Woodpile ethics-to do or not to do

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I'm stocking up on additional wood. Have just received fresh cut wood from the neighbors. Is it best to split wood green or aged dry? I use a gas powered log splitter. My wood pile has wood dust around the stored (one plus year)pieces. Is this termites? What do I do to get rid of the any bugs in the pile. Pile is inside the garage. Any art to stacking the pile? Thanks.

-- Jan Allan (Mudthumb@AOL.com), January 09, 2000

Answers

Jan, get that wood out of your garage and NOW! I can't tell you what of the many many sorts of bugs are in your wood. Maybe if I knew the type of wood and your general location I could make a guess. Generally dry wood is less vulnerable to bugs than wet wood. Then go back into your garage and clean and vacuum the area where the wood was stored. Hopefully, the bugs haven't migrated into the garage framing. But it depends on what kind of bug you've got. Termites tend to build mud tunnels to the wood they're in. There aren't really any home treatments for insect infestation, at least, treatments that will work on whatever you have at ALL stages of their life cycle. Covering the stack outside very tightly with plastic and letting the sun bake the daylights out of it will help some. Anything you sprinkle, spray, fumigate, etc, with, will still be there when you handle the wood and burn it inside your house. If you've got a wood splitter, go ahead and split the new wood now, if your splitter can handle it. The wood will dry faster and stack more neatly. But keep it outside. Also if you can, stack it off the ground, using metal or cement blocks or something to help seperate the wood from the ground and therefore, buggies.

Check the wood framing in your garage and check it carefully. Keep checking even if you don't find any damage at first. If you find that whatever was in your firewood has migrated into your garage, get professional help fast. Even faster if your garage is attached to your home. I don't know how much wood you burn at a time, but try bringing it in in small batches. If you can find a pail or something like that, carry your wood in inside it and leave the wood contained until put into the stove. On a brighter note, stacking wood is an art. It helps if you stack two rows back to back. This is different than stacking it two deep. Two rows back to back can be stacked to lean very slightly backwards and into the back of the other stack. It helps stabilize the piles. It also gets you walking around the pile a bit so you can give it a good look from different directions. This will help you spot anything going wrong with your piles. Try to fit the pieces together by looking for the perfect spot for the piece you've got in your hand while still working swiftly. Gerbil

-- Gerbil (ima_gerbil@hotmail.com), January 10, 2000.


I agree with what Gerbil has said entirely. We discovered bugs in our house's frame last year when we went to build a new addition. The exterminator surmised that they got in from the woodpile we kept in the basement for the wood furnace. Out went the wood immediately. We never keep it in the house now, but have it piled outside away from the house in stacks covered with waterproof tarp. It is a chore to go outside in the cold to get some when we want to burn wood, but better that than bugs eating away our 100 year old farm house. We only bring in enough at a time that will be burned almost immediately.

-- R (thor610@yahoo.com), January 10, 2000.

We split our wood by hand, green, when it is seasoned it is too hard to split. I keep many big rounds for night wood and we stack it on pallets, a long way from the house. I started in this fall with 11 cords, I stack it in measured cords and it is covered with Blue tarps all winter and open in the summer, one summer here and it is popcorn dry. I have an old 8'X 20' chicken coop, (3 sided)and that is filled, then as I need it, I stack it on a back porch every 2 weeks or so. Wood is our only heat, so keeping it dry is important bugs do not seem to be a problem. Our wood heater runs for 6-7 months without every shutting down.

-- Mudlover (redgate@echoweb.net), January 10, 2000.

I worked in pest control for a bit...saw a bathroom where the wall behind a few centimeters of formica panel was gone in a bathroom....

In Texas I ran a small horseranch...We had a BIG problems with fire ants...they would eat the horses alive if kept in the stalls in warm weather. They also would eat ME alive at night...they would swarm my bed. I finally put the bedposts in cans of oil...that solved the prob unless a sheet or something fell on floor and gave them access to me. Some sort of frame set up with coffe cans of oil might help for ternites since most are subterrain...they build their tunnels of mud up the side of the can but-fortunatly they can't build across the oil.

They are also dependant on having a water supply. So the oil and an occaisional check to bust the tunnels might help.

Just my thoughts...kinda fun to watch them spark in the fireplace tho. ;)

-- Satanta (satanta@zdnetmail.com), January 11, 2000.


Don't panic yet! Where are you? And what are your wintertime temps? How cold does your garage get? We are in Maine, and our temps usually bottom out at about 20 to 25 below. I stack and cure my firewood outside in the summer to let it dry. Best to keep it off the ground with some sort of sacrificial platform, which will rot eventually. In the fall, after first cold (40 degrees?) weather, I bring a large, maybe month's supply, pile into our unheated garage. The powder may be powder post beetle. Or it may be some other critter. However I have found they are all pretty dormant in the freezing garage, and have never had any damage. Now come spring, clean out the garage! Warm wx makes the little munchers a lot more active! Stacking the pile? If it's against a wall - just put the gravity toward the wall. If freestanding, alternate fat and thin ends to get a balance. If it falls down, pick it up! But always maintain a sense of humor! Sour people live in cities!

-- Brad Traver (homefixer@mix-net.net), January 19, 2000.


Hi Brad, Thanks for your reply. I'm located (believe it or not) in the wild hills of the SF Bay area...never freezes. My garage is cement floor and one wall (where wood is stacked) is cinderblock. Rest of wood is outside. I'm still not sure if better to split if green or dry. I know I don't have termites--had it checked out but sure don't like the spiders. Wood in garage will last one season.

-- Jan Allan (Mudthumb@AOL.com), January 25, 2000.

Jan, most wood splits easier when it's green. Madrone seems to split easiest when it's green, not too hard when it's really dry, but hardest when it's halfway in between.

It ALWAYS dries faster when it's split.

Were you being facetious about the "wild hills" of the SF Bay area? I didn't know there were any wild areas left.

I used to live in Sebastopol and Santa Rosa. Weren't wild then, less so now. What part of the bay area are you in?? (if you don't mind my asking)

-- jumpoff joe (jumpoff@echoweb.net), January 25, 2000.


Yes,all the bay area is edged in wild forests/land because most of the hill areas are bordered by regional or county parks...Berkeley has Tilden, Oakland has Redwood Regional, San Mateo and all of the peninusla has hill area open land so does Marin County. I have deer, racoons, skunks, oposom, etc. The wood I salvage from the neighborhood is acacia, pine, laurel/bay, native oak,cedar/cyrus, eucalyptus and redwood. Our storms down these trees frequently and so do the builders, so I have them all delivered including all the chipped material for mulch (after 6 months to compost) Thanks for inquiring. Yesterday I found a man that will split by hand. Wow, from the city no less.

-- Jan Allan (Mudthumb@AOL.com), January 26, 2000.

I am a first year wood burner and just split my first tree a month after it was cut. It split easily by hand.

Then I bought a truck load of cut wood seasoned for 1 full year. There were 8 pieces that needed to be split out of this truck load. It was hard as nails. In fact, after resawing 2 of the 8" round logs down to short 10" lengths, I still cannot split them!

It seems to 10 times harder to split wood than is dry and seasoned.

Mark

-- Mark Chapman (mchapman@planetkc.com), December 12, 2001.


Mark it may depend on the type of wood also .Dry wood is usually easier to split.Pine will be easier than oak.

-- Patty {NY State} (fodfarms@hotmail.com), December 12, 2001.


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