Storing wet wood in a wood shed.......

[jwscarab]

I have a question I hope hasn't been beat to death. I want to build a wood shed - large enough for 3 years wood. It would have great ventilation all year but be tucked in a wooded area. I would cut and split my wood and store right in the shed WITHOUT stacking in the open sun for a summer. I would stock 3 years and every year replace the section I used up - first in / first out.

So - why should or shouldnt I do this? Moisture will cause mold and spread thru all my wood? Rot?

I guess I am trying to eliminate the stack / dry / move to shed step. If I can have it in the shed for 2 years - i'm thinkng it will dry by then even if only in the shed.

Thoughts?

Thanks in advance

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Part of that depends upon the wood you will be stacking in the shed. For example, elm vs. white oak, or cottonwood (yuck) vs. red oak, etc.

Another part depends upon the shed. You say it has great ventilation, but do you mean the shed does or there is good ventilation outside the shed? If the shed is quite tight and it is back in the trees so no sunshine and very little wind....

Overall though, if you leave it 3 years the wood should season okay.

 

[jwscarab]

Hopefully ash, oak, hickory - but mainly whatever I can get my hands on!

Yea, it would have little sunshine and wind, but the shed itself would be built very airy - maybe lattice sides/rear, open front. It will have a raised floor with air slots - maybe pallets or a deck type with wide spaces. It gets air flowing in the woods in the winter, but not so much in the summer. Just wanting to keep it hidden if possible

 

[LLigetfa]

Will the shed have a raised floor, concrete slab with good drainage, or pallets to keep wood up off the ground and humidity low in the center of the stack?

The only other concern I have for stacking green wood is that as it shrinks, (and shrink it does) the stack could tumble. Frost movement can also be to blame. The higher the stack and the less stable the base, the greater the risk unless you have some vertical studs or posts working for you.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Hopefully ash, oak, hickory - but mainly whatever I can get my hands on!

Yea, it would have little sunshine and wind, but the shed itself would be built very airy - maybe lattice sides/rear, open front. It will have a raised floor with air slots - maybe pallets or a deck type with wide spaces. It gets air flowing in the woods in the winter, but not so much in the summer. Just wanting to keep it hidden if possible

It should work.

For the life of me though, I can't figure out why anyone would want to keep their wood pile hidden! I'm proud of mine and I get great enjoyment from just looking at it. We have a long driveway and coming into our place, that is what people see first; the wood pile. Yes, I do get lots of comments about all the wood I have on hand. Thank you, I hope to keep that much on hand every year too (about a 6-8 year supply).

 

[jwscarab]

I have to agree about hiding it. I live on 10 acres. My driveway goes thru the woods and I have wood stacked wood (cut but not split yet) between trees on either side of the driveway. I think it looks awesome to drive thru!!

Problem is I am not sure my wood shed will look good by my house - you get a good view of the house in the open as you go down the road. The house is a log cabin. So I thought of putting the wood shed in the woods with easy access from the driveway. I must agree tho - I like the looks of wood piles too!

 

[LLigetfa]

The wife made me nail together some lattice, not the ready made diamond stuff. Her plan was to plant vines to grow up the lattice. There's mostly just weeds.

 

[LLigetfa]

Here's a pic of my guard dog protecting my wood supply.

 

[savageactor7]

^looks exactly like my dog LLigetfa.

So the wood won't have any sun but plenty of ventilation. Hummm never been there before to give a certain answer but I'd bet that most wood freshly split wood stored like that would be good to go in 12 months. If you can stay a fews years ahead you should be golden.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Actually a lot of our wood pile doesn't get much sunshine. But we have such a good supply of so many years that we just don't worry about it. It dries by the time we are ready for it.

 

[Bigg_Redd]

I have a question I hope hasn't been beat to death. I want to build a wood shed - large enough for 3 years wood. It would have great ventilation all year but be tucked in a wooded area. I would cut and split my wood and store right in the shed WITHOUT stacking in the open sun for a summer. I would stock 3 years and every year replace the section I used up - first in / first out.

So - why should or shouldnt I do this? Moisture will cause mold and spread thru all my wood? Rot?

I guess I am trying to eliminate the stack / dry / move to shed step. If I can have it in the shed for 2 years - i'm thinkng it will dry by then even if only in the shed.

Thoughts?

Thanks in advance

I live in a very wet area. Way, way, way wetter than anywhere in Indiana. It is common practice here to put wood directly into the woodshed. I would do it without a second thought.

 

[RPK1]

When I first built my woodshed I stacked green, frozen, white and red oak splits in a tight pile. Three cords worth. My shed is not that well ventilated but it has a wood floor up off the ground. It stayed in the shed two full summers before burning. I had no problems at all with mold or rot etc. I was surprised that the wood was so hard and dry. Maybe because it was oak and it sat stored dry with the summer heat. Now I have all my wood put away before the snow flies.

