Wood species. What’s worth bringing home

[fenris]

Around here most everyone who doesn't have a wood stove will tell you you can't burn anything other than oak or Hickory. It's infuriating how often this lecture is repeated. We did mostly burn oak and hickory growing up but back then it wasn't hard to come by cheaply. The oak was for when it wasn't very cold. We started working a little Hickory in during the freezing nights. 

I've been giving away what I call junk wood for years. My neighbors will burn anything they can get if it's free.  Yellow pine, mamosa, maple, even boxwood. Lots of similar species that grow here. 

It all burns just not as well. I've always been told the pine will cause a house fire. My neighbor burns it but he has to clean his chimney a lot to keep the buildup from catching fire. The pine we have here is awful. It has a lot of resin and it's messy. We usually burn it outside near where it falls. 

I'm doing some clearing at the back of the property and wondering if any of this is worth putting in the truck and bringing to my pile. 

I don't think any of the above would be worth the fuel to bring from far away but this is already here. Or I could let the neighbors load it up. What species would you guys consider worthwhile? 

[Ianab]

Here in NZ plantation pine is the number 1 firewood, not because it's a great firewood, it's just the most common tree available. More dense woods like Eucalyptus / Sheoak / Acacia is more desirable, but also fetches a premium.   


Problem with the less dense woods is you need more volume for the same heat, and the lighter woods tend to burn up faster. If you then damper down the fire it can get smokey, and that creates the creosote in your flue and possibly a chimney fire. The local wood stoves are designed as double burners and as long as you let them get up to temp they can be dampened down a fair bit and still burn clean. 


If you decide to keep some of the lighter weight wood, make sure it's dry of course, and either use it as a "starter" to quickly get the fire up to temp and get the denser woods alight. Or some folks use them in the "shoulder" seasons when they don't need the full heat output. We would call that slightly cooler weather Winter here.


When you have a choice of what wood to collect, then naturally you pick the better ones first. And if you are buying, then you can be fussy, or at least expect a steep discount for the lower density wood. The heat potential of most woods is the same based on dry weight, so picking up a chunk or Oak and a chunk of Cedar lets you estimate how much heat it can make. You will want 2 or 3 chunks of the lighter wood, so if you are buying on volume, make sure it's priced accordingly. You sure don't want to pay Oak / Eucalyptus prices for pine

[SwampDonkey]

I burn aspen, maple, ash, fir, spruce, tamarack, alder, striped maple, cherry. I use a furnace, so it doesn't matter if there is coals in the morning because the furnace will not run on a small bed of coals. I've compared the actual heating time, the time the fan runs, on a load of wood and not any significant difference between aspen, fir and maple. As I said, coals don't mean much unless they put out significant heat to trip the fan. No fan, no heat except in front of the door.  :D Of course there is convective heat up the pipes, but not as significant as with a blower on. ;)

I've never have creosote. I let the stove control the air flow, has a damper. Wood is 12-16% MC. I brush once a month on the colder months, just because that is what we always do, even when we burnt just maple, beech and yellow birch. Part of running a stove. Being slack or complacent can get you into trouble.

[twar]

I grew up in the foothills of NC, and we cut and split mostly oak and hickory. Burning these logs would run you out of the house if you were a bit heavy-handed when filling the oven/fireplace. Then I moved to Montana to attend college. Missoula's winter was...a bit more winter-like. There were a lot of woodstoves, but no oak and hickory. Now I live in Norway--plenty of winter here too. We burn white birch, scots pine and even Norway spruce, and depending on where in the country you live, some oak, maple, chesnut, apple...

I've always been opportunistic with repect to firewood; I burn what's easily obtainable. In NC, with all the oak and hickory, when an ice storm brought down long lanky pines in the neighborhood, these too were cut up for firewood.

[peakbagger]

FYI Pine does not form creosote. Wet wood forms creosote. Pine burns faster than hardwood and if its in shoulder season folks will try to cut back on the stoves output by cranking down the air so they can get a longer burn instead of just burning a smaller load. 

