Just got back from Romania in the EU - Wood Drying

[derbygreg]

My wife and I just got back from visiting Romania. Their climate is very much like the Northern US. It is cooler there now than it is here in Ohio. While traveling around the countryside, I saw time and time again trucks going up the roads with freshly cut trees and just dumping them in peoples yards. None of this wood is seasoned. The wood would get dumped then they would cut it into appropriate lengths. Then burn it.

I don't think they understand the idea of seasoning wood. Before dusk when people lit up their stoves or radiant ceramic heaters, there would be a lot of smoke in the entire community.

Found it interesting that the heating season has begun there, yet they are just now getting their wood.

Then again it is a poor country and this may be the way things are done.

 

[begreen]

I saw this happening in some areas of Bulgaria too. And at night, in the mountain valley, it was full of smoke. My guess is that it keeps the chimneysweeps well employed.

But the smart burners, like the B&B;where I was staying, already had their wood neatly stacked and that was pretty dry. My guess is there is a mix of good and bad wood burning practices going on, just like in my neighborhood.

 

[Rick]

They have the same mentality where my family is from in Italy. To them (at least in our village), the notion of burning dry wood is just silly because it burns too fast. I've had this argument with my dad over and over. He lives here now and is burning with a new Jotul. Last winter I caught him burning wood a neighbor had just cut that week.

 

[pict]

Back in Scotland, I would never cut down trees for my firewood, I would always look for fallen branches, then cut them up.
I never really knew about seasoning wood till I came to the U.S.-if it felt dry enough to burn, I burned it.
I remember smoke coming out of my chimney right enough, but I think everyone did the same as I did.
We'd call wood that was really damp "snake wood", as it hissed when you put it on the fire.

the best stuff to burn is peat-gives off a great smell when it burns.