This months scrounge.

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OHutton

Member
Nov 20, 2014
79
Chico, CA
www.ohutton.com
I say this month because that's about how long it'll take me. What started as helping a friend get rid of a downed limb in his yard has turned into an all out scrounge. My buddy had a limb from a Modesto Ash come down in the front yard of the house he bought and is currently fixing up. He called around and he said the tree services quoted him around $500 bucks to remove it. That seemed insane to me, and since I'm not one to leave a friend hanging I brought the ol 261 over there and make quick work of it with his help. He even helped me unload at my place. That's what I'm talking about!

While I'm there he says, "Oh yeah, I have some firewood in the back and it's yours. We just removed our fireplace so we could knock out a wall. We don't need more than a little for the outdoor fire pit. I go out back and lo and behold is about 1.5 cords of CSS of either Pine, Doug Fir, or Cedar. I don't really know my softwood varieties because we have so much more hardwood in Chico. I rarely get to burn it. But heck, free is free, so I tell him I'll take it.

The next day he calls me and says his neighbor just got one of their Modesto Ash trees removed and everything that was too big for the chipper was bucked up and left behind. I get there and where was once a 3 foot diameter tree is a huge pile of rounds. I get one truckload and barely make a dent in the pile. I usually split by hand, but I think I may be having to take a trip out to the rental guys so I can get through these heavy beasts.

Only downside of the whole score is our weather is in the high 90's low 100's already so even though a lot of work is done it'll still be work. This is why I do all my cutting in winter.

Fun fact: The neighbor who is letting me have their wood is the head brewmaster of Sierra Nevada Brewing. Pretty cool!

Where the limb came from:
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What's left of neighbor's tree.
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Me and my wife attacked this pile yesterday. It wound up being about 2 cords of wood that we split and stacked. I rented the splitter at 8am and returned it at 3:30. We finished stacking around 5:00. She was in and out of the house dealing with the baby, but she was a great help operating the splitter while I got the wood in and out of position. It went much faster with her at the helm. I won't be burning the ash for 2-3 years so I made the splits nice and big! :)

Ended the day at about 100+ degrees and she didn't complain. Long day, lots of water, lots of sweat, but lots of ash and even some nice live oak in there as well that I picked up from my folk's property.

The day ended with her basically telling me not to bring any more wood home for a couple years. Haha. I'm pretty sure I'm at a 3+ year supply now.

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That kind of workout may require you to buy a hot tub to recover or keep your wife happy. You'd have to factor that into the economics.
 
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