What’s Your Go-To Firewood and Why?

[qwee]

Speaking of Elm - the tree service just put up an ad. I went and he loaded up my small truck and trailer. Nice, not-much-work firewood. Probably a cord or a little less.

 

[Dataman]

When I burned Wood I used Pine. All we have really in E WA State. Red Fir was 2nd but hard to get and Tamarick Pine was best. White Pine only wood I have on property and nasty Bull Pine. Needs to dry out for year and even then nasty smell. Switched to pellets in 2018 and last year switched to Heat Pump (Extreme Cold Weather). Got tired of Bugs. Cedar was also nice to burn.

 

[ScottLewis]

Dataman I lived near Newport for a year. Way out in the woods overlooking Diamond Lake. Our only heat and cooking was a wood stove and as you said, Tamarack was the best wood available. I told the guys about the white oak we burned back in Georgia, they found my stories hard to believe.

 

[Giaman]

Pretty much all my stuff is red and white oak, and hickory. All freshly cut, green, and in good condition (and usually from my property). The BTUs are so high, and high quality green wood is a joy to cut. It’s worth the lengthy seasoning.

I have no time for old, dry, half rotten ash trees. It’s lower quality wood and makes cutting miserable for me, and also increases chainsaw maintenance 10-fold.

 

[ScottLewis]

I only had 3 ash trees, down here in Dixie. After the emerald ash borer killed them, I cut them up and burned them in the Jotul. What's wrong with ash? Easy to split, about 21 million BTU/cord as I recall. Ash didn't harm my saw.

 

[Giaman]

I only had 3 ash trees, down here in Dixie. After the emerald ash borer killed them, I cut them up and burned them in the Jotul. What's wrong with ash? Easy to split, about 21 million BTU/cord as I recall. Ash didn't harm my saw.

Nothing wrong with ash itself, it’s great firewood of course. But it’s all dead here, for years now, and as the dead ash gets older year by year, the quality gets worse as it rots and gets dirtier. Good quality dead ash is becoming harder to find so I don’t think I’ll bother with it anymore

 

[ScottLewis]

Now that you mention it, the last ash I was going to get, when I sawed it down, the outer 3 inches were rotten. I left it on the forest floor.

 

[fire_man]

Ash and Oak are dream wood because they split so nice and straight. I never met a crooked ash tree around here, oak less so. The ash practically stacks itself its so perfectly square. Beech seasons quick, burns great but wow we have lots of wind twisted Beech that split hard, and stacking can be difficult.

Sadly our Beech forests are going the way of the ash. We have Beech Bark and Beech Leaf disease. The birds used to come in huge flocks every Fall for the Beech nuts. The flocks darkened the skies and made a beautiful tremendously loud squawking noises every year until just a few years ago but not so much any more. Kind of sad.

 

[kennyp2339]

I prefer a mix of oak and locust, but in a pinch the easiest for me to get is norway maple and ash, both are fast drying woods, can cut in the spring and ready to burn by the winter if you have good drying conditions

 

[Turbo89]

Another vote for any variety of oak for its long burns and relatively easy processing. I love ash too, super easy to split, and seems to be in endless supply around here.

 

[Ryan_C]

Hard to beat oak. It burns long, gives good steady heat and leaves a nice coal bed. That said, I'm not terribly picky. I'll burn pretty much any decent hardwood if its properly dry. Moisture content matters more tro me than chasing the "perfect" species. Dry mediocre firewood beats great firewood that's still wet.

 

[Slimdusty]

I wish we had oak around here but it’s rare. I would like to compare it with black locust. I save the locust for the colder days and overnights. Very dry black locust is the top choice wood available to me. No complaints.

 

[sixer]

Overall, another vote for oak. Plentiful here in the Northeast, easy to split, long burns, great coaling. Of course it takes a long time to season but if you can get ahead it's hard to beat.

I do love cherry though. The color and the AROMA are excellent! I'll usually get a small piece burning and let it smoke like incense. Too bad it's usually so difficult to split...

That said, I'll harvest and burn just about anything. White pine is nasty to work with but we have lots of it. I usually save it for the outside firepit.

