You as a young hoarder......When did you find the passion

Ever since I can remember, I've always loved building fires. Out in the woods camping, or just in a firepit at my home growing up.

And I've always loved trees, ID'ng them (though not an expert by any stretch), climbing them, watching them grow each year.

The hoarding mentality really came on in the past 8 years, which is when I bought my farm out in the country (I live in the city). After a few years, I got the woodlot marked and some selective harvesting done. Forest was littered with tops, some hardwood, some softwood (red pine mostly). I forget the exact reason, but I bought a chainsaw, a few splitting tools and just got started processing in small batches here and there. Just really loved doing that, and still do. In fact, I'd love to be doing it right now instead of being stuck at my desk.

Along the way, I joined a few wood-related forums the stumbled on this one and have stuck around. Learned a lot, about species, 3-year plans, drying times, equipment people use. It's give me a lot of ideas for the future when I plan on living on the farm full-time.

 

My family always burned wood growing up, it was a part of winter life. I can remember the delivery occurring some time in August, the stacking, kindling splitting and loading of the wood bin.

Took many years off between college, renting, then buying a house with a fireplace. Then we bought a little place up north and installed a wood stove.

There's something about the entire process that's extremely satisfying. Especially if you burn what's been harvested from your own land. I'm on year 2 of wood we had cut and it's really neat that the wood was grown on our land, cut, split, seasoned and burned all right there.

 

There are quite a few pictures of me helping my dad stack wood in the back of his chevy 3/4 ton truck when i was 3. He purchased a woodlot in 1982. The woodcutting slowed down for us from the time i was 8 or 9 until i was 24. Bought my first saw, a MS361 in 2003ish. Cut firewood for my dad and for campfires and cleared a couple acres at the woodlot until i put in my own woodstove in 2010. Still use that old 361 to cut alot of wood. Decided to build a cabin down at the wood lot which got us into milling wood (and of course we put a woodstove in the cabin). My wife has been spoiled by the wood heat and hates the in between days where its not quite cold enough to start a fire lol.

Wood is just a way of life for my family. My daughter helps stack just like i did when i was her age.

 

Me September 1981 at parents acreage,just turned 18,then again 31 years a few feet from original photo Started using saws at 17,worked for small local tree service just out of high school until 21 or so.Still cutting all these years later,not as often (1-2 days monthly year round if weather,job schedule cooperate & I have the extra energy)

Long as I'm physically able I'll continue to do so.The passion for it is as strong as ever,even though some days my aching muscles say ''NO''.

 

Grew up in Oregon in a family that was mostly all sawmill workers or timber fallers. Started splitting and stacking when I was 9-10 years old. Dad always had a self loader deliver a load of lodgepole or Douglas fir logs for me to c/s/s when I was a teenager. I ran a p61 pioneer to cut up the truckloads. I didn't hardly do any firewood after high school until I turned about 32. My job at the sawmill was enough to satisfy my love of freshly cut wood . The Mills all shut down here when I was 32 so about a year after that I bought a 272 husky and started helping a friend cut for his house, it was a great feeling to run a saw again. Been doing it ever since, some years only a couple cords other years more like 20 cords. Like tons of others on here I love it.

 

For me it started pretty much at birth. My grandpa always burned wood. My dad was taught by Gramps. I know my Mom's side were farmers and burned wood too.

 

I grew up with wood heat. Usually hated the work involved then, but it taught me many lessons. Little did I know how much my fathers work ethic rubbed off on me. I have memories of getting wood with his VW bus. That's right, a VW bus (old hippie, lol). He never owned a truck till later in life. I also vividly remember a time when he had a trailer made from the bed of a pick-up. Once that trailer passed us, full of wood, and crashed into a fence row of the local farmers field.

I started burning here after learning from a friend that Mott's sold firewood permits for $1 and you could cut all you wanted. I actually started hoarding before I had a stove. Ended up with 16 cord of apple wood for that $1 permit. So it was the savings from buying fuel oil that motivated me. That was just under 10 years ago. I think I've called the oil man one time since then!

