Cherry ?.

[Remmy122]

saw this on CL and was skeptical.

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/zip/2482849201.html

Called the guy and he said it was all still there. Well for once CL paid off. It does look to be a cherry (which is kind of rare in our area) and he had a good amount of it.

I filled up one truck load during lunch and will go back for one more after work. maybe even a 3rd might be in there.

Any way, to my question. This wood was cut around April (after tornados) and left in the round. I know... It hasnt started to season. The ends of the rounds are showing good sized cracks though. How long to season?

Hopefuly it will sit till '13 but im wondering which stack to go to in the "oh chit" scenerio where I run out of wood.

Cherry cut april 19th and left in the round split july 9th OR white oak, cut and split April 16th?

 

[Wood Duck]

The cherry will be better seasoned than the oak, even though the cherry is a few months younger.

 

[3fordasho]

I've got quite a bit of black cherry in my stacks and it does dry quicker than oak but I still like to give it a full year. I've burnt some odd ball pieces in the fire pit and if its not fully seasoned it just sits there and smolders. Might not be an issue when throwing into a hot stove with a good coal bed. It always smells good - cutting, splitting, stacking, burning.....

saw this on CL and was skeptical.

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/zip/2482849201.html

Called the guy and he said it was all still there. Well for once CL paid off. It does look to be a cherry (which is kind of rare in our area) and he had a good amount of it.

I filled up one truck load during lunch and will go back for one more after work. maybe even a 3rd might be in there.

Any way, to my question. This wood was cut around April (after tornados) and left in the round. I know... It hasnt started to season. The ends of the rounds are showing good sized cracks though. How long to season?

Hopefuly it will sit till '13 but im wondering which stack to go to in the "oh chit" scenerio where I run out of wood.

Cherry cut april 19th and left in the round split july 9th OR white oak, cut and split April 16th?

 

[woodchip]

I'd put the oak away for longer, and split the cherry a little on the small side to get it seasoning a bit quicker so it will be ready for this coming burning season (towards the end).
At a push, last year I put a few splits of one year old cherry indoors in December and left them near the stove (not too close) and they burned fine in the Spring.
If you can, get a whole load of wood in now to season for 2 - 3 years time, then you won't have to think about what type of wood you have in your stacks, it'll all be well and truly dry.

I'm trying to get all I can to get myself at least 3 years ahead, still way behind Backsav and the other experts on here though ;-)

 

[CTYank]

Any way, to my question. This wood was cut around April (after tornados) and left in the round. I know... It hasnt started to season. The ends of the rounds are showing good sized cracks though. How long to season?

Can't really say about that, but the checking on the ends tells us that the wood there has definitely started to dry. Thus the radial/tangential shrinkage there relative to deeper-in.

You get to have the fun of determining just how long the drying process will take. And, influence it by how you cut/split/stack/cover the wood. And, determine when it's done. Any answer that we could give would obviously be a guess, educated or otherwise. Properly prepped, one summer ought to get it done.

Watch what you stack it on outside. Around here, some sort of borer likes to chew into the wood, leaving little piles of fine sawdust, and also chew a layer off of dimension lumber that the cherry was stacked on. Yet another reason why I burn it as reasonably possible.

 

[chinkapin_oak]

Cherry is a dry wood to begin with, much like ash. It will season fast.
Also, it will keep for several years since the heartwood is rot-resistant.

It should be good enough for this fall. I wouldn't even think of burning the oak.

 

[Woody Stover]

Yep, split small, especially if it's your backup wood for this season. I split some green Shingle Oak small, a year ago June, and it wasn't great at the end of last Winter, but it was burnable.

 

[cptoneleg]

saw this on CL and was skeptical.

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/zip/2482849201.html

Called the guy and he said it was all still there. Well for once CL paid off. It does look to be a cherry (which is kind of rare in our area) and he had a good amount of it.

I filled up one truck load during lunch and will go back for one more after work. maybe even a 3rd might be in there.

Any way, to my question. This wood was cut around April (after tornados) and left in the round. I know... It hasnt started to season. The ends of the rounds are showing good sized cracks though. How long to season?

Hopefuly it will sit till '13 but im wondering which stack to go to in the "oh chit" scenerio where I run out of wood.

Cherry cut april 19th and left in the round split july 9th OR white oak, cut and split April 16th?

You got to remember it did't even happen without pictures, it's so easy just do it.

 

[Remmy122]

Well for fear that a pirate ship will appear along our canal, Here are your photos.

The pile is a good sized one. 2 solid truck loads. I split every thing I could last night before the rain came down. The rest need to be cut a little bit (gonna end up with LOTS of uglies on this one). I cant get over the smell when splitting, and its even stronger this morning after rain last night. I took one round which was pretty much rotten, took it just to get it off his yard. I split it open and found what was in that last photo...

*side question: There are flies all over these logs, not on the oak. Weird.

 

[Remmy122]

I think Im going to put a new handle on the axe head and take it back to the guy who gave me the wood. This should help keep the wood karma on my side, right?

Besides I dont see where I need another axe.

He was a nice guy, and $10 for 2 truck loads of wood isnt a bad price

 

[chinkapin_oak]

Flies just love the sweet sap that comes out of cherry. You have to remember, even though it's a wild cherry, it's still a cherry tree.

 

[Thistle]

I think Im going to put a new handle on the axe head and take it back to the guy who gave me the wood. This should help keep the wood karma on my side, right?

Besides I dont see where I need another axe.

He was a nice guy, and $10 for 2 truck loads of wood isnt a bad price

Great idea. Clean up the surface rust,install a new handle & touch up the edge with a good file.He should be very pleased.

Cherry does smell wonderful,whether its being sawed,split,shaped,sanded or burned.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

We used to cut cherry and burn it right away at deer camp. At home, I've cut it in late winter and burned it the following fall and it did well. A year is better though.

Flies on the cherry? Must be the bees haven't found it yet.

 

[stee6043]

I love burning cherry I've run through 3+ cord a year for the past three years. I've measured moisture when split in spring at mid 20's%. By fall of the same year I've seen smaller splits get all the way down to 14-15%. It seasons faster than anything I have in my piles. I still give it 18 months +/- but my opinion is that it could easily be burned the same year if you were in a pinch.

 

[firefighterjake]

I love processing cherry almost as much as I love burning cherry . . . the only thing is splitting cherry slows me up as I keep picking up splits and smelling them . . . my wife thinks I'm nuts.

Oh yeah, +1 to what Wood Duck said.

 

[lukem]

Burning cherry wood smells a lot like cherries. On the other hand, burning apple wood smells nothing like apples.