A buddy of mine sends me a text not long ago while I’m on my short drive home from the chiropractor. Says there is cut AND split pine sitting on the curb on a side street not far from home (which I was about to pass in 2-3 minutes) So I swing by and see this perfectly stacked, cut, and split pile of fresh pine. In about 5 minutes it’s all loaded up in my truck. I have to be happy the guy didn’t want to burn down his house with this pine . Not too short of a half a cord. Thanks buddy!
A few times years ago I bought a dumptruck full scraps from a pallet maker (untreated pine) when husband traveled alot those years. I told a single mom and she bought a load too, it was a great price. A month later I was at her house and asked where the wood was and she said "it would burn her house down", with her eyes all wide and emphatic. She could not tell me why. But yay for you!
Maybe the whole burn your house down with pine thing started by : someone out west burning their shack down using eastern pine or by someone in the east burning their shack down using western pine… Just saying rumors have started over less.
It is just amazing how the rumor keeps alive, but most of the folks I hear say it have never burned wood for heating a home. I also once knew a man who would not burn pine in his house but it was okay out in his shop.
That one really makes sense. Wow. Common sense out the window there. Do people on the east coast ever think about what people in the North West burn for firewood.
I wonder the same thing. It also comes back to me that in 1952 or 53 my folks took a vacation and I remember more than one place burning wood; pine wood. Even as a child that hit home with me. And yes, in MI during various times in summer it can be nice to have a wood fire going, especially in a fireplace. I think the first time I observed this was at Hartwick Pines Stat Park near Grayling. Pines? That's about all they had and of course they burned it there. I believe they still do but it has been a long time since I was there (raised prices to enter and I refuse to pay that much).
The last time I went past it was still there but it is further north and I moved south and don't get back very often.
I imagine the rumor started in fireplace days with people who didn’t dry their wood long enough. They put up some oak and some pine. Burn (smolder) the wet oak (“because it lasts longer”) until springtime. Meanwhile, the quick-drying pine has had long enough to get reasonably dry. Light a pine fire to take the chill off one morning, get the first decently hot fire of the season, ignite the creosote from a year of wet hardwood, and there you have it: pine burned the house down.
I should preface this with we've burned Lodgepole for 30 years and never had more than flyash. Except winter 2014 we blew through 8 cords and had to order more, I had some flashbacks that cord. Pine too, even out here with desert humidity. Friend's home (cattle ranchers) burned down this Oct, the husband/father died in the fire. Last month husband looked at a roof at another home near that ranch, it was a widow who by seeing the creosote on stack and melted asphalt shingles around the stack had a chimney fire too, she just got lucky. All wet lodgepole pine, which literally will season in log form over a year, yet the sellers deliver sopping wet just cut/split wood. Senseless and heartbreaking.
