Red Cedar

[JasonA]

Hello to all.  I am curious on the best method to dry freshly cut cedar.  I have a small tree farm of eastern red cedar and I am slowly harvesting it for wood projects.  I also have a dozen black walnut tree's as well.  Would the drying method be the same for both?  I appreciate any advice or tips

[moodnacreek]

If you follow good instructions for air drying the cedar will do fine and even the walnut. A breezy, southern exposer under a roof, a year per inch of thickness. Then the walnut should be stickered in a dry slightly heated building before being used for indoor projects

[JasonA]

Awesome. Thank you for your response. I have them cut in 9ft logs. I measured yhem using the Doyle scale. The diameters vary 34 inches on biggest side and 25 inches on smallest side. I am going to make a small mill using my chain saw..  All of the cores are solid and heavy. I was also wondering if I wanted to keep them half way fresh for someone could I water them daily to help slow the drying process. Or just stack them in a dark area and let them be. 

[YellowHammer]

The best approach for both walnut and cedar is to saw it, sticker it, stack the piles, on pallets, as high as you can stack, and then put some heavy weights on it, maybe 3,000 lbs for a 4x8 pallet.  Put them in a well ventilated area, don't block the sides, it doesn't have to be dark, it just needs to be protected from direct sunlight and rain.  Then forget about it for awhile.

Don't saw through the pith, or you can surely expect it to crack, no matter what you do.    

If you mill the walnut thicker than 2.5" thick expect some cracking.  Cedar can go a little thicker but not much more.

Go buy a $30 moisture meter from Lowes or Home Depot, and it will be good enough for you to have an idea of what the wood is doing, as it gets lower in moisture content.  

[moodnacreek]

    There are places in our wonderful country that have e.r.c. , enough to run a sawmill on it. Kentucky and Indiana come to mind.

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

Open grown trees, along fence rows, might have too many knots, but often will have good diameters for a sawmill designed for smaller diameter, short logs.  Forest grown trees might be better with fewer knots.  Oftentimes, the sapwood, or much of it, is not desired in lumber, so larger diameters will be better, but are hard to find.

Specifically for your an answer to your question, contact the state forestry offices from Virginia to Missouri and the adjacent states of these states.  They will know volumes, sizes, availability, and so on.

Did you ever wonder why these trees grown along fences?  The birds eat the berries and in about 12 minutes poop out the seed, which will now, due to etching from the bird's digestive system, germinated more than three times better or more often than the non-pooped seed.  After a tasty feast on berries, birds like to sit on a fence, maybe to rest or digest, for over 12 minutes, etc.  The tree itself creates dense shade and also makes the soil alkaline with reduced nitrogen, all which controls weeds.  Incidentally, the moth repelling properties are open for discussion.