Ironwood is also called hop hornbeam. It is very dense wood! I don't see them around here larger than just a few inches DBH. Surely there are some bigger ones here somewhere. It think it looks a lot like elm. Do you guys come across decent size ones? I am sure it burns hot and slow, it's dense! I have a LOT of these on my land. Wonder why I don't see any bigger ones but maybe they are just uber slow growing. My big ones are 4-5 inches DBH, maybe 30 ft tall. It's a cool tree, it has unusual seed pods, catkins. I got to thinking about the seeds, each tree has a lot of catkins! Here is a good article... Foraging Hop Hornbeam Write if you know ironwood!
I love ironwood. It doesn't grow to be too big around here. Same as by you. A lot of the time, I just cut and don't split it. Give it 2 years and it's perfect to burn, because I only cut dead ironwood. It might be good in less than a year, but extra time ensures it's good. It's a high BTU wood. Almost as good as shagbark hickory, far better than any oak. Burns a long time too. I save this for the super cold nights.
No hop hornbeam but there are terms as trees that are known as “ironwood”. Holly is one of these here. Very slow growth. I’m not experienced with holly but with most trees that don’t grow quickly often burn for quite some time. I burned some wood back a couple years in my stove that burned so long, it didn’t seem like it was properly identified. Ridiculously dense and it hardly changed even when dry. Not sure if it was “ironwood” but wouldn’t have denied it such a term if it needed one.
We call it ironwood but some call it musclewood.. never really grows very tall or large trunks but it is great firewood
I have a few hundred of these in the 4-12 inch range. I had one that was about 2 ft across at the base, but It was gnarly. I dropped on big hickory on it.... so it was last years burn. Good stuff, but heavy. I turned a few pieces on a large..... rough process!
This sapling i cut in my processing area was one. Pic from Springtime. Never have seen a large one that im aware of.
We have a lot of it here in Ohio and I have some mixed in with the Locust and Hickory out in the woodshed. They are very slow growing and the larger ones do seem to be knarly. It was Dad's favorite firewood and we used to cut a lot of it for Boy Scout summer camp. We also used it to build towers and bridges with it because the smaller ones were so nice and straight... oh yeh, very strong too. The wood definitely lasted much longer than the rope we used to lash it all together. We also have the "muscle" wood here too. It is also a hornbeam, but a different variety, American Hornbeam or Blue Beach although Dad called that one Water Beach. Some of the folks around here also called it Ironwood but we always called the Hop Hornbeam with the scaly bark Ironwood.
There are a few places where musclewood (blue beech) is called ironwood but it is much different than the ironwood that is spoken of here. I know the people in Ohio seem to call blue beech ironwood and I can see why as it seems to be as hard as iron. But blue beech does not last long in the stack especially if it gets wet. If we cut any, we tend to burn it within the first year, but then, it does not get very big either.
In scattered areas of MI there tends to be lots of ironwood. There is even a town by the name of Ironwood in MI. Look in the far western end of the UP.
