Drying the real little guys...?

[AnalogKid]

Any of you veterans have any tips for effectively drying the little shorties, ends, nubs, chunks, et al?

They are to small to stack and don't seem to dry piled up. I'd like not to waste it. It's good wood and perfect to toss a pile in with a piece of cedar during shoulder season.

Thoughts?

 

[USMC80]

i throw em on top of my stacks that i plan on burning the following year

 

[MrWhoopee]

I dry 'em over a fire.

 

[Ram 1500 with an axe...]

Yeah what they said, on the top of stacks, firepit or in a milk crate that sits in the sun a lot.....

 

[Ashful]

I stack my wood in long rows on pallets. I usually construct a bin from a few pallets, at the end of each row, and toss those shorties in the bin.

 

[Hills Hoard]

im no veteran, but i dont worry about drying those bits too much....i just start a pile of wood that doesnt make the cut (so to speak) for the inside fire and when the ugly pile is big enough I have an out door fire with a few beers and mates....

 

[PapaDave]

Yep, the little stuff goes on top of stacks.
Dries real gooder up there. Even Oak.

 

[JOHN BOY]

I have 2 pallets that i throw all my ends and ugly pieces on .

 

[timusp40]

Cookie Box?

 

[Paulywalnut]

Yeah, I think on top of the stacks is popular. That's what I do and the real shorties season in a year.

 

[Waulie]

I guess I put mine on top. I have to wonder, why so many chunks?

 

[red oak]

On top of the pile or in a separate pile. They tend to dry fairly fast. I actually keep a separate pile by the fire pit and burn most of them in there. I also keep longer pieces and soft wood there as well. After campfire season is over, I throw the rest of the chunks on a good hot fire in the stove and it burns fine.

 

[Applesister]

I havent tried this but I want to coil chicken wire into tubes and stack them together on a pallet. Fill them up with scrap pieces. To get the most air.

 

[Soundchasm]

I havent tried this but I want to coil chicken wire into tubes and stack them together on a pallet. Fill them up with scrap pieces. To get the most air.

That sounds brilliant. How big would you make the diameter? 12"? How tall would you make them? 3'? Just think, if you made them 16" tall you could bend a few pieces of 14 GA solid copper wire to seal the ends and stack them horizontally just like cordwood!

 

[HDRock]

The small stuff seems to dry fast as long as it's up off the ground

 

[McKeznak]

I love the idea of having a separate little box for them! Well I know what my project will be this afternoon.

 

[andybaker]

I just throw them on a hot fire fire and get rid of them fast as I can, green or not. They seem to burn ok as long as something else going good. If I get a lot of them I'll lay them in my stacks in a row like a full split piece and they season there til I get to them. Bad ugly ones that are big go on top of the stacks.

 

[adrpga498]

I dry 'em over a fire.

View attachment 113514

NIce chimnea, I would like it even more if it wasn't on a wooden deck

 

[BrotherBart]

Most of mine end up under steaks or burgers on the grill.

 

[MrWhoopee]

NIce chimnea, I would like it even more if it wasn't on a wooden deck

As soon as I burn the wooden one, I'll replace it with Trex.

 

[Adabiviak]

I get a lot of them because so few of my rounds are 'true' (round rounds and flat, level yards... I wish!). Lots of knots or twisty wood means extra misfit pieces come off either as debris from splitting, or cuts to make the wood splittable. I take the best of these, chop them into sizes maybe half the size of my fist (like a briquette), and keep them in milk crates on a sunny section of the porch, which I save for camping trips. The others sit in bins similar to what's shown here, and I use them in the shoulder season and/or to embellish regular fires. Some go into a kindling pile, depending on their shape. The thought of tossing these because they're not a proper split makes me wince... I keep everything down to very small pieces in these bins.