Unprepared to cut, more than willing to load

I have a (bad?) habit of Resurrecting old threads of mine if it’s the same species combination, similar theme, or the same spot but revisited. It can be confusing but it keeps me from having a bunch of redundant threads.

 

In my early days as a FHC I would post new threads until I realized it was easier to add a post onto the thread it was associated with. I have gradually learned to check the original post (OP) date when I read other members posts. It's a work in progress here as is my hoarding "career".

 

It's all good! It was all a new read for me anyway. Like a second chance to capture what I missed.

 

I came prepared today. A few rounds of black birch bucked and loaded. Right around the corner I grabbed a few pre-cut lengths of camouflage tree (sycamore) I have yet to hear anything positive about it as firewood, but being a first time opportunity for me I had to take a little to try for myself. There was some larger bigtooth aspen there as well but I already have plenty of that at home.

 

I found this

 

Yeah I Googled it not too long ago and read this. I just haven't heard anyone on here rave about it. That's why I only took this little bit. A couple stove loads worth is enough to say I've burned some sycamore. That and space at home is at a premium right now.

 

The temptation was too great huh buddy!!!???

I triple dog dare you to hand split the sycamore...and post a video.

 

That doesn't sound conducive to having a good time I forget, have you ever taken any?

 

Year or two before I joined FHC I did take a couple limbs but knew ahead of time it was a b!tch to hand split. Remember I didn't have a hydro then. It wasn't fun even though the rounds were only split in half.

I dries very light and produces a lot of ash from what I've been told.

So are you gonna give it a whack...or 100?

 

There will be no whacking of sycamore at my house. I reserve monster maul duty for wood that doesn't leave me feeling less than a man

 

Those rounds aren't monster maul size...use an axe!

 

I got a rare score of ash a few weeks back. Very few left around southwest Kansas. Got a full dump trailer load of rounds 14x6. Was pretty excited about splitting it and got started on it tonight. Almost wish I would have hauled it all to the landfill in hindsight. It is the hardest splitting, stringiest wood I have ever processed. It was live standing Green Ash. Anyone else have experience with that species of ash? I will take elm over this stuff any day!

 

Any type of ash can have a stringy one once in a while...I've had some that had I not known for a fact that it was ash, I would have said this is elm for sure!
I just came across some stringly looking ash in the wood pile the other day...I think that wood was cut from a neighbors fence row IIRC...

 

Hydraulics prevailed. This is enough sycamore for my stacks to say I’ve got some sycamore in my stacks.

 

I found some sycamore one time and let it sit a few months and then split it and it split pretty easy. It burned fine in a fire pit.

 

I’ve burned mountains of “junk” wood in my stove over the years and I have yet to burn a species that made my house colder than it was before I burned it. I’ll take the undesirables fairly regularly, I just won’t fill up my entire yard with them.

 

I am going to be burning quite a bit of sycamore this coming winter. It's been split and stacked since 2020. I burnt most of the limb wood off of that tree in 22.

 

Yes I have cut living green ash and it wasn't that easy to split. Most I encounter now is dead and using a hydro, splitting is not an issue.

 

Did you try hand splitting any for chits & giggles?

 

ENNNNNNNN OOOOOO No way Jose'
These split weird for sure. Kind of like Bradford pear crossed with beech. I dunno, weird. Nothing I'd willingly try to hand split, ever.