I just cut a bunch of Wood from both of these trees. Is the wood very good for firewood? what is the optimal time to split it? I will be doing it with my splitting maul. I am using this maul and love it https://amzn.to/3nqg5zG
The optimal time is now for white oak. It’s a top shelf firewood. I won’t burn any gas for Poplar, but it dries faster than oak.
Both are great firewood. Oak in 3 years and tulip next year.. a lot more BTUS in oak but lot longer drying time
Get both cut, split and stacked, as soon as you can. If you can, stack separately. As Canadian border VT mentions above, big difference in drying times.
second year burning shoulder wood and I’m finding the poplar is the oak of the soft woods. Burns much longer than the spruce I mix it with. Pleasantly surprised by that. I find my self rationing it as I have way more spruce.
I personally like Tulip Poplar, splits easy, dries fast & has decent btu's. The White Oak is one of the best firewoods in North America, but as mentioned above 3 years to season. Split & stack as soon as you can.
Yeah the Isocore is what I go to when I really need to break some big nasty’s up… beats noodling, as long as it does split.
I think you’ll like the tulip. It processes easily and dries in less than a year. Burns fast but hot and clean. Only downside I noticed is that it tends to pop a bit and leave unburned chunks if you’re burning it exclusively. I found that mixing a couple splits of something else like cherry, oak, or even spruce will help incinerate everything consistently.
Couple seasons ago I c/s/s about 6 cords of poplar for my parents. They burned through it like greased lightning. It’s hard to pass up a nice big ol straight log of it. As mentioned, don’t expect long burn times with it. White oak is just about as opposite as you can get. I’d never turn it down.
I've found in the past when I've tried everything to get a fire going good and can't, throwing a piece of poplar in will do the trick.
Poplar good for shoulder season. Dries in as short as six months. White oak is some primo firewood just takes a long time to dry. Split ASAP to start the drying process. When i exclusively was a hand splitter i used to split fresh cut rounds ASAP as once the ends start to check they get more difficult to split IME. Split now the poplar will be ready for next Fall and the oak maybe a couple years, maybe. Three years even better. Oak takes a long time to dry be it red or white. Ive owned my Isocore for two years and love it. Partners perfectly with their X27 ax. I now use it mostly to section big rounds to make handling easier on the old back.
Poplar is one of my favorites. It splits so easy, and although it burns fast, it is like built in kindling. Throw a dry split on some coals in the morning and no huffing and puffing required, you can have your fire going in no time.