Nice Beech

Some people i work for had a nice big beech tip over (actually their neighbors tree) on a fence i was about to fix. Always nice when a nice tree tips itself over for you and you can get paid to clean it up! All the limbs created some excellent firewood, the stem turned into a bit of a contest. The rounds cut out of there were some of the gnarliest ive ever seen. Last pic is as i left.

 

Beech is great burning but it is definitely hit or miss when it comes to splitting. Sometimes they are straight and clear and sometimes they are miserable twisted crotches.

 

Yep, this is near lake michigan shoreline and at least 75 years old by a very quick estimate (probably older, about 24" DBH). Many years of very stiff west, northwest winds left this tree extremely twisted along with ton of old knots. Nearly every round had to be mounted on the splitter, noodled as much as was possible, wedged and then split. even then we stalled the splitter engine several times, a pretty uncommon occurrence (single stage gear pump), and made some very ugly splits

 

Nice looking wood, but I see what you mean about being difficult to split with all those branches coming off the trunk!

I really like beech firewood myself, do you have a splitter?

Where abouts in Western Michigan are you?

 

I had a friend come with his splitter, i split mostly by hand if i can. Im in Frankfort, a tiny town between manistee and traverse city.

 

and all those pictures miss the loads and loads of brush i removed before getting to the fun stuff

 

Nice you had a friend help you out with a splitter.

I use to live in western Michigan, I noticed in your pics the pine dry beds I would see in northern Michigan. Very nice area.....

 

Yep, i love it. Was born and raised here, went away for school and other stuff for some years and made my way back and doubt i will ever leave (at least not any time soon). Its a little crazy in the summer with all the tourists but thats how all us locals make it through the year so kind of a double-edged sword (or double-bit axe if you will haha)

 

I guess I've been lucky with the beech I have. It's straight grained old forest, and splits so easy.

 

we were about 20 miles south of where the worst of it hit. They had massive power outages and trees down, roads closed etc...we had some rain and wind and lightning but missed the worst of it. Im sort of bummed though i love a good thunderstorm