American elm, red maple and mockernut hickory. A coworker took a few trees down at his son’s house this past weekend and offered me whatever wood I wanted. Smaller diameter, perfect size to just halve the rounds with minimal work. Back right up and load. I won’t complain about that (not even for elm)
The elm. It’s going to sit in the round until next spring. The red maple. The smallest of the skinnies went into the outdoor burning supply. The mockernut hickory. I’ll try hand splitting it next, since my splitter is loaned out at the moment.
The mockernut is processed. Definitely had to channel my inner buZZsaw BRAD to get these stringy rounds to yield to the maul. I may break down some of the short chunks for smoker wood.
Gotta love easy scores. Youre gonna have to educate me on mockernut. Im sure ive seen it but misidentified it as pignut. How common is it among the hickories around here?
It’s relatively rare from what I can tell. Shagbark and Pignut are much more common. I’ve only seen it a handful of times. A few trees close to my work in Middletown, and a couple I saw on a hike in Plymouth. I recognize it by the bark more than anything. Woven ridges that are really smooth with rounded peaks. Like a lot of trees, the bark changes a lot with age.
Most of the time fresh cut hickory splits rather easily...most of the time. I ran some through the hydro a couple weeks back but they were older rounds and stringy when split.
I should have worded that better. The maple splits pictured are for the woodstove, but I had a small pile of 2-3" twisted/knotted skinnies I left unsplit that are for the firepit.
Another nice trio. Didn’t even have to cut either A coworker answered a Craigslist ad and scrounged 3 loads already. Hickory, red oak and black birch. He put this aside for me. Guess I’ll have to make more room for this at home somehow
He didn’t even cut them. Whoever was clearing land and advertised for free wood on FB Marketplace cut them to length. I swear they’re all within a 1/2” of each other on the length too There’s a bunch more to get if I want it but it’s like 40 miles one way. Hard pass for me.
I know I'm overloaded in my Chevy Colorado by the way it drives, more than how high the wood is piled in the bed. Yesterday that little truck felt very squirrely rolling down the road. Eventually I'll have time to work on that trailer I bought a few months ago, and that'll become the new (and better) way to haul wood.
