/spruce variety to look for or avoid in Pennsylvania? Any that are easier to process than white pine? I split by hand.

How long did you find it took the white pine to be dry?

 

[JA600L]

How long did you find it took the white pine to be dry?

The tree was dead standing so I let it dry 6 months over the summer.

 

[JA600L]

Here are some random pine samples from my trees around the house. It looks like they are all white pine?

I just reloaded with some more white pine. I engaged the cat right away and shut the stove down quickly. 10 minutes later the heat is climbing with a black box and occasional ghost flames. This stuff is incredible. Almost zero babysitting.

 

[D8Chumley]

Pic 2 is Doug fir I think. Or blue spruce, hard to see on iPad

 

[JA600L]

Interesting. I guess maybe they are spruce. I never looked into it before. It's not a blue spruce. Does spruce burn better than pine?

 

[D8Chumley]

I have no experience with any pine except white. Maybe someone else will chime in and let us know

 

[Ctwoodtick]

Not pine. looks much like spruce from here

 

[billb3]

That could be norway spruce
It's not eastern white pine. EWP has 3-5 inches long needles almost always in groups of 5.
I cut a colorado spruce down a year ago but haven't tried it yet.
I cut some kind of fir that was an an ornamental lawn tree 2 years ago and it actually burns pretty good. Certainly lasts a bit longer than EWP.

 

[billb3]

That could be norway spruce
It's not eastern white pine. EWP has 3-5 inches long needles almost always in groups of 5.
I cut a colorado spruce down a year ago but haven't tried it yet.
I cut some kind of fir that was an an ornamental lawn tree 2 years ago and it actually burns pretty good. Certainly lasts a bit longer than EWP.

 

[firefighterjake]

I've burned a bit of just about every kind of native softwood here in Maine -- hemlock, Scotch pine, eastern white pine, fir and I think I had some spruce. They seem to burn fairly similar . . . some lasts a bit longer than others.

I personally like burning softwood in the spring and fall . . . when you need that quick, hot fire, but don't necessarily need to have the stove pumping out all kinds of heat for the long haul. In fact, as of late, I've been burning a fair amount of pine and poplar.

Like others have said . . . the needles shown belong to a spruce . . . norway or white I would guess. Crush the needles in your hand and if your hand smells like a cat peed on them you have, without a doubt, white (aka cat) spruce.