Dead red oak limbs? Pre-seasoned?

[Hunter8282]

Would you consider these dead red oak limbs to be seasoned? As in if I collected a bunch of it it could be burned this coming winter in a Blaze King Stove?

 

[stoveliker]

If you split it, measure it in the fresh surface it reads 20 % now, then yes....

 

[ericm979]

In my climate and with my tree species, standing dead is rarely dry enough to burn and its even less likely when on the ground.

 

[ClintonH]

I had a 20" diameter red oak a few years ago find its way to my house: the top of the tree split and burned just fine that year. Toward the bottom it had more moisture in it and needed a year to season.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Be very careful dropping a dead tree. Branches are not called widowmakers because it sounds cool.

 

[stoveliker]

My point was that you have to get data; assuming it's good (or still too wet) has a decent probability of getting it wrong and either waiting longer than needed or burning wood that's too wet.

The question "is this dry enough" doesn't have a generic answer in this case.

 

[Eman85]

Will they be seasoned?, probably not to their fullest. Can you burn it?, yes it will burn and keep you warm but not as good as seasoned wood. If it was all I had I would burn it, and I would check my stove and chimney often. Start stockpiling and get a few years ahead and you won't have to worry in the future.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

If you split it down to kindling size and leave it in the dun and wind it’ll probably get dry enough.

Toothpicks dry faster than rounds!

 

[ispinwool]

I agree with using a moisture meter. It takes the guesswork out of it. They aren't
all that expensive and they will last for ages.

 

[Garbanzo62]

I deal with a lot of Dead Standing Ash. Oaks density is a bit different but you will probably run into similar stuff.
Once Dead it starts to decay, So you might have some level of punkiness to deal with. Even though it is dead, capillary action will draw moisture up from the ground. The stuff at the bottom will have significantly more moisture than the stuff at the top. Make sure if you test you test different parts so you can get an average.

 

[bigealta]

Well you have a good head start even if it's not below 20%. (which it probably is not until split and stacked for a while.)

 

[3darcher2]

There was a big red oak that fell two summers ago that frankly was a mess and bigger than I wanted to try to handle. I took a lot of the stuff I could get to and process. It fell across a gas line right of way in my woods. The gas company made their every 3-4 year check last week where they clear all their right of ways and broke it down a pretty good bit and so far I've been able to get several logs 4-5' long and 10-15" diameter. Some had some bark on and some lost the bark during their cutting but most of them are getting a little punky or they look dry and gray on the outside.

I got some rounds up to the house and hand split them yesterday. Nice straight grain and easy to split. Maybe a 1/2" to 1" of just starting to get punky on some but all were very solid inside. Moisture readings were still in the mid 30s to high 40s.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Get it processed and it’ll start drying!

 

[Garbanzo62]

The Punky stuff will act like a sponge. Keep those pieces covered once processed.

 

[EODMSgt]

@Hunter8282

One of my favorite dead and down to scrounge is long-dead red oak, the kind with the bark long gone and hard as driftwood. I have found that although it seasons a lot faster than live oak, it still needs time to dry. As others have said, even though this stuff is long dead, there still tends to be a lot of moisture in those unsplit rounds. For the small stuff, I still try to go by the old adage of letting unsplit small rounds season for 1 year per inch in diameter. Anything over about three inches I'll split to speed up the seasoning process. I just scrounged a pile of the stuff over the last few days. Great wood to burn!

 

[Sawset]

Would you consider these dead red oak limbs to be seasoned? As in if I collected a bunch of it it could be burned this coming winter in a Blaze King Stove?

2 years ago I started new stacks, one each year since, 10cord each. These were from all standing dead red and white oak. A recent measurement indicated moisture contents of:
stacked spring (Feb, March) 2023, 13-14%
stacked spring (Feb, March) 2024, 22-25%.

Newly split white oak rounds processed a month ago were measuring from 30-50% moisture.
It only takes a few weeks here for oak to dry to 30%. And a few years to dry to 20%.
The equilibrium moisture content for SE Wisconsin is around 13-14%.

-

 

[Wisco Shepherd]

@Hunter8282

One of my favorite dead and down to scrounge is long-dead red oak, the kind with the bark long gone and hard as driftwood.

I found some of this recently, happy with the fact that it was going to dry faster but for some reason my mid power saw did not like it when compared to wetter wood.

 

[bigealta]

Yeah that "petrified" wood can be hard on the saw. Burns great though.

 

[patrickk222]

personally id consider it semi seasoned the reason y i say semi seasoned is because red oaks tend to collect moisture lts no ones buisness so id c/s/s as fast as soon as i could to finish out the seasoning ... nice find btw

 

[singed]

c/s/s

cut/split/stack?

 

[Wisco Shepherd]

c/s/s

cut/split/stack?

Bingo