[doc henderson]

I like the softer less dense wood for ornamental fires.  chiminea, fire pit, fireplace.  I took car trailer loads to my parents.  My Dad enjoyed getting up every hour and adding another stick of cottonwood to the fireplace.  At the end of the day, it would burn out in a few hours and no major coals to worry about.  It was light for him to handle as he got older and kept him from spending hours in a recliner.  I prefer medium density woods, like oak and mulberry here.  make good coals for fire start in am, and burn hot enough, but can be shut down after getting good and hot, and getting most remaining moisture out of the wood.  I like the idea of starting with fast starting less dense and moving to denser wood later and for overnight.  We have hedge, but i have used little.  many throw a chunk in at night so there are coals in am.  I agree with burning what you have access to and depending on how cold it is.  They have mostly softwood species in Alaska and that is how they keep from freezing to death.  Cottonwood is about 18 million BTUs per cord, oak and mulberry 25 million per cord, and hedge is 32 million.  so, 2 cords of cottonwood are over double the heat of 1 cord of hedge.

[Magicman]

Pine burns faster than hardwood and if its in shoulder season folks will try to cut back on the stoves output by cranking down the air so they can get a longer burn instead of just burning a smaller load.

peakbagger nailed it.  Loading the stove and then choking it down is the problem with any wood species.  Load it light and let it go. 

[gspren]

When I had my 2 farms and an OWB I burnt almost anything that died/fell down. I had all the normal east coast trees although very few pines, the only ones I let go to rot were the willows that grew along the pasture stream,very heavy when green and dried to very light, just wasn't worth it to me.

[doctorb]

From my old OWB days, I burned mostly oak and locust through the winter.  But I never turned down the softer woods.  The key, in my opinion, is to get them well seasoned, as SwampDonkey said.  

[Ianab]

only ones I let go to rot were the willows that grew along the pasture stream,very heavy when green and dried to very light, just wasn't worth it to me.

When it's green you are carrying home more water than wood. :D
It's not that it wont burn after it dries out, it's just a hassle handling all that heavy wet wood for so little dry firewood at the end. Like you say, not worth it when you have better options. 

[Ianab]

like the softer less dense wood for ornamental fires.  chiminea, fire pit, fireplace.  I took car trailer loads to my parents.  My Dad enjoyed getting up every hour and adding another stick of cottonwood to the fireplace.  At the end of the day, it would burn out in a few hours and no major coals to worry about.  It was light for him to handle as he got older and kept him from spending hours in a recliner.

That's more like heating with a woodstove here in NZ. It's in the lounge and you can keep an eye on it, feed it couple of pieces of wood as needed. You don't have to fill the box and then damper down the fire to make it last. Just add a couple of blocks every hour or so and let it burn clean. DRY Pine, especially if it has a bit of resin, burns with a hot cheerful flame.

[711ac]

OP, There's probably a species/BTU chart here somewhere, but just do a search.
Oak is nice but it takes 2+ years to almost dry. I have tons of beech and it's almost viewed as invasive around here but it's a touch higher on the BTU charts and 1 year drying is perfect for my boiler. Same should be with a wood stove. 🪵

[John Mc]

BTUs by species chart attached (published with permission of the original author

[SwampDonkey]

I never follow the BTU charts, simply because I thin my woods and it all makes heat. Those charts are mainly for firewood sellers and anyone holding on to the tradition of more heat per cord makes less work. My view is I have more thinning to do than I can possibly keep up on. ;D

[John Mc]

I've been doing some crop tree release on my own property. I have more potential firewood sources than I know what to do with. I sell or barter a couple of cords a year to friends, but have no desire to be in the firewood business. I also let a neighbor grab what he wants from among what I have already taken down.

I posted it because the OP asked about species and it's a quick way to get pointed in the right direction. I don't pay a lot of attention to the charts, since I already know which species in my area make prime firewood. I figure with so much to choose from, if I'm going to put the effort in to hauling it out, cutting, splitting, and stacking, I'm going to focus on the species that give me the most bang for the effort. I do bring in a bit of the lower BTU species for burning in the shoulder seasons when I just need a quick burn to take the chill off, but I mainly focus on the higher end stuff and those that are easy to access and process (That gnarly 24"+ Oak that is a pain in the butt to get to and on the high end of what I feel like wrestling with on my splitter might just stay in the forest to rot and provide wildlife habitat.) If wood were in short supply, I'd certainly spend more time on the less "premium" species.

