If it is/was a native species, probably pitch, but with front yard landscaping and so many imported cultivars available at some nurseries, you'd have to be a forestry expert of some sort to be absolutely certain. If you count the rings and the tree is older than the house on the lot it is highly probably a native tree. Unless of course if the area was purposefully reforested a hundred years ago.
Every time I hear that song, I immediately think of the Weird Al parody. Sorry for the thread derail.
I kept singing "hey Ricky" instead of "Mickey" after reading Midwinter 's first post, googled it and forgot about the parody version. He made some funny songs and videos. Now its stuck in my head. Been singing it for a couple hours now!
Wait until you look up "Yoda" and "the saga begins". You'll mix the songs forever. Edit- remember, he gets permission from every artist before he does one. And for the most part, they help him do it. The only ones that didn't go for it was Prince and Garth Brooks.
OK, everybody STOP! I am disappointed that I am the first to point out the fact that Midwinter took "One of the big butts and put it in her backyard to play with later"
That is where I really thought this thread would head, but no, it went to bizarro land instead. Now to wash that all out with an earworm worthy sickeningly sweet season appropriate melody.
The first thing that came to mind was a sir mix-a-lot song. However (butt), I didn't know if it would be allowed.
I'm sorry. I take full responsibility for the derail. I counter your happy Christmas song with another. Not for little chilluns, though.
BTW, I don't have much pine around here. But, I burn long dead, standing cedar. I usually split it small to keep hardwoods at the right burn, but mostly for kindling. I enjoy sitting at the splitting stump with my boys axe and a sissy stick to fill a bucket or two.
Being a connoisseur of Pine, one of the things I've noticed in the many discussions we've had about it is that Pine seems to get lumped into one giant category of wood and the general consensus is between, "it'll burn your house down", to, "yeah I might burn it in shoulder season if there's nothing else". Out west, softwood is what hardwood is to you guys back east. We have hardwood out here but not like you guys have out there. Oak and Eucalyptus make up the bulk of our hardwoods out here (both of which are great) but there are nowhere near the species you guys have back east. Softwood is king out here and within the softwood category there's Pine. Not all Pine is created equal. Digger Pine is not Ponderosa and Ponderosa isn't Fir or Lodgepole. I've burned all of these and while Digger is pretty terrible, Fir and Lodgepole can hold their own with the Oak I have in regards to burn time. Now before you throw me off the forum for heresy, I'm not saying that Fir beats hardwood I'm just saying it does pretty darn well for a softwood and being that it grows like weeds out here, it's pretty darn easy to process, and it seems nobody wants it, lb for lb I'd say it's equal (or better) in my book to Oak. I can put two good chunks of Fir in my stove at 9PM and I'll still have coals enough to start a fire without help in the morning. Is it the great bed of coals two chunks of Oak will give me? No but its only about 3 or 4 degrees difference in temp. No too shabby in my view. I say all this because our Fir is your Eastern White Pine. Give it a try I think you'll raise an eyebrow.
Great post. I just took a walk in my woods, and my pines are all bunches of 5. So EWP as suspected. Now I’m curious to see if I can find any Red Pines. Besides the needle bunches what other tell tales are there?
