I helped my neighbor yesterday take down a dead sugar maple. We often take down trees together as we both enjoy the work. It was about 24"in diameter at the butt and maybe half rotten. He did not want the wood as he has plenty and owns 60 acres. He asked if I wanted it, I said of course. He brought over his splitter and I split it up and threw it into the pickup. It made just over a load. This tree ranged from solid at the bottom and wet to almost compost at the top. I then had a very difficult hoarding dilema. My younger brother who has lived with me for about 7 years, just bought a place of his own and moved out two weeks ago. He is right down the road about two miles. He has helped me with wood and numerous projects of my own my entire life. He has a woodstove, but its late in the year to start scrounging any sort of legitimate wood. This stuff was pretty dry most of it, or would dry out pretty quickly. I had about a half cord of sugar maple in my posession, in my own pickup truck, already split. Do I drive it over to my house and stack it or help someone else in need? I knew the right thing to do. So after consulting with my wife to urge me to do the right thing, we drove down to his new house and threw it behind the garage. He wasnt even home. It was hard to do, but I feel good about it. I hope this will come back in good hoarding Karma some other day for me. Well, I may have split the 4 largest, most solid rounds last just to see if the truck was full by then. Yup, couldn't get it all in one load. No sense in making a trip down the road with a partial load.. I'll just put it in my pile. Hopefully I'm not going to hoarding hell.
It's your bother and he helps you, so doing what is right, well, it is right.. You will sleep better. What goes around, comes around.
Awesome. I was just thinking about working on some karma myself. I'm totally full - any more splitting over here has to wait until I burn off some of this year's supply, or create a new storage area. My sister and BIL are just down the road; they probably have enough wood for the year but they never get around to splitting until they're trying to heat with it. Having 4 young kids keeps them pretty busy.
Good job ! Maybe the 60 acre guy will let you cut some dead standing or down stuff, Never hurts to ask Dead maple & birch get punky fast, standing or down stuff. getting a few loads of dry stuff & sharing it , was a good thing !
For sure it is almost always good to help someone out; relation or not. In this case, he has helped you over the years and it is good to help him. Sort of a house warming gift. (Pun intended.)
John is great. He enjoys logging as much as I do and we often work together at it on his land. I've gotten lots of good wood from him in the past from firewood to sawlogs. One of the best guys you will ever meet. Extremely hard working, honest and generous. He cuts and splits wood for his two sisters that live on the road too. His whole family occupies our road, we are the outsiders but they have adopted us. This certainly isnt the first time i've done something like this. I helped him cut wood for his sisters this winter and we cut about 10mbf of pine sawlogs this winter too. I bought a winch this spring and I think it will spend most of the winter on his tractor, as he has chains and a much bigger machine than I. I hope it does anyway. I've seen the poor guy put in way too much work to get to logs in the past. The winch is going to change his life. I also haul my tractor up to my moms two hours away on weekends to cut and split her firewood for the year too. She lives pretty much on the side of a mountain, which makes it interesting. She is all set for the year. Im blessed to be able to have the means to own the equipment I want and be able to use it to help others around me that need it. I have a sickness, like many of you, where you just cant help being around wood, saws, and equipment. If you can help yourself and others while you are at it, all the better. I have some big piles of Pine and Tamarack slab wood that I will probably cut up and deliver to my brother and others on the road too. I love a scrounge as much as the next person, but I actually enjoy having tree length dropped in my yard and cutting it up as a see fit. I dont mind paying for it either, its finding adequate supply when you want it, is the challange.