In our firewood donation program, our shortage is most often in the volunteer labor to process the logs into firewood (or me getting around to organizing a work party to do it.) With that bottleneck, we've turned down offer of free long logs of Poplar (Low BTU content) or American Elm (medium BTUs, but a pain in the neck to split, even with a hydraulic splitter). IF someone has split wood of those species to donate, we'll certainly accept them, but if we are going to put our limited volunteers to work on some wood, why not have them focus on something that gives 60% more BTUs for the effort as compared to poplar?

[Magicman]

If it ain't Oak I don't bother to bring it out of the woods.

[newoodguy78]

Magicman how long do you let your oak dry before it gets burned?
I agree it's great firewood given it's cut and split for 2 years. With the volume we burn it makes it tough to get that far ahead.
Curious with all the heat you get if the dry time is less down your way?

[Magicman]

My normal is to buck and split a couple of years before burning.  After I get a bed of coals, I only add 1 or maybe 2 sticks of wood and close the air down to a slow burn.  I guess that I regulate the air to regulate the heat in the room.

The wood that I am now splitting and hauling home has been down a couple of years.  The sapwood is in bad shape but the heartwood is still heavy and contains a good bit of moisture.  It's for next year, but I had run short for this year so some may have to be added along with this year's dry wood.

The majority of the blowdowns on my property rot so I can be choosy and only get what is convenient and close to the roads.  I hate to see whole 30"+ Red Oak trees/logs lay but I have no means of recovering them and no use for it if I did.

[newoodguy78]

That's the same thing I see with oak up here. It will rot from the outside in before it dries unless cut and split. It actually seems to gets wetter the longer it is in log length.

[Magicman]

I agree because that rotten sapwood would be like a sponge.  Some of the smaller rounds that had virtually no heartwood were discarded because I could not see that they would have any heat value.  The heartwood was mighty heavy and wet so I split most of it down to 2-3" so it will dry quicker. 

I hope to get that trailer unloaded tomorrow so I can get back and maybe finish my firewood duties for this year but we have rain forecast for Saturday.

[SwampDonkey]

I remember an old white spruce log that was full of big knots. The owner cut it and used it to gate his road. I was doing some work for him and nothing to move it with except a Logrite peavey. And good thing it was down hill so I could roll it out of the way. That log had laid in the grass a couple years and was like a sponge sucking up water, way heavier than if you fresh cut the thing. It was close to 30" diameter in the middle.

[JD Guy]

The southern yellow pine that we have in the southeast isn't the pine that y'all in the NE, Midwest or West burn. I don't know of anyone who burns SYP in their wood stove or indoor fireplace. It's got way too much resin in it and burns with lots of smoke. Any pines that go down here at our place are left to rot or loaded up and put in a gully. The stump's however can be mined later for fat lighter . Some will burn SYP in their outdoor fire pit but it's still too nasty smelling for my taste!

Our primary species are red/white oak, some hickory, pecan and yes some sweet gum and poplar for start up or shoulder season. The occasional maple shows up too and we burn it. We have some beech that will need to come down so will see how it works out over the next couple years.

[Magicman]

Some of the reasons that I only burn Red Oak are;  White Oak and Ash makes/leaves too many ashes.  Hickory and Elm are difficult to split plus Hickory leaves ashes and Elm does not burn as hot.  Of the Red Oaks, I prefer Cherrybark over Water Oak but I will burn either.

Reckon that makes me a Red Oak snob.   :

[SwampDonkey]

I dump ashes here once a week with a galv pale. I saw no difference in ash from any wood here: maple, birch, aspen, fir, tamarack. Still dumped the weekly pale full

[Magicman]

If you burned only Red Oak, you would see a considerable difference.  Enough so that I shun other species.

