Best time to cut wood?

[turnkey4099]

Don't hesitate to ask any question here. Sure, you might collect a smart a** remark occasionally but we all had to start from nothing. I learned most of mine as a kid in logging country (I wasn't a logger) but have also learned a lot on this forum also.

Harry K

 

[Manco]

I don't do much in the summer when it is hot. I would rather do the work when it is cooler and let the stuff dry when it is hot.

Firewood keeps me warm while cutting, splitting and burning

 

[Manco]

I do lots of cutting in the summer. Thats when all the heat intolerant folk leave the good oak and hickory alone. I scoop up what I want then and dont have to fight for the good stuff as much during the winter.

We have people come by in the winter and pick up anything that resembles firewood and in the summer we can cut and stack nice hardwood and hardly anyone stops. Doesn't make sense.

 

[Manco]

No sweat, every area in the world has its on lingo.

If you come across the term blocking it is the same as bucking also.

We use the term "blocking" as in "blocking down a stub" Stub=spar
Blocking=cutting trunk of standing tree in pieces after all the limbs have been removed

 

[SawTroll]

If you cut trees in the middle of the summer with the leaves on them, dont buck them untill the leaves have died and fell off. This will suck most of the moisture out of the tree and when you split it it will be totaly seasoned in a very short period.

Agreed, for practical reasons this is what we usually do on our woodlot. But felling in late fall to early spring is better if you want to use the firewood next winter.

I think that whenever you fell the trees, it is best to leave them alone until leaves have died on them once!

 

[max2cam]

I can walk around my woods now and see piles of newly cut firewood and fresh milled lumber all ready to be hauled in before the bugs come out and it gets real hot and humid. Cut a mixture of ash, oak, and jackpine. It all burns....

 

[eric_271]

I cut a lot of osage orange and its not a wood you want to leave lay too long before cutting to length. Its a lot harder then oak and if you wait a year or two after you have cut the tree down you have wiated to long. After it has layed around that long even with a sharp chain late in the day you can see sparks coming off the chain. This stuff gets harder then a rock, best to get it done while its green. Fall tru spring is the only time to cut. I still sweat while cutting in the winter but It dont seem near as bad as sweating in the summer. Enough said.

 

[SawTroll]

Comment to my last post.....

Maybe I should have mentioned that the trees I am referring to is birch and some mountain ash, in an Arctic climate...............

 

[max2cam]

After it has layed around that long even with a sharp chain late in the day you can see sparks coming off the chain.

I have oftentimes seen sparks while cutting jackpine late in the day, but I have always assumed those sparks were coming from sand particles embedded in the bark. I don't see how saw-chain working on pure wood can make a spark. Hot yes. Smoking maybe with a really dull chain....

 

[Chris J.]

There are some good threads here that

discuss osage orange, it's hardness, & the pyrotechnic properties.

 

[David_T (MO)]

No sweat, every area in the world has its on lingo.

If you come across the term blocking it is the same as bucking also.

I've also heard of 'sectioning' and 'knocking a log apart'.

Here in SW MO I start cutting after the first hard freeze (usually late Oct.)and leave the woods when the ticks start moving again in March. I'm running late this year but almost have all of next winter's wood cut and stacked (a first for me in 20 years of primarily wood heating).

 

[eric_271]

I have oftentimes seen sparks while cutting jackpine late in the day, but I have always assumed those sparks were coming from sand particles embedded in the bark. I don't see how saw-chain working on pure wood can make a spark. Hot yes. Smoking maybe with a really dull chain....

Clean dry wood. Did I say as hard as a rock? At times it seems harder then that. You wont cut to much of it with a dull chain. I dont run a dull chain on any kind of wood. Its not just me that has seen the sparks. A lot of people that cut osage orange have noticed it. To burn it you have to have a completely sealed stove. At times while its burning it looks like a wild fire works display, thousands of sparks poping off the wood. I think the sparks you see while cutting it does have something to do with the make up of the wood.

 

[SawTroll]

I have oftentimes seen sparks while cutting jackpine late in the day, but I have always assumed those sparks were coming from sand particles embedded in the bark. I don't see how saw-chain working on pure wood can make a spark. Hot yes. Smoking maybe with a really dull chain....

I think you are right, but I am no expert.