Sub-Optimal Oak Experiment

I like Oak, not so much the drying time. Back in May I decided to run an experiment of sorts. I spotted a red oak tree that had been cut down 5-6 years ago. About 18” DBH, moss covered bark falling off, 3/4” punky sapwood ring and Mushrooms growing out of the end cut. The trunk was dead straight for a good 20 feet. Perfect mediocre firewood scrounge, MAYBE??? I bucked it all into 12” lengths and split it into thin wedges. How fast can I get this sub-prime wood to dry? Fast forward 2 months. I checked a wedge today. The outside reads 13%. Bull. Split it and I get 28%. I’m a believer. Odd thing is it feels really light. I mean, it does need some more time to dry obviously, but it’s not sopping wet like it was when I processed it. It lost a TON of moisture comparatively. What I’m getting at is this ~ is it worth going after not so optimal wood like this, or is there a catch? The light weight of it has me concerned. Will it burn fast/not produce as much BTUs? Or am I making mountains out of mole hills here, over analyzing and should just shut up and burn it up?

 

I've generally passed over a lot of the punky dead wood on our property... but I do know others that will burn punky wood.

I guess I'm blessed enough to have as much good wood/trees that we have, that I've been able to be a bit of a "wood snob"


If it is that far gone... perhaps put it aside as SS wood.

$.02

 

Try a piece or two in a campfire. Watch to see if it bubbles moisture out the end. If not, I'd be tempted to use it in my stove, if I had to.

 

Thanks. Yeah I could easily go after much better fresher stuff, (although I’m a scrounger I still have standards )but when I took my first cut on the log and saw the heartwood looked decent I got curious. I figured since the price was right I could give it a go just to see. At this point it’s wait and see. Even if it doesn’t produce the typical oak BTUs I’ll still be better off than the guy that buys bogus “seasoned” wood from some random tree guy.

 

Yup. That last part.

 

It’s probably lost some of its BTUs to decomp. But it’ll burn good and make good heat. I burn a lot like that. Keep the rain off it.

 

Yep.. you've not much but time invested then, and it should still yield you some valuable BTU's

 

It dried that much already AND there is a lot of summer left!

 

I’ve used a hatchet at the splitter to knock off the wet punky stuff. It usually just crumbles and removed a lot of resident moisture

 

That’s exactly what I was going to do. It’s a little bit of work but you end up with cleaner wood and less mess bringing it in the house. I have about half a cord of longer oak splits I did this with too. The heartwood is still rock solid. I shoveled the pile of sapwood punk in with the compost as well. That stuff breaks down fast.

 

Yeah I was pretty thrilled with the results so far. Friggin Ash doesn’t even dry that much in two months. When I processed this small haul it was soaked. When the maul sunk into it you could see the water being displaced. I won’t be looking to burn it until the 2021-2022 season but it’s not too much of a stretch to be able to use it towards the end of this upcoming season (if I REALLY, REALLY needed too)

 

I will generally pass on punky wood.

 

I'll burn that kind of stuff in the SS and light heat load days during the winter all the time...keeps you from using the good stuff when you really don't need it

 

From what I see in your pictures, a fair amount of it only has punk on the outside (inch or so), absolutely nothing wrong with that wood. I would not wast time knocking off the punk, been burning Bur Oak with a small amount of punk for 40 years at times.

 

Nothing wrong with that IMO. It probably has lost some btus and longevity of burn. Doesn’t mean it’s no good.
We burned tons of wood like that over the last 30 years. Had 80 acres to scrounge from and keep clean. Can’t always get to it right away.
Sometimes the heartwood punks out fast. Even while standing. Sometimes it don’t. I’ve got a few huge monsters like that in the woods right now. One I never even knew was sick. Fell over in a storm and even the 20” thick branches snapped when it fell. The entire tree has nice bark but punky wood. Ants. Seems to have something to do with ants. They die from the inside out it seems.
Back in the day when we burned what we cut last winter it was good to have. Dries faster than live wood.

 

I think you’re on to something there. The house I bought back in January had a couple large red oak trees blown over in the backyard. They looked great from the outside and I was gung ho about bucking them up and processing them. In the spring I got around to it. After a couple cuts I was baffled by how bad the wood was. Thousands of carpenter ants started pouring out too. Dang critters ate that thing alive. I ended up carving a decent section up with the chainsaw and making kind of a rustic bench to set by my outdoor fire pit.

 

Yeah the heartwood gets a slight yellow tint to it. And when it breaks you can tell it’s not good. Doesn’t splinter as much. That stuff I won’t bother taking home now as I’ve got enough good stuff. Years ago we would have burnt it anyway.
Yours doesn’t look like that.
The other one is just off my backyard. Good size red oak, probably 24” dbh. Ants ate that one fully hollow. It’s only 2-3” of wood left. Hollow all the way to the top. I think we have some crazy Africanized Ants in Ct much like the killer bees.

 

I burned dead standing red oak for three Winters straight. Some of the best burning wood I've had. Crumbly soft punky sapwood was kinda messy but worth it for the solid dry heartwood. Some of the soft sapwood had ants so we used the splitter to shave some of the thicker sections of softer punk off.
Laying on the ground wood can be punky soft through and through and not worth it at all. You can tell by running a saw through it usually.

 

I'm definitely interested to hear the results of your experiment, so keep us posted!