[SwampDonkey]

Ashes aren't a deal breaker for me, I'm after the heat. Since there's no red oak of firewood size or bigger around here close enough or in quantity, it would be a rare thing to burn. I also burn 7 wheel barrel loads of wood a week, so there is a lot more ash in comparison to the volume you burn a week. If I was to burn one wheel barrel a week, I wouldn't clean ashes for 2 months.  ;D

I have tried to regenerate some red oak here and the wildlife either debarks it, chews it back from the top down or rips the limbs off it before it can get big enough to withstand the onslaught. :D

[KEC]

I don't spend much time worrying about how much ash I'll get from any particular kind of wood. Too many other things to consider. I regard ashes as a resource to scatter in the drip line of favored trees, or put on the garden or the lawn.

[Old Greenhorn]

I don't worry about ash either, it's a byproduct just like sawdust but not as heavy. ;D I don't care for wood that tends to leave unburned chunks, but I keep stirring that up with every new load and eventually it turns into ash. I empty the shop stove about every 10-15 days, and the house about once a month and let it sit in a steel pail for a few day on bare ground before I dump it on the compost/rot pile I've been using for 35 years. (Someday I might take something out of that pile. :D )
As for species, I pretty much burn it all in it's time. I don't have a woodlot, so I burn what I can get. The exception being pine, which I don't get much of, but will throw in some pieces now and then in a mixed load. Lousy wood either gets burned up quick in the shoulder seasons, or mixed in with good wood here and there. So I am the opposite of a snob.
I also don't go with the crowd on the 'red oak has to dry for at least 2 years'. I am burning some beautiful red oak that came down in the spring. It was split smallish (3-4" squares) and stacked in a dry spot. It dried nicely, gives good all night heat, and I can almost light it with a match. I do not care for the splinters though, they are fierce and hurt like the dickens.
I just finished heating my shop for 3 weeks straight with dried out pithy garbage ash and maple. 72° from nice dry ash is about the same as 72° from semi rotted pithy garbage. Yes, it's a bit more effort with all the junk that falls off it, but I back the trailer up to the side door of the shop and feed right off that to the stove 15' away. All the junk gets swept up and goes right in the stove.
I guess I am just a wood pig.

[ihookem]

I even burn hybrid popplar, only cause it's 50 yds. from the boiler. It's one step up from rolled up cardboard, but keeps the hardwood pile a bit bigger and is nice in a spring evening when it's still cold, but not to bad that I need to max the fire box. It might raise the house from 67 to 70, but it makes the floor warm from hydronic , keeps the floor warm till till the next day and heats the water too. My nat. gas  bill  was $18 and $17 the last 2 months . heck, just the fees are $12.

[B.C.C. Lapp]

Was written by the lady Congreve.  Id say she got it about right. 

Beechwood fires are bright and clear
If the logs are kept a year,
Chestnut's only good they say,
If for logs 'tis laid away.
Make a fire of Elder tree,
Death within your house will be;
But ash new or ash old,
Is fit for a queen with crown of gold

Birch and fir logs burn too fast
Blaze up bright and do not last,
it is by the Irish said
Hawthorn bakes the sweetest bread.
Elm wood burns like churchyard mould,
E'en the very flames are cold
But ash green or ash brown
Is fit for a queen with golden crown

Poplar gives a bitter smoke,
Fills your eyes and makes you choke,
Apple wood will scent your room
Pear wood smells like flowers in bloom
Oaken logs, if dry and old
keep away the winter's cold
But ash wet or ash dry
a king shall warm his slippers by.
 

[SwampDonkey]

Aspen and fir is the biggest part of the firewood pile here. Never froze yet. In fact I don't burn wood all day long, too hot. :D

[NewYankeeSawmill]

Around here most everyone who doesn't have a wood stove will tell you you can't burn anything other than oak or Hickory. It's infuriating how often this lecture is repeated. We did mostly burn oak and hickory growing up but back then it wasn't hard to come by cheaply. The oak was for when it wasn't very cold. We started working a little Hickory in during the freezing nights.

I save the pine for the fire pit, but put plenty of poplar up the chimney the passed several years. Property is loaded with it, price is right!