Grandpa was never one of my favorite people. He wasn’t a bad person, just that I thought he could be more like the grandfathers in the books I was reading.
Born in November, 1893, in north-central Minnesota, a World War One veteran and farmer, he moved to his last residence in 1952. So he’d grown up in a rough and tumble era, had a rough life and died owning his home, his truck, and a full baker’s dozen children had been born to him and Grandma- who I did like a lot more. Probably because she made bread daily, filled the house with its wonderful aroma. Of course, she had work for us kids, too.
It was with his background that he taught us boys a few things. When working now, at home or on the job, I often think of those lessons learned, albeit unwillingly learned at the time. Too, quite often I find myself in conversation with Grandpa as I go about the chores.
Splitting wood just a few days ago, I heard his voice clearly scolding me. “That should have been done last winter, not this spring.”
“ Right, Grandpa,” I replied. He was right, of course.
Firewood is best gathered in the deep of winter- for many reasons. First, but not most important, is that there’s no plowing or gardening to do in Minnesota in January. Second, in the deep of winter, there is little sap in the wood- it’s all in the roots waiting next spring, so it dries faster/more easily. It also cuts and splits more easily. Too, getting wood is hard, hot, sweaty work. Doing it in winter cuts back on the sweat factor by ten or more.
“ That’s not very good wood,” he told me.
No, it isn’t: I was splitting Jack pine. Stump dead, it was weathered and beginning to rot around the edges. But it makes a very good wood for autumn days when it isn’t really cold, or in the spring for the same reason. In the dead of winter, preferable woods are oak, ash, birch, and maple, in that order. These all burn with good heat, not so hot as to risk burning out a good/new/quality stove. Birch and maple are sappy woods, create quite a creosote problem if they’re not fully dried. Let them hang a couple years and they burn clean, don’t clog the chimney much at all. Oak and ash burn well, cleanly and hot. (Ash has a urine smell when it burns, however, so don’t get the smoke indoors.) Lesser woods to burn are tamarack/larch: this wood is excellent for heat, burns hotter than oak and ash, even. Which is its problem: burning too much tamarack will burn out your stove, or through it if it isn’t well-built. Poplar is a soft-hardwood, burns well with medium heat output and, as a tree species, grows quickly, dies almost as quickly. Its biggest drawback is that it’s really hard to stack due to the slippery bark. Jack pine, white pine and sometimes Norway are used as firewood- though anything will work in a pinch- soft pines, they contain some heat but not really enough for cold-cold winters. Other pines- spruce and balsam are worthless for home heat.
Grandpa’s voice cut into my thinking as I sliced a two inch thick piece of branch so I had to tell him, “It’s for kindling, Grandpa. Besides, this splitter makes it so easy I just enjoy it.” Grandpa would have a fit if he caught us kids splitting pieces smaller than six inches so we learned quickly to use our hand span. Still, around here, everything gets split once at least, and I cut down to two inch size branches. It dries better and has fewer bugs remaining active under the bark. And just because it’s so easy with the 20 ton hydraulic splitter. Ten inches or more is split into thirds or quartered.
But that isn’t the only reason. My stove is kind of small, takes a twenty inch piece of wood if it’s stuffed in and the door slammed. To compensate, the wood is cut to 16 inches, appropriately, the length of my chainsaw bar.
To keep mess out of the yard, the wood is bucked up in the woods and tossed into the pickup, hauled home and split as it’s taken from the truck. I find this to be the best/easiest method for a one-person operation. If a load is delivered by any local logger, he stacks it about ten feet from the cordwood pile, leaving enough room to get the splitter between the stack and pile. (Life is more simple when you have a plan. Besides, I’m lazy and usually the best way to do something is the easiest.) Any mess made from splitting is cleaned, thrown into the pickup and hauled back to the cutting area and dumped before the next load goes in. Follow the KISS principle.
Stacking is how I know how much wood I actually have and can monitor the usage. One cord is a pile four feet wide by four feet high by eight feet long. My stacks are head high- six feet- and twenty feet long. About one cord per row, in other words. In a mild winter, using the stove only during the hours at home, five cords will last a year. In severe winters with lots of wind, eight cords will do a season. (My furnace is in the house with two fire extinguishers near “just in case” and I use the propane furnace to maintain sixty degrees when not at home.)
Grandpa said to stack the wood bark down. His logic: if the wood is tarp-covered, the escaping moisture acts like a sauna or kiln and provides better ‘heat’ to dry the wood faster. One of my neighbors says to stack it bark up to shed the rain. Personally, I don’t think it matters a whole bunch. Getting the wood supply large enough for two years, always burning the oldest first of course, and the wood will have ample time to dry. And birch and maple really need the two drying seasons. So will poplar/aspen if it’s spring or summer cut. As to having two years’ supply on hand, three is a more comfortable margin, though it takes up a lot of yard space.
Of course, most of this thought is considering a total system breakdown where wood is going to be the only really consumer-gathered heat source. For the most part, this is what I expect in my ‘imaginings’, though something less harsh will probably be the case. Either way, wood is the heat source that warms three times for one season and the most practical heat in any situation.
“ You make a good stack, Jim,” I heard Grandpa say. “Now clean up that splitter and go have a cup of coffee.” I did as told- cleaned up the tools and went for coffee, my injured back happy to.
Garnered through years of work in the woods and as a carpenter who helped with log homes, my tools are the simple and effective tools of a logger. The half- ton four wheel drive pickup; two 25 foot lengths of ‘skidding’ chain; two chainsaws- newer Husqvarna and old Poulan with two chains each and toolbox with assorted tools; a Pickeroon [a.k.a. “Peavey” or “Cant Hook”] for moving and/or lifting a trunk to slip the skid chain around, sometimes for pulling pieces forward in the truck box; and the new 20-ton Honda powered splitter that replaced the six pound maul and home-built hydraulic splitter–the latter now owned by my neighbor. A pair of leather work gloves and chaps conclude the tool list. As for the chaps- everyone should wear them, or an equivalent pair of Kevlar jeans, but I find most often I go without. “With familiarity comes…” is fair warning. Steel toed logger boots are my standard footwear and they’ve paid for themselves many times just in bruises alone and a great investment. Except in winter when the steel toe attracts cold. A wonderful invention these days is the [Stihl brand] helmet with [integral] ear muffs and face shield. Definitely worth the investment for hearing alone. Even wearing glasses, the shield will keep large chips away from eyeballs, though I have had a flier or two get behind the shield and into my eye, it doesn’t happen often- usually when the wind is ‘right’.
Coffee cup in hand, I gaze at the wood pile and feel a touch of satisfaction in knowing I’ll be warm this winter, and stronger and healthier for doing my own gathering. All in all, a good day, Grandpa- thanks for the help. Now if I only had Grandma’s green thumb. – JSW