Kindling Question

[scfa99]

All my firewood is neat and racked. Anyone have any tips on how to organize all the kindling i have piled up all over the place? I have some sitting on a pallet but it doesn't hold much. I'd like one central area so I can tarp it and keep it dry, but I need to figure out a way to store alot of it and keep it off the ground.

Also I have piles of bark i'd like to get rid of. Is it ok to burn it all in the fireplace? Does bark build up cresote faster?

 

[babalu87]

I know some of the guys here leave smaller splits among the woodpiles used for heating, I have started doing the same thing.
Its a nice suprise to get thin pieces of nice dry wood to help kick start the fire after an overnight burn

I fill a fish tote with it and split as needed in the basement
Most of my kindling has been pallets I get from work
Some are Oak, some are poplar or pine
ALL are nice and dry

Bark doesnt burn very well
Makes great compost though

 

[precaud]

I collect kindling in cardboard boxes which I store on the back porch until one is needed.

 

[Sandor]

Couple of things:

I used old cereal boxes that I collect sticks in from around the yard. Stored in the shed, to stay dry. Pull one out every couple of days to get things going if there are no coals left to restart.

In the wood pile, I save one end for pine splits to get me going, and its stored under cover. I also have a trunk on the deck that I store the splits in, by the sliding glass door. Its a covered trunk so if we get a downpour, I always have dry kindling.

The ritual:

Crumpled paper..... tear cereal box open and chuck the mess into the stove.....load dry pine splits on top.... light it up and feed the hardwood when its rolling.

 

[DavidV]

Around here we just stack it with the wood. But for starting fires I have to put my vote with fatwood. buy a big box of fatwood for 5-10 bucks at the beginning of the heating season and it will last quite a while. Ran out about a week or so back so I sent my wife and she brouth home those little wax/sawdust logs. I break off a golfball sized piece of those use it to get the smaller pieces going.

If you need a seperate solution though. I found a 170 liter coverd plastic bin at walmart for about 10 dollars. I imagine that would work very well. It has wheels on one end and locking handles on each side to hold the top on.

 

[saichele]

I second David's vote for fatwood. I buy a 25pounder every couple years, but only use maybe a dozen sticks a week.

I mostly keep small splits/fragments in the pile, but do have a separate rack for all the yard debris.

Dry bark can really help a fire get going fast. Wet bark will smother it. I wouldn't burn just bark for any length of time, but I do use dry bark intermixed with kindling just to help get the box/chimney warmed up.

Steve

 

[fbelec]

i cut up my kindling to the size i like and use plastic trash barrels to store it.
makes for a quick grab and go when the garage is 2 below zero and you only want to be in there and back into the warm house

 

[Rob From Wisconsin]

Some barks work really great for kindling -
birch, silver maple & elm (when dry - they even coal a bit).
My kindling is precious, stored in my shed in a seperate enclosed
mini-rack. The way I look at it, if you don't have decent kindling,
fires become a real chore to start!
Fatwood - never tried it, but it sounds promising...
Wonder if one of the Hardware chains carries it....

Rob

 

[kregars]

Early in the season (November, maybe even as far back as October) BJ's in Waldorf MD had a pallet of neatly boxed FatWood. I have found byfar though that the best price for it was found at WalMart (in LaPlata). It was on the clearance rack for 25 cents for 10 sticks or a case for 3bucks...I picked up the case thinking there would be merely be the equiv amount plus a nice 'dusplay'....there were 35 bags of 10 each.

I have also found that the long ago taken pines leaving stumps only behind the fense of our yard..went to town with an axe and shovel to get the stumps out of the ground and then to town with the hatchet...and I think the stuff I found was far superior to the store bought variety....they light faster and burn longer and hotter and my oak starts to catch MUCH faster (larger splits..before I learned to split my larger splits into smaller splits...nod..still new to this burning wood in my own stove thing).

I also found that the cedar I aquired is pretty good in the AM to get the fire going after it's down to the last of the coals from the overnight.

 

[hugehuggo]

I bought a set of the black firewood rack ends which are designed to connect two 2X4's and cut the 2X4's to about 3 feet. It looks neat and does a great job of stacking kindling. A full rack will last about 3 years. I set aside staight grain narrow splits while I am splitting and then make kindling.

 

[belsenj]

Hi, I'm new here and really love this site. Before I bought my new Jotul F100 last year, I got much needed info from here.

I have a good set up for kindling. My daughters old cedar playhouse in the yard holds all of it -
some bark, dried spongy wood, chips from chopping, etc. I just throw it all in there in the spring and by the
fall it's dried. It's got two little open windows and a small door in the front so it gets great ventilation.
All the small limbs and sticks that fall from the trees during the winter make very good kindling, too.

 

[MountainStoveGuy]

I love fatwood, and its one of my top selling products in my shop. I have found a big difference in quality from the imported fatwood versus the stuff from Georgia. The Georgia Fatwood has lots more pitch in it then the stuff from mexico, at least from all the samples that i have tried.
(broken link removed to http://www.trucoenterprises.com/firemountain/fatwoodinfo.html)

 

[warren88]

Wine corks are among the best fire starters that I have found..

 

[tutu_sue]

When I go out to get my firewood I take my wheelbarrow, splitting axe and one or two cardboard boxes. I make kindling from the short straight grain logs and put standing up in the boxes. I put the boxes on a shelf in the garage. I have a lined basket I got with one of those gourmet gift baskets. I load up the basket and keep near the hearth.

I also use fatwood under the kindling as they burn long and strong and get the kindling going right quick. LLBean carries and it they have excellent prices on fatwood in 15, 25 and 35 lb sizes ($1.04 to $1.10 per lb.). They also have the log rack kit for $14.50 and their shipping is very reasonable. They also have a nice crock that would be great for kindling but kind of $$$.

Home Depot had an adjustable steel log rack that was about $25 that I think would be perfect for a lot of kindling, but they were out for the season as of three weeks ago.

 

[wahoowad]

My large poplar trees shed dead branches about as fast as I am losing hair in the shower. On any given day I can go collect a few 10' long branches, cut them up with my chop saw, and stack them in boxes. These poplar branches are already dead and well seasoned by the time they fall off the tree. They really do the trick for me to get a fire going. I bring home cardboard printer paper boxes from the office and fill them up. They stack great. I'll also throw in my splitting debris and kindling sized splits.