 

just a memory that popped up- mid 70's fuel shortage- My folks called (me and the wife lived some 75 miles away)and wanted to know if their ww2 fuel ration tickets were still usable. fast forward 2009 mom passed away ( she was 92), so I am working on the house and guess what I find, yep ww2 fuel ration tickets she still had them tucked away.

 

I grew up in a home with a woodstove. I dont remember much about it growing up (I can hardly remember last week most of the time haha). I know we never stockpiled any wood so we were always looking for dead standing trees on the farm. Our stove was a dual purpose wood/coal burner so there were some years we would order coal. Man does that stuff throw some heat but was very messy.

Fast forward to my college days....I would burn wood as much as possible but wasn't home a lot to keep the fire going. At this point my parents moved in to the farmhouse years before and my brothers had moved out so I was living in my parents old house (still there, hopefully will be buying in near future instead of renting from them) and was having to supplement with the oil furnace. It got expensive quick!

I had a small echo chainsaw for a while (don't remember the model) that died on me. The local saw shop was running a deal for $150 off Jonsered with any trade in. I picked up a CS 2165 which I still have.

For years I cut and burned as I needed wood. Last year I plugged the chimney twice due to burning green wood . That got me thinking there's gotta be a better way. I started doing some research and found this site. This summer I picked up a new to me Osburn 2200 freestanding woodstove and installed a ss liner. I'm now doing my best to try working towards the 3 year plan. I should have enough dryish wood to get through this winter so everything else I'm getting will be going towards the future winters. I've never kept track of how much I burn.

I've always enjoyed getting out to work on firewood. I just never made the time to do it in advance. I've been amazed at what a difference even 9-10 month CSS wood has made. No more plugged chimney for this guy!

 

Yes that was a good time meeting you and Judy in DC. And meeting Tom Morrisy and his gang from Woodstock, and Matt Remine (NW Walker I think) and his rocket stove. Good times indeed!

Never would have guessed where this would go and the memories it would make. I consider myself blessed to have met and made so many friends/family here, especially you and Judy!

I think I met Mr Ackerly and Craig (owner of the other site) while in DC also

 

This is ,of course, the best part of wood heat.
Kinda feels like you're "sticking to the man"

 

<I grew up in the city (outside Wash. DC) in a 3 story duplex w/forced air gas heat. A fireplace, woodstove, and cutting wood seemed to be only a dream if not foreign to me. I always wanted a home with a fireplace. Fast forward after college/grad school I moved out to the PacNW (22yrs ago now...) Met my wife out here who's family burned wood and I was hooked. In our second house we made sure to have a wood stove and have been burning since. For me it's been somewhat of a very practical, pragmatic dream come true. Running the saws, splitter and stacking wood is a great break from the office/cube world. Seeing stacks of wood in the shed is one of the most satisfying feelings I can get. Just that simple.>

Cut and pasted my response above from a similar thread here way back when. The real reason you like to cut firewood?

 

Hi all Lissa here, Nick isn’t much of a typer so I’ll speak for us both! Nick grew up splitting wood from a very young age (mostly with a maul and he’s a BEAST!). His father cut trees and sold firewood on the side. As a teen he started climbing and cutting. He was able to gain experience out in woodlots and fields, learning how to make precise drops without crashing roofs, etc... He’s had his own tree service business for about 6 years now. He can run up those trees like a squirrel!!! We also sell firewood as a side business and I’ve become obsessed with all things trees! About Me, I was raised with Woodstove heat. I helped my father stack and carry and didn’t like it one bit! Now days, I love it! It’s just what we do.... My son is now an arborist (taught by Nick) and he absolutely loves it too! I’m thrilled to have stumbled across this club while searching for tree/wood information. I crave knowledge and will definitely be posting questions to satiate my insatiable lust for trees! Thank you all in advance

 

Nicely said and so true for me as well! Sometimes I just stare out the window at my racks and woodshed....LOL!

