Have had next to no experience processing sugar maple firewood in 40+ years. Cut a small blow-down on my wood permit and just had the pleasure of splitting/stacking it. Maybe 15 rounds, 10-14" in diameter. Every piece split with one wack of the maul except one piece (took 2). Wow.! What a pleasure! Did I get lucky or is sugar maple always that easy to split???? That is it left of the sweatshirt.
Clear straight sugar maple stem does split easy. Crotches and knots add some difficulty but split without noodling. Gnarl or spiral grain sugar maple would still be easier than elm but tougher still. Sugar maple is my favorite wood since it dries faster than oak and burns HOT. Oak etc. coal better than sugar maple.
Nice and easy, I split a bunch this winter. The big rounds took a few whacks, the smaller rounds just one.
I just recently got aquatinted with sugar maple. It splits nice for the most part. I would still like it if it split like elm. It burns Hot!
Straight grained does split easily for the most part. Gnarly yard trees i avoid like the plague as its noodle city on those. Big sugar maple i scored in November. Stack i was working on behind my shed. Pic from November. All sugar maple now three rows filled. Two cords total I like SM. Seasons fast, great coals. Prefer it over oak.
I prefer sugar maple to oak as well. It seems to split pretty easily, but then again I use a hydraulic splitter almost exclusively. There a are always a few gnarly bits on every tree though.
None on my place. The property was logged many years decades ago and all the prime trees were cut. There is a couple shagbark, 2 red oak, a couple of white oak and a few blue ash and a bunch of dead white ash. The way the white ash grew it looks as though they may have been planted.
another score of SM from September. Grabbed this in a hurry as it was mostly straight grained primo stuff! All of it is in that stack i pictured earlier. The thread was Pour Some Sugar Maple on me! This Score Rocks!
Agreed, splits like a dream, burns real nice. I am actually saving the splits I brought inside in my private reserve area to cook over in the woodstove....Which I haven't mastered yet, but keep trying.
My favorite wood for heating in the dead of winter. I mix in a little paper birch and black ash when first loading the stove or hearth. Once SM gets going and builds coals it is nice and hot. Burns and hold coals a long time too. It is great for heating overnight. I prefer 2 years for seasoning SM versus 12-18 months for birch or black ash.
There is quite a bit of sugar maple around my area, they seem the take the bitter cold well. And yes, sugar maple splits quite easy. I grab whenever I can. It's quite heavy when green still. I will be burning a mixture of sugar maple and ash this coming winter!!
Agreed it splits really great. Even easier is the soft maple. Sadly we do not have any hard maple on our place but happy to have lots of soft maple. We burn that in daytime and oak, ash or elm at night.
Why ? Who decided that most of the best BTU firewoods are well south of here ? Little beech trees, not any Sugar/Hard Maple, some Red Oaks, rare Yellow Birch, no Hickory, and so on...... We get the CT. ticks, butt none of the good woods.
Sugar maple I have generally tackled splits pretty easy. I have seen larger maples, say 36 inches plus are like hitting a rock towards the bottom of the log. Good stuff though, enjoy
