OK - so I get - 3 year plan/rotation Different wood species season at different rates. You need to keep track of your stacks, for the 3yr rotation. Do you actually stack different wood types separately, and work them into your 3yr rotation? I've read here, that some folk keep different species, separated, stacked apart. Unless you're in the wood-selling business, stacking by species sounds like a headache.
When we first started burning we would burn some of our best wood early on because it was mixed in but after that we started stacking the higher btu wood in it's own area so when the -10 to -30 weather hits we go to the area our best wood is stacked in. It just depends on what works for you.
Mike I don't necessarily sort by species but let's say by type.. sugar maple oak locust iron wood high btu stack.. birch ash cherry etc etc regular stack... pine and popular .. shoulder season or throw couple pieces in to burn down coals.. as I tend to get most of the middle stuff biggest section of my stacks but got couple rows of other stuff..... when I get it I just split and stack there... since I get a tree of xxx I split and stack where going...
I do not keep things separate in my stacks. If I was retired or wealthy and did not have a time crunch, maybe. I burn 2/3 of a cord in a week mid winter. I simply stack larger night rounds in one rack, and the rest in another rack. I personally find a blend to be nice as I like small piece of ash to kick off two much larger pieces of hickory. I have considered keeping a cord set aside of large hickory and ironwood, but have yet do so.
My stacks are mix and match, and they get even more mixed up as they are transferred from the woods, to the splitter, to the drying shed, to the "in use" shed, and then finally to the wood boiler. I also know exactly what species are in my stacks, so if I feel I need to burn more softer/lighter wood on a warm evening, or heavy/dense wood on a cold night, I can just grab what I need. Usually I mix it up even in the firebox. Softwoods and low-BTU wood goes on the coals first, followed by the high-BTU wood on top. The only wood I tend to stack separately are pieces that are destined for a different use - either cooking fire, BBQ/smoke woods, or project pieces (i.e. headed for the wood shop).
I stack by species. I'm a nerd though. It started out to keep the high BTU wood separate for jan/Feb then to keep the cherry separate because I like the smell so I burn it when I'm outside working. Then I stacked pine and fir separate for shoulder season then all that was left was ash and soft maple. I figured I'd just keep it apart
It depends on how it comes to you. It's easy for me, cause there's really only 8-10 different species on my land, and I only burn 4 of those on a regular basis: red pine, red maple, white&green ash, and black locust. Seems like they come to me in batches, so I'm usually just working one species at a time anyhow. I do prefer to run a blend in my stove though, tailored to the burn characteristics I want. Softer woods when don't want as much heat, harder when I need more. Some of the denser stuff like locust takes a little bit to get going, so I like to have a piece or two of pine on top of those loads to burn off the extra smoke that's produced while the locust heats up.
I stack it all together - whatever species, whatever size. When I bring it into the woodshed, I sorta try to get the denser/bigger stuff in the middle. This brings the big guns into play in the mid-winter cold. But, the result is also that I have a mix throughout, which is what I like. All of my wood is seasoned 2-years at the moment, working on the sacred 3, and all of it is technically softwoods.
All my wood is mixed except I keep ash separately be cause some customer don't like the mess of other wood
I started to separate them by species but ran out of racks and started getting confused and mixed and matched so now they are just all mixed. Most is all oak with little pine and cherry.
I confess, I too am a stack nurd. However I don't have too much to choose from. I've about 5 cord of red oak, another 5 of ash and a couple of cord of black and honey locust and a couple of cord of mixed shoulder season wood, red and silver maple and some cherry.
About how I do it. It's mishmosh right into the wood room. If I see some oak and hickory I'll set it aside for a cold nite when the weatherman is calling for It a few days out
I actually have started separating the species - not a hard and fast rule but in general. So in this year's stack I started with pine, then sycamore, then some punkier oak that needed burned up, and now I'm getting to 3 year seasoned red oak. My hope was that I'd hit the good stuff as the weather started turning really cold, which it is getting ready to do. I still have some pine and sycamore left but that can be used for spring shoulder season too.
I fill my stacks with whatever the tree yields, if it doesn't fill the stack, I fill It with the next tree regardless of the species. When I bring the wood inside, I do have two stacks inside, and split them at that time into harder or softer wood.
Q) You need to keep track of your stacks, for the 3yr rotation. Easy I just keep it in order. Whatever stack is burned over the winter gets replaced with the next stack. and on down the line. Q) Do you actually stack different wood types separately, and work them into your 3yr rotation? Whatever is cut that year is whats for minimum 2 years down the road. Yes I stack as much of the same species ( cut that year ) together it looks nicerI do not mix previous years together.
I mix match all my wood in stacks except for the Lodgepole pine. I keep it separate. All the other wood even though it is mixed together is still easy to tell apart and I do use certain woods late at night for a longer burn. I do not get up during the night to load the stove so that last burn is it until morning. The other thing I do is to write the date I stacked the wood on two or three ends of splits in the stack with a black marker.
Wife made labels for each section of the shed She know I can't remember 3 hours let alone 3 years Labels : 18/19 in the shed
