A neighbor has a dying ironwood, sight unseen, that she was trying to find a sawyer for.. i’m guessing it will end up chipped in the dump. Is it worth intervening if I am hand splitting? I see it is a lot of btus.
Very dense,similar to the hickories in hardness & weight.Related to Birches though.Excellent firewood,it normally don't grow real big,normally grows in the understory beneath & along side larger trees such as various oaks,hickories.maples,ashes,white pine & hemlock. In all the years I've only seen or cut 3 of 'em that were big enough to need split (8"-10" diameter) around here.I've heard reports & some pics of some ancient ones that were 18-20" diameter with 5-6 foot long trunk & near 50 feet tall,hard to imagine really.Up in NE Iowa along the Missisippi River bluffs/protected areas there's some big ones still.Most that I cut are just 3 to 5" diameter,only either dead or broke off/split from storm damage. The wood makes excellent mallet heads,wedges & various tool handles also for those items subject to abuse.
These are pretty fair sized Ironwood, the forester that marked them for a timber stand improvement project said they were the biggest he has seen in the county.
Wow! Never seen one that big, usually the ones around me are about the size of the limb on the right. Some folks call hop hornbeam ironwood as well. I've seen hop hornbeam that size.
Hophornbeam is the correct name for it,Hornbeam is closely related not as widespread I don't believe & the tree is smaller.But the wood looks very similar.
Cant say ive ever scrounged any mrfancyplants. Being that it doesnt get very large, for the most part, i would take a shot at it. Smaller rounds are "easier" to split than large in any given species. You could always trade for wood at the dump.
The only time I tried it by hand was the last time mrfancyplants. It is way to tuff for me but is one of the best to burn IMO. I would never not get, if given the opportunity. This is what I've collected laying in the woods doesn't need split just cut. This is the only species of wood I would bother doing this with.
