All, I had a very nice stash seasoned that I burned through and sold since 2016 since I gave up my property with a stove. Now I'm at a different house and have a little over a cord of well seasoned which should be enough for the next month. However, after that I will be cutting and splitting with endless access given my buddy has a tree service. I plan on splitting small to decrease drying time, but it won't be till winter of 2025 that the new wood will be reasonably well seasoned if I start in May 24 (I'll likely avoid oak given how slow that seasons). My insert has secondary air tubes and a catalytic. My question is if wood is less than ideally seasoned, would I just be better next year to rely on the air tubes to get the heat out and engage the cat when I have 2+ year seasoned hardwood? I don't want to ruin a catalytic and can just run a brush down the chimney liner after next season if some creosote build up in the stainless chimney liner. My current wood I'm burning was cut and split years ago, so I'm ok for the rest of this season.
Find wood species that dry quickly. Split and stack now. Seeing that your in Illinois, there should be dead standing elm, ash will dry if it was dead standing, in a summer, pine, box elder, soft maple. Stick with those. Let sugar maple, beech, oak, hickory , Norway maple, locust go at least two summers drying.
