Gathering firewood every fall is a satisfying ritual. However, the best time to get your firewood is one year before you plan to burn it. Green firewood burns inadequately and creates creosote buildup in your stove and chimney. With a sturdy woodshed, you can stack your firewood indoors for the winter and let it cure for next season. Look for the telltale cracks in the ends of each stick that will tell you your firewood is properly seasoned and ready to burn.
You’ve probably heard that hardwood is the best and softwood is to be avoided at all costs. This isn’t the whole truth, though. Softwood has a lower heat output, but unless
you’re burning pine, it doesn’t contribute to creosote buildup any more than hardwood, as long as it’s properly dried. Hardwood makes a lovely fire, but it’s a precious commodity, and in some places it’s impossible to find. Nonetheless, softwood isn’t as valuable as hardwood, so you should expect to pay less for it. If you’re paying someone else to cut your wood, take a close look at what you’re getting for your money. Anything more than a few sticks of pine, birch, or poplar should mean a lower price for you.
If you’re cutting your own firewood, you’ll want to buy a hydraulic splitter, or you can rent or borrow one. Splitting firewood by hand is for lumberjacks and people with a lot of time on their hands. It’s also a whole lot of work. A powerful hydraulic unit will chew through a cord of wood in an hour or less and leave it ready to stack in a neat pile in your woodshed.
The unit of measurement for firewood is a cord. A cord measures four feet by four feet in a stack. Each stick should be cut to 16". If they’re a great deal shorter, you’re not getting your money’s worth; if they’re bigger, they might not fit in your fireplace or wood stove. A full size pickup truck and haul home a cord of wood in about one plus one-third of a trip, but it will be loaded down. You should plan to drive slowly and stay off the freeway while hauling firewood in your truck.
Once you’ve brought in your firewood for the winter, you can relax in front of your wood stove with glass doors or your fireplace while the cold wind blows outside and plan to buy some fireplace mantel accessories.
Comments on this entry are closed.