Firewood is a great way to heat your home, but if you do choose this source of heat, realize that you are going to have to take charge a little if you want to have a steady supply of dry wood. Most people wait until the last minute and start looking for dry wood in the late summer or fall. But my more experienced customers know not to follow the masses. Instead, they buy their wood in the spring or early summer when others aren’t.

They do this because they know it will then have plenty of time to dry before winter. So it doesn’t matter if I bring them wet or green wood. They actually usually prefer to buy it green because green wood costs less, and it is usually cleaner, with fewer bugs, mold and fungus. And since fewer people are buying early in the year, you can get it when supplies are more available and when the weather is favorable in the woods for cutters to be producing wood.

If  you want dry wood, spring or early summer is the best time to buy. Or if you buy it later in the year, it should not be for the coming winter, but for the following winter so it will have a full year to dry. It is great to give wood a full year, but if you get it after winter it can dry during the summer and won’t have to sit out in the damp all winter and mold and attract bugs and debris to later bring into your home.

Either way is good, as long as you are giving it at least a full summer to dry and have a good place to dry it. Otherwise you are taking a big gamble expecting firewood dealers to bring you dry wood at the last minute.

Buy firewood in Humboldt County

Why it is So Hard To Find Reliable Dry Firewood For Sale

I sold out of dry wood early in the summer last year, so I didn’t have dry wood available for those who usually buy it before winter. I just didn’t cut as much wood early in the year to dry last year, since I had other business to tend to. This is the nature of the firewood business. Supplies of dry wood will not always be reliable.

Firewood is not usually a mass produced commodity. It is not like electricity or natural gas,  it does not have nation wide and even worldwide well established distribution systems that make it always available on demand. Firewood is a product that is usually produced by local small operations, sometimes one person doing it just because they are out of work or to make extra money. It is a tough business to be in and most suppliers will come and go. You may find a reliable source for a while, but they probably won’t last forever.

In order to bring you dry wood, a wood cutter will have to cut large amounts of wood months ahead of time, and then wait for it to dry before it can be sold, and before they can make a dime on it. Most cutters are more interested in paying the bills now and aren’t going to cut and split that much wood knowing they won’t be paid for many months. And huge piles of wood in a wood yard don’t dry nearly as fast as a small amount stacked at your home will. It is hard to get good air circulation in a big pile of wood to dry it.

Firewood is sold in full cords, face cords, ricks and other measurements. The difference in the amount of wood in a face cord or rick can be very different than a full cord of wood.

A cord, sometimes misspelled “chord” is 128 cubic feet. This comes from the common firewood dimension of 4′x4′x8′. A cord of wood is the amount of wood that can be tightly stacked in those dimensions. Wood that is randomly piled  has more air space between pieces and would need to be closer to 180-190 cubic feet to make a full cord.

A face cord or rick is not always a reliable measurement since it is not an actual volume of wood. Face cords and ricks are different things depending on who you talk to, but in most cases they refer to a single row of stacked wood that is 8 feet long and 4 feet high. The problem with this measurement is the amount of wood you get will depend on the length of the firewood pieces. The longer the pieces, the more wood there will be in a rick or cord of wood. When buying wood in these measurements make sure the seller specifies the length of the pieces.

Face cord or rick with 12″ pieces = 1/4 cord

Face cord or rick with 16″ pieces = 1/3 cord

Face cord or rick with 24″ pieces = 1/2 cord

If you are buying firewood, knowing how to measure firewood can help you make sure you get the full amount you order. To measure a stack of wood simply measure the length, height and width of the stack and multiply those numbers together. Then divide that number by 128. That will tell you how many cords or fraction of a cord you have.

If the wood is in a heaping pile that will make it a little more difficult. You may have to do some estimating on the dimensions. To to get a full cord this way it should be closer to 180 cubic feet instead of 128.

When someone brings you firewood, don’t be afraid to measure the load before they unload it. An honest firewood dealer should be happy to let you measure the load. If they object or even act offended, think twice about buying from them. If what they bring is not what you ordered you don’t have to buy the wood. Just make sure you decide this before they unload it.

Learn in more detail about how to measure firewood and examples of common cord of wood dimensions.

Many firewood dealers advertise seasoned wood and sometimes you can get lucky and what they deliver will be dry. But it’s all too common that what is delivered will be other than dry. Not all wood cutters are trying to rip you off when they bring you wood that is not fully seasoned. Many of them may not know that it is still wet. Many wood cutters are just someone with access to some wood, a pickup and a chainsaw. They may not even burn wood themselves or know much about burning wood. They are just someone who has found a way to make a buck and are in no way firewood burning savvy.

Depending on some of these guys to bring you dry wood right before it is time to burn, can be a big gamble. I hear tons of stories from customers about how they had a hard time all winter trying to burn wet wood that someone told them was dry. This is a very common problem with firewood dealers and will not likely go away any time soon. And sometimes, like in my case this year, I just don’t have dry firewood available to sell.

How to Have Seasoned Firewood Every Year

There is a simple solution to this problem that many of my customers have learned. They have learned how to get seasoned firewood every year regardless of what a wood cutter brings them. Many actually prefer to buy green firