How many separate their firewood by species? I tend to burn it as I go, but wonder if I'm wasting a lot of high BTU wood on "milder" days (25-40 degrees F for daily highs). I may start separating out my Hickory, Oak, and Sugar Maple.
Most of my wood is ash, however I have some red oak, white oak, black locust and hackberry. There is also some shoulder season wood, cherry, silver and red maple. Each species has it's own stack. No particular reason other than my OCD kicks in when I'm stacking!Actually, oak and locust are difficult for me to acquire so I save it for the coldest weather. The little bit of white oak still has another 3 years before I even think about burning it, it's not a year css yet.
I separate as much as I can but with my limited wood shed size (about 6 chords) I often end up burying wood that is more ready or more appropriate to burn at a given time that I end up not using because I don't want to pull wood out and re-stack. I currently have a a lot of pine, a lot of poplar, a lot of white oak, some red oak, a little black locust, and a small amount of a few other species
Yes, I do. SS wood in the front of the shed, then a little better wood for the slightly colder temps, then the good stuff for dead of winter when we need the heat. After that, it's the reverse. Pretty simple really. When we first moved here, I had NO CLUE. Now that I'm older and hopefully a little wiser, I don't like using the good stuff when it's 40 out anymore than I like using Pine in the dead of winter unless I'm looking for a real quick warm up. I've already burned through the pine and most of the poplar in the front of the shed. Next up is about 1/2 cord of Beech if memory serves. Behind that is Ash, then more Ash, then I forget. I can always pull from the other side of the shed if things get too wonky. At least 1/2 cord of small Ash splits (think kindling size-ish) on that side to pull from.
Wow, very similar to me, I had all my poplar and pine in the front. Still have lots of it left though. My oak is all from this year, so I wont be burning it. Luckily I have 2/3 cord of black locust that should treat me right in January. I am definitely cutting it close this year with firewood. Last year was my first year burning, got my stove/chimney install done in late December, and ended up buying about 2 cords of hard wood. So this year was my first chance to get my own firewood, and I got about 5 cord without having to pay by scrounging, but since almost 2 cord of that is oak, I really only have about 3 cord to burn this winter, which I think isn't enough. I have a gas furnace, so I don't need the wood for heat, but I pride myself on not using the furnace. I haven't turned it on yet this year even in 5 deg `arctic blast`. Last year it was the `polar vortex`. Honestly, I think the weathermen just make this stuff up...lol.
My six rows are a mix of wood (hornbeam, red oak, slippery elm, sugar maple, rock elm, black ash, bitternut hickory, hackberry, white ash and a sprinkle of white oak, shag bark hickory). I can identify every wood type by appearance and pick the lower heat wood from anywhere in the row when less heat is needed. Lower heating value wood work even during winter afternoons (above 20 deg) after warming the house with hotter wood in the morning. Rapid burning wood is for cold weather (below 20 deg during the day) which sugar maple is the best. Red oak, white ash, and black ash are my slowest burning woods with slippery elm being in the middle. I have to be careful and not drop my sub 15% moisture sugar maple when carrying it to avoid igniting it before putting it in the furnace. Then the furnace blower needs to be locked on to avoid melting down my furnace. My furnace has a full grate and my chimney is 8" round triple wall stainless (drafts like jet engine). The super dry sugar maple is actually scary stuff on a full grate.
My wood is mainly ash. I separate by drying times. I have several rows of maple. Another stack of 2 year drying wood. Black locus, Apple and Mulberry. I have a few stacks of 3 year Oak. That will be my deep winter wood. When I bring the wood up to the house, it is generally stacked front to back with the lesser BTU wood in the front, good wood in the middle and more lesser wood in the back. We burn front to back. At one time I did try and stack by species but got to much of a hassle.
I have pine, red maple and oak in separate stacks. If I get any hemlock I stick it in with the pine. If I get any grey or yellow birch, cherry or any medium BTU wood that dries in about a year it gets tossed in with the red maple. So basically three sorts. If I were to get any beech it would probably be a fourth as it seems to season fairly quick.
I separate just the oak and pine here. Any other hardwood that falls in the same seasoning requirement all gets put up together as I get it.
I separate wood species while it's drying, but then I put together a blend for shoulder season, and a blend for colder weather. The exceptions are white birch, which I use for kindling, and about a cord of dry oak, stacked in the basement for blizzards and other nasty weather.
I separate by species, only because its usually very easy to do so when processing as it comes in. Shoulder season is about 1 cord. Half goes into the porch bin at the beginning of the winter, and the second half stays out in the stacks top covered until spring. Two cords of oak are currently in the shed for real winter, and I will burn that daily. In the coming years, it will be a mix of oak and locust. I can somewhat separate that into the shed, but my current shed makes that fairly difficult, so it will get selectively chosen out of the bin as needed.
I separate almost everything, a lot of my wood is in totes, so it’s easy to bring what ever wood in I want. I do have a few totes that are half cherry and half ash. Those two burn good together.
Hickory, locust and cherry get set aside. My name is Steve and I'm a wood snob. Oak,ash,mulberry and everything else gets burnt as dry.
I stack and mark my wood as to when stacked. I don't separate by species. I usually have 2 sheds and a row or 2 outside at any given time so I can access dry shoulder season wood or January wood at any time.
No, my wood is primarily an equal mix of Red Maple, White Ash, and Black Cherry, so little to gain by sorting. That said, I do have one pile of Red Oak that I got outside my usual wood processing time and it is stacked separate. And my sugaring wood is separate. But no, I don’t sort. Much.
i generally have oak, hickory, locust on the multi year seasoning plan. I dont really separate one year seasoning woods. Maple, ash, beech, cherry etc. I dont burn softwoods or lower btu hardwoods. I look at it this way. If it takes as much work to process silver maple as oak ill take the oak. Once in a while ill pull higher btu wood for extreme cold but doesnt happen often here in Southern CT. Fortunately ive always had decent btu wood.
I never did. Most of my wood from the property was red oak or black Birch. Fairly similar woods. Now that I’m paying attention, scrounging elsewhere and getting on a three year plan I’m sorting it out at least somewhat. Finished stacking the black locust today. That’s definitely not mixed. There’s a little room in the stack yet and I may put some hickory on top. A very rare wood for me but there’s one waiting in the woods for me. Have a stack of shoulder wood,,,,well maybe two stacks. Maple, Sassafras, tree of heaven. Oaks will be mixed together. Not enough difference to make segregation worthwhile. Have a stack of ash too. I will be separating the dead oak that’s in the woods and the fresher oak. Dead trees season faster IMO.
I separate my pines(soft woods) from the hard woods and also try to keep the hard woods that I split together as far as drying time. As I have said in previous posts, I usually get a decent fire going with a load of pine, then when that has burned down to just coals, I throw in the hard woods. Seems to work pretty well.