RPK1

 

[LLigetfa]

My father stored his wood in part of a large closed shed with an earthen floor. It was disgusting... the stench of mold, the thick frost on everything, his tools rusting. He had a chimney fire and burned the house to the ground. Sold the land and moved to the big city.

Vented would be fine. A concrete slab with good drainage would be better than an earthen floor. Pallets with tar paper underneath would suffice.

 

[bsa0021]

I don't know how this is working for anyone. Three years ago I got some small splits of popular that I wanted to use to start my fires. They were split green and stacked in my garage overhand (like a carport) on the inside wall. There isn't much air flow since it is surrounded by my other wood which is seasoned in the sun. I thought in a year it would easily dry but I still get moisture/hissing in those pieces after three years. I can only conclude that the air is too still to carry away the moisture.

 

[RedRanger]

Used to work for me when I was burning a pre-epa insert. That old beast would handle the mould and mildew. My new insert doesn`t like it one little bit. And I have been doing the "straight into the woodshed thing" for the past 30+ years.

My experience is with softwood only, cause that is all we have out here--but it is as follows===

Green wood into the woodshed=lots of mould and mildew.

Semi-seasoned wood into the woodshed= mostly doable and burnable.

Seasoned wood into the woodshed is best by far--nearly perfect.

And my woodsheds are like yours-built in the forest-minimal breeze and minimal sunlight.

I think you will really regret stacking totally green wood in there.

 

[JerseyWreckDiver]

After my first year of constantly messing with tarps to keep the rain & snow off my wood I finally built a couple sheds. Deck off the ground, plastic on the ground underneath and all four sides & the bottom open with a nice roof overhead. It sits in the trees like everything around here. Now I don't get wind like you might have in an open field but there is plenty of air movement, breeze or wind on the right days. Dam little sun when the leaves are on the trees so I figured the shed is just the same without the potential for rain soaking my wood. It dries a lot faster in there then exposed. I've always split it and stacked it straight in the shed, though much of what I was splitting may have been stacked as cut rounds for quite a while, some was cut green split and stacked same weekend and never an issue. Not until a nieghbor had a nice mature Hickory cut down and gave me all the wood (over 20" rounds added up to over a cord)

The rounds sat in my drive for a while till I had time for em. After just a week they lost enough water to start shrinkin outa their bark. So I figured, no bark, faster drying... and took my improvised bark spud (ice breaker) and peeled em all bear. When I picked them up to carry to the splitter they were soaking wet and slimy on the outside (got cut in the summer) So I split them and stacked them in the shed, all happy about how fast they were going to dry, no bark, under a permanent roof with good ventilation. Two weeks later the entire lot was covered with a heavy growth of green mold. Never a problem with Chestnut Oak, White Oak, Ash, Cherry, Sugar Maple, Soft Maple, Elm but I'll never do that with Hickory again.

If your rounds have been stacked and drying a while then they are partly seasoned already. You shouldn't have any issues. Just watch what wood your throwing in there completely green.

 

[JerseyWreckDiver]

Here's a pic of my guard dog protecting my wood supply.

Ha, I like it...

Try to mess with my wood and you'll be dealin with 120lbs of Guinness (extra Stout)

Little does anyone know he's a big baby. You got more to worry about from my wife, if she catches you doing anything that might make her cold, she'll be headin straight for the gun safe...

 

[jebatty]

I've done the direct wood shed storage for more than 15 years. But good ventilation is extremely important - air movement directly through the stacks and stacks raised up off the ground. I also follow the FIFO method, emptying and refilling the shed in a circular pattern.

Minimal handling and rehandling pays big dividends as age creeps up on the body. I now split in the same place I buck the logs, no need to rehandle the cut rounds. Load the splits directly into my Pug, drive to the woodshed and dump, load the stacks.

 

[bsa0021]

Used to work for me when I was burning a pre-epa insert. That old beast would handle the mould and mildew. My new insert doesn`t like it one little bit. And I have been doing the "straight into the woodshed thing" for the past 30+ years.

My experience is with softwood only, cause that is all we have out here--but it is as follows===

Green wood into the woodshed=lots of mould and mildew.

Semi-seasoned wood into the woodshed= mostly doable and burnable.

Seasoned wood into the woodshed is best by far--nearly perfect.

And my woodsheds are like yours-built in the forest-minimal breeze and minimal sunlight.

I think you will really regret stacking totally green wood in there.

Actually, that wood I stacked green was bought the first year I burned when I didn't know squat. The guy I bought it from claimed it was a cord of seasoned oak but turned out to be 90% popular 10% oak. One reason I scrounge for wood now. I will move it to a sunny area this summer to season.

 

[LLigetfa]

The guy I bought it from claimed it was a cord of seasoned oak but turned out to be 90% popular 10% oak...

Guys like that should be taken behind the woodshed and taught a good lesson. >:-(