Thread: Where'd my wood go?

Last winter my step father had about 2 cords taken from his property. They even knocked over about another chord. He thinks he knows who did it. If it is the person that he thinks it is he would gladly have given him the wood since he was recently unemployed and bad off finacially. My stepdad doesn't use the wood to heat his house just his beach house that he has a wood burner in.

I was also pissed about that because I helped cut, load, split and stack that wood.

The thing we were both pissed at was that some one stole it. I hate theives and think that they are the lowest rung of society.

I've had wood taken from me without permission. That stopped after I installed cameras on the piles and had them motion activated to start recording. When it started recording the t.v. turned on. Many times it would just be an animal but once it wasn't. Could see someone loading up a truck. Well, I did learn one thing when a gun gets loaded right behind you, you tend to listen.....

Originally Posted by Boogieman142

I did learn one thing when a gun gets loaded right behind you, you tend to listen.....

Sure does!!

When i was working at a job site their was a massive stump hole, guy decides he doesn't want to pay me for taking down a few extra trees. I told him he had 2 day's to pay me or he will be 40 feet underground rotting with 500 stumps.
I got my money an hour later.

Its going to get worse before it gets better....

A "City slicker" wouldn't life a finger to help themselves; the people that would actually do manual labor to steal something (spent my life watching and studying people's habbits/traits)
are type "A" going on a camping trip and took the ad-hoc opportunity.

A fella up the road had an entire log truck load stolen the day before it was to go to Hampton.

When my customers pick up their wood, I issue a detailed proof of purchase slip so they can't be questioned/mixed up with a thief.

Sorry for your loss my friend.

We used to have wood stolen on a regular basis but it han't happened since the neighbor behind us moved away.........

Shari

This would burn me as well. People just are clueless on the amount of work and time that's put into what we do. I was looking at our piles the other night and even made a comment to my wife that it looks like someone has taken some pieces, but she reminded me that we just don't have as much wood as I'd like to believe we have! (I still think some is missing ).

I feel your pain, i really do.
Last year I had a few ricks take off while I was out delivering wood.There is no doubt that it was my neighbor, never had any trouble until last year when he started burning wood, and he is a lazy son of a gun.
This spring I discovered that not only did somebody take off with my wood, but he helped himself to my metal fence post pounder,my sledge hammer, and splitting maul.
Why he wanted them I have no idea, its not like he works any!
If he comes back this winter, he is going to be on video!

It's amazing how brazen some thieves can be. I had some stolen right out of my trailer while I was at my doctor's office (maybe 20 minutes).

Originally Posted by Dalmatian90

Worked a couple seasons for the state parks back in college.

Few times each summer you'd find garbage bags dumped along a dirt road -- and we weren't exactly a remote park.

Put on the rubber gloves, go through the trash, find old bills...

"Here's your garbage back. And your court date."

Excellent!

Tell someone at work you were going away? The wife?

Originally Posted by matt9923

That sucks. Iv had wood stolen. Iv had trash dumped iv had trees taken down while i was away.

What really got me was someone cutting 80+ year old oaks on my property! I wish i caught them, they would have walked home in pain and id keep their truck and saws.
Someone dumped a bunch of oil cans near my brook once. Whats wrong with these people.
They steal wood from my pile and leave it uncovered? Common now i have 12" of snow to clear off.

What part of CT are you in?

Originally Posted by avalancher

I feel your pain, i really do.
Last year I had a few ricks take off while I was out delivering wood.There is no doubt that it was my neighbor, never had any trouble until last year when he started burning wood, and he is a lazy son of a gun.
This spring I discovered that not only did somebody take off with my wood, but he helped himself to my metal fence post pounder,my sledge hammer, and splitting maul.
Why he wanted them I have no idea, its not like he works any!
If he comes back this winter, he is going to be on video!

LOL....I LOVEEEEEEEE your wood pile nightwatchman.....funnnnnyyyy

I feel your pain. Decades ago I was in college and cutting firewood in the winter on the snow and simply dropping, blocking and tossing the blocks into piles that would be fetched in the spring when I was out of school and it was dry. I put in 3 solid weeks of 10 hour days and I had thinned a good ~4 acres on the contract I was cutting.

Imagine my horror when I came home from college at spring break to find nearly all the wood GONE! Probably close to 75 face cords stolen. Knowing the wood was over 1/4 mile from the nearest road and it was behind a solid steel gate I figured the camp counselor/forester in charge of the land must know something. When I went to talk to him he seemed really cagey and would not look me in the eye all the while denying any knowledge of where my wood went. Subsequent checking of the area showed that the wood had to have been taken out through the gate area when it was open because no other tracks were found leaving the area.

I decided I had had enough of working on their land even though the previous forester was a great guy to work with and so I got another contract to cut on closer to home. He would not give my money back and even insisted I continued the remainder of the 12 acre thinning. He even had his brother the lawyer threaten me. He had marked about a 100 acre logging contract on the land he was in charge of and somebody, I have no idea who, went in and marked a lot of trees that he didn't with the same color mark that he had used. I heard it took him about 3 weeks to go and retally the trees and remark the ones he wanted to take down, and cover up the marks on the trees he wanted left behind. His veneer log mark was also too easy to change into a normal lumber log mark.

In the photo I posted of my brother's operation his wood can be seen stacked right about 15-20' off the road. It is real tempting for thieves to see 4-500 cords of wood like that so close to the road. Fortunately crooks that steel his wood are idiots and they always back up to the piles. We found out long ago that ~2' diameter holes ~12" deep in the bottom of the ditch and covered with leaves and grass make great truck traps. Back a wheel into those and they do not get out. He has caught a few clowns trying to steal wood that way.

His biggest problem is kids trying to pilfer a few sticks for a campfire. If the kids would just ask he would give them plenty of log butts and small slivers from the processor. Nearly every log leaves a small chunk because every stick of firewood is exactly 16" long. Any log that is not a perfect multiple of 16" in length will leave a butt. If they would ask he would give them some. He also has geese for the last 10+ years and nothing, I mean nothing happens anywhere on his property without those geese letting him know. Dogs could take lessons from the geese.

Originally Posted by avalancher

I feel your pain, i really do.
Last year I had a few ricks take off while I was out delivering wood.There is no doubt that it was my neighbor, never had any trouble until last year when he started burning wood, and he is a lazy son of a gun.
This spring I discovered that not only did somebody take off with my wood, but he helped himself to my metal fence post pounder,my sledge hammer, and splitting maul.
Why he wanted them I have no idea, its not like he works any!
If he comes back this winter, he is going to be on video!

When hes not home go snoop around and se if you see your stuff.
Then go and punch him in the mouth.

Last summer about this time had a real problem with theft, not only wood but anything else that was not nailed down also. Put a cam system in, one that can record images without infrared at night, got them on the system a couple weeks later and turned them into the police. So far this year I have not had any shrinkage. I have this seasons stacks in a locked chain-link compound, fresh split stuff is outside of that. Just finishing a load of elm and twisted/bent the splitter beam(10yr old HF 30 ton) all out of wack on a crotch piece. Now it is rebuild time.