 

Such great stories here! I always loved wood and while in college as an art major I worked with wood to make my sculptures along with some functional artistic furniture. It was by age 17 after a series of woodworking projects I realized there are so many ways to enjoy the science of wood along with the many varieties of trees. I built a chainsaw mill attachment out of wood at 18 when I couldn't possibly afford one of those portable Alaskan chainsaw mills. That was a lot of fun but soon milled more wood than I knew what to do with or had room to store the drying stacks. Then I got busy with work and milling seemed to stop. I always loved cooking and so in my parents back yard I built a stone wood fired wok grill that I also made to fit a 55 gallon oil drum to smoke meats and fish. Always grill my steaks on wood so I started collecting burning wood initially for cooking and to this day I still don't own a gas grill. I found I loved the organic process of collecting wood for cooking fuel and so I thought since my piles were getting larger I needed to think about burning it for ambiance. I built a backyard gazebo years ago and fitted it with windows collected from the garbage (Yes I was an old window hoarder) so you can imagine a shabby chic sort of green house. In there I installed a cast aluminum chiminea fitted with chimney flue to go out through the grapevines that covered the roof. We lived in that room during Hurricane Sandy's week long black out and all that wood I collected kept us warm. During that same time of Sandy I was having an extension put on the house to remedy its terrible railroad style layout and also extended the wrap-around porch to meet the new addition. Here I could have a screened in section to smoke my cigars outside (what can I say, cigars make me look like a big shot). Anyway, my 1897 Queen Ann/colonial home had an existing fireplace that was lathe and plaster covered over in the 1940's. By this time my wife and I (we met in art school mid 80's) owned the house for 20 years and I always dreamed of opening up that large wasted chimney running right through the center of the house and put a wood stove in it. I finally decided to pull the trigger and went ahead with the project since my house was already under construction and I rather enjoyed that time burning full time for heat in the chiminea during the crazy power outage. Putting in that insert was the best decision I ever made. I love the whole process... the visual fire, the warmth, the challenge of finding wood in the NY metro area, CSS-ing, and my significantly reduced gas bill.

 

It's raining out, and I'm just now reading all your stories.
None of my family were woodburners, not even my Polish born, mushroom hunting grandfather, who owned forest acreage in western MA. Go figure. The houses I grew up in mostly had fireplaces, but my parents' idea of fuel was rolled up newspaper logs. They didn't burn very well.
So woodburning was completely off my radar until my boyfriend (now husband) and I moved into our present house in 1990. Talk about lucking out! The previous owners had put a stainless steel liner into the flue dedicated to the Fisher mama bear in the basement. A natural gas furnace supplies forced hot water heat to the upstairs, but the basement is unheated. So to spend any time in the basement in winter, we needed to run the stove. We would order a cord or two of "seasoned" wood in the late summer or fall, stack it in the basement, and fire up the stove whenever we wanted to spend time down there. This worked all right for occasional fires, we didn't burn enough to seriously gunk up the chimney, and I'd have it swept every summer.
Well, as the years passed, a cord of wood went from $125 to $200 to $250, and seemed to shrink in volume every year! And the loads were full of bark, and the wood muddy. I would try different wood suppliers, but they were all a shifty lot, no offence intended.
We had an old Norway maple in the front yard cut down, and cut into rounds, by my husband's chiropractor, also a woodburner. Well, the rounds were too big to fit in the stove. I went to a lot of flea markets, estate sales, and junk barns back then, so I bought a wedge and old sledgehammer, and taught myself how to split wood. With only one wedge, I frequently buried it in a round and couldn't get it out. That's when I figured out you need at least two wedges. We still bought some wood, but supplemented it with wood I would find at the dump and split. No chainsaw yet, so I would accumulate a big pile, and my husband would rent a chainsaw over a weekend and cut it all at once. With shoulder problems and surgeries, he grew weary of that.
We got a cat, who hung out in the basement a lot, and we needed more wood to keep it warm down there. In addition to wood from the dump, I started answering Craigslist ads. Sawing it up was a bottleneck. Between chainsaw rentals, I was trying to hack some up with a sawsall. We replaced the Fisher with a Jotul stove, which I like a lot better.
I found this forum, and started lurking. I started posting after a particularly exciting Craigslist score. Everyone here was very welcoming, and Backwoods Savage took me under his wing and advised me on a chainsaw purchase, a Stihl MS180. It has proved to be a very comfortable saw for me to use, and I've cut some suprisingly big logs with it. My mechanically inclined husband keeps it well maintained and sharpens the chain. bocefus78 was my secret santa last Christmas, and gave me a Fiskar's x25. First time I had used an axe to split! It was a revelation. I found that I needed something heavier, so I graduated to a Helko splitting axe, but still use the x25 for small stuff.
I have to say, this forum has enabled my firewood hoarding immensely (in a good way)! I probably have three year's with on hand, math is not one of my strengths so I'm not too eager to do cord calculations. Plus I really enjoy hanging out with you all on FHC, because let's face it, making firewood is a pretty solitary occupation. As MikeInMa says, "hoard on!"

