This is why seasoning doesn't start until splitting is done.

[Poindexter]

I got about a cord of birch from a guy at my church in Jan 2020. He assured me it had been stacked in his shed for 9 years and was absolutely dry. I don't doubt it had been in his shed (as rounds) for nine years, he is a good guy, an elder at my church. But it wasn't dry. I actually split these rounds in Feb 2020 and had them stacked in March 2020. Most of it is burning pretty well, but not all of them.

I readily agree that some rounds from species other than birch can/could dry as rounds stacked in a shed, and I readily agree birch is the "extreme", as in no one makes canoes out of maple bark or ash bark, but this is exactly why I don't believe unsplit rounds are "seasoned" no matter how long they have been "seasoning."



FWIW this is a cordwood fired BBQ at work, not my wood stove.

 

[peakbagger]

When I was growing up we had a house with an upstairs fireplace in the living room and one in the basement. We never used the one in the living room as my mother would not allow it so we got some nice big white birch rounds and set them on a grate for decoration. 20years later when we had sold the house and cleaning it out I wanted to grab the grate for future use.I grabbed onto the rounds and they were featherweight. There were probably 20 inches long and the bark was in fine shape. There was wood showing on the cut ends but it was easy to stick finger through it, the inside wood was just dry crumbly. I expect if I took a match to the interior wood it would puff into a cloud of smoke.

Early in my firewood career Iearned the trick to run the saw down the length of a white birch if I was not cutting and splitting immediately. The again over the years I have on rare occasions cut standing dead white birch and actually found good wood but the majority of the time it was widowmaker with nothing but rotted wood.

 

[MTASH]

I cut some aspen down this spring to prepare the site for a pole building. I was in a hurry and didn't bother to split any rounds. Just yesterday I split a 10" round and it read 28%. This is in my winter '21 stack, but it will be interesting to see where it's at a year from now.

 

[johneh]

The white birch we get aka paper birch if not split or
at very least the bark split will rot within a year

 

[Wood1Dennis]

.....Early in my firewood career Iearned the trick to run the saw down the length of a white birch if I was not cutting and splitting immediately......

Peatbagger, you beat me to it. I learned this trick from my dad years ago. It works with smaller rounds that are too small to split. Usually the bark will shrink and loosen so the wood will dry.

 

[Isaac Carlson]

Wood dries pretty quick around here, once it's split. Unsplit will just rot if given the time.

 

[MongoMongoson]

We cut a lot of choked-out standing dead sugar maple for one stove we burn. They end up being rounds that are 6" down to 2". By the time we get to it the bark is falling off, and they dry pretty well as rounds. The top half of the standing dead tree is pretty dry when it drops, but the bottom half is kind of wet. Capillary action draws water up the trunk even with the tree is dead, I suppose. Even so they bottom ones dry well if the bark is off. If they are much larger than 6" I'll split them.

If they were white birch or popple they wouldn't stand long enough to dry, because they would rot first.

I'm surprised that 9 year old white birch that was unsplit didn't turn to dust inside the bark.

 

[bigealta]

Early in my firewood career Iearned the trick to run the saw down the length of a white birch if I was not cutting and splitting immediately.

I thought about this, but never tried it, for Aspen that i can't seem to get to burn well. Will be using this trick in the future, thanks

 

[peakbagger]

I just did it again to a few white and yellow birches I dropped this weekend.

 

[bigealta]

Just cut the 4ft stump of white pine that i cut down about 3 years ago. It was about 20" diameter. Most of the bark was loose and i just pushed it off. I cut the top off at about 16". Then the last bottom piece at about 18". That left about 3 inches of stump above grade. The top 16" length piece was pretty green still, felt like i just cut it from a live tree. The bottom 18" piece was still so wet it was foaming up with every sinking of the maul. It was spitting sap in my face. So 3 year old white pine stump was no drier than fresh cut.

 

[qwee]

Last week, I grabbed some freshly dropped ash and pin oak at a family's house. They told me I could have the neighbor's stacked rounds too - they said it had been stacked out there for years. What kind of wood is it, I asked? Don't know but it is dry. I was focused on the pin oak and ash.

I've never had oak before - it was wet. Even the little rounds were heavy. Man it was dense. I got it loaded. I went to the back and the owners returned and helped me load the ash. My trailer is 2/3 full and I still have the pickup bed. Might as well get the neighbors 'dry' rounds. I went to the neighbors driveway. Darn, the wood was poplar, oh well.

And, in this case all of the rounds were dry, very dry with no rot (mountain desert climate). I loaded the large and medium rounds (leaving the smalls due to lack of room/I didn't want the hassle). I got home and started splitting on a small kinetic splitter.

I was throwing great big dry poplar rounds on my splitter while struggling with wet medium sized pin oak rounds. And which one split easier? The oak was way easier to split because the grain was mostly straight. At times the popple's grain was going every which way. I set the poplar off to the side (campfire wood?). Now I see why oak is such a good firewood.