 

[Pete16]

Jealous of all you guys able to burn oak! Where I'm at in Alberta Canada, our choices are a bit limited, but definitely work. This year I'll be burning a combination of white spruce and lodgepole pine. Hoping this will be my last year burning the spruce and should be all Lodgepole at minimum after that. BUT, I found a Crown Land spot that has a nice pocket of Tamarack that I'll be harvesting in a couple weeks. Very excited for that for next year.

 

[Dataman]

Tamarack great stuff, only 2nd to Cedar. Buy who can afford Cedar. I found big ass stump few years ago. Almost hurt me and Wife putting in PU Truck. Great Wood for Heating. Alas Pellets now and they are only when it's below 10f. Burned 3 bags last year vs 3 Tons before. Went to Extreme Cold Weather Heat Pump. Elec Bill went down $30 for Coldest Month and saved $900 on Pellets. Midea G3 Evox Heat Pump with 20kw Strip Heat inside. Downside can't run the fan when in Heat Mode. It won't do it to stop cold air from blowing on you. Midea Makes the Carrier Performance™ 19 Crossover Heat Pump
37MUHA

 

[Murray01]

Jealous of all you guys able to burn oak! Where I'm at in Alberta Canada, our choices are a bit limited, but definitely work. This year I'll be burning a combination of white spruce and lodgepole pine. Hoping this will be my last year burning the spruce and should be all Lodgepole at minimum after that. BUT, I found a Crown Land spot that has a nice pocket of Tamarack that I'll be harvesting in a couple weeks. Very excited for that for next year.

I loved Lodgepole pine, no branches till the crown and that got left behind! Moved out of Alberta and unfortunately no Lodgepole in our area in Saskatchewan.

 

[ScottLewis]

I lived up in eastern Washington State for a while, north of Spokane. They burned tamarack if they could get it. The only hardwood was maple, and the maple trees were like big bushes with 3 inch diameter trunks.

I would tell them about sawing up and splitting a 30 inch diameter oak tree back in Georgia, they could hardly believe it. They were jealous but they thought I was probably exaggerating.

 

[vatmark]

Choice of wood is whatever is free. We had 2 trees come down in ice storms which were oak. We had 2 trees taken down. One was oak and one was hickory. We had Helene come through taking trees down in the neighborhood. One was on our property and was oak. One neighbor cut up rounds and put them out at the street. We took a bunch of those as long as they weren't too long to split on our splitter. No idea what they were. Probably lots of oak as that seemed to be what a majority of trees were that uprooted.

 

[Plink in NM]

I grew up in Pennsylvania, living many years in the mountains of the north-central where several varieties of oak were the main wood-burning fuel along with ash, cherry, hard maple, beech and several other hardwoods. So, I have a lot of experience burning those species (and I also have a degree in forestry from PSU) and can vouch for them being perhaps the best you can burn. However, 29 years ago my wife and I moved to New Mexico where the primary available wood fuel is a mix of pine varieties, cedar, and juniper. Hardwoods are much harder to come by, but in my experience one stands out as the best: Elm. I know what you’re thinking, elm has a bad reputation among wood burners across the country for various reasons. Some, like stringy and hard to split are legitimate, others don’t hold much water. If fully seasoned for 2-3 years, elm is not all that difficult to split and it burns in a stove nearly as good as those PA hardwoods I mentioned earlier. The variety of elm that is common here in NM I believe is what is considered Chinese elm (as opposed to American elm, slippery elm, red elm) so that may be a determining factor in why it is, in my opinion, a very respectable firewood.

 

[qwee]

Plink this video should interest you. Same for me 800 miles to New Mexico's North - Elm, Siberian Elm.

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

 

[Plink in NM]

qwee...nice find, thanks for sharing. Too bad he didn't go into the fact that it makes great firewood.

 

[Toasty-Yote]

My stacks are 85% ash and will be that way for a few years yet. In my part of NY, freshly dead ash are everywhere so I see it as a waste not to burn it. They are in that sweet spot where they can be split and burned same year but they are still mostly solid. They are sketchy to drop though. I had a piece come through my windshield when a hung up branch gave way as I was bucking up the trunk.