 

Not until LP hit $4+ a gallon. Passion initiated...… Before that it was just a addiction.

 

Parents burned firewood off and on growing up. At first in a fireplace with a coal boiler and then they had a wood stove . So us kids cut wood sporadically to match. Axes, mauls and manual saws. I've had stoves here and there and mostly bought wood up or scrounged until we bought my great grandfather's house from my parents. So I'm living almost next door to where the farm I grew up on used to be. (almost all the farm buildings are gone) After my dad died I kept mom in some wood and then 5 years ago upgraded her stove and she ended up keeping the stove going 24/7 when oil got to $4 gallon and we had a prolonged power outage in the Winter and her emergency stove proved to be too small for the task.
Heating partially with wood not so much for need but if you still can, why not. So at one point I was cutting wood for 3 houses, now just 2.
We have just about enough forested land to have the firewood we need. I figure if we have to pay taxes on it we should farm something out of it to compensate.

 

It's a way of life.
Watching dad cut trees in the woods as far back as I can remember. Climbing through the tops...
Putting snow/ice from my mittens directly on the hot wood stove to see and hear the awsome reaction. Coming inside on many cold winter night of playing in the snow as far back as I can remember being all wet and cold standing close to the stove. Spreading out my clothes to dry next to it...
Trying to swing a maul/wedge before I could effectivly use it.
Dad handing me the home light xl when I was 11?12? You wanna try? Same age getting in the car with a rope in the tree waiting for the signal to pull.....
I have a long awsome list of memories and shared experience growing up what's now called "country"

 

All my Dad's family in Texas had wood stoves or fire places. The Big House at the ranch in Uvalde had a Monarch propane/wood stove in the kitchen and a small wood box heater or pot belly in just about every room! When I was in grade school in Maryland out in the dingweeds we had a huge snowstorm and we, and about 7 neighbors, were snowed in without power for almost two weeks. Since my Dad always built or bought a new house at every new duty station, he always made sure it had a fireplace. All the neighbors bunked up at our house because of the fire place and all our Coleman stoves, lanterns and camp gear. Great fun for the kids but rather stressful for the adults but it impressed on me the advantages of backup heat. I put myself through 2 years of college in the Pacific NW cutting and selling firewood to the carriage class of wood burners in suburbia. When I was first on my own I worked at a Truss and Wall Panel shop. I found I could have all the 2x4 and 2x6 cut ends I wanted for free. I removed the tiny, inadequate propane heater from my 500 ft square rental, put in a Washington Stove Works potbelly stove and suddenly had unlimited, billowing, free heat! Heating with wood was now a fact of life! All my friends were hunting, fishing, wood cutting, blue collar hard workers. Fast foreword a few years and I am newly married and building a new home. I bought a Stihl 028 and cleared the land. The new house had a wood stove and we had lots of wood. My Wife came from a different social strata than I and was a little askance to cutting and heating with wood and other outdoor activities. Heating all winter on wood was a new experience. I have to give her credit, when we started off on a new life direction she was onboard and riding shotgun without complaint. Even though we live in the suburbs, we are on the bitter end of our electric grid. All power in this area is overhead. We have had many 3 or 4 day storm outages but always stay warm and powered up between the woodstove and generator. After 40 years of marriage and wood heat we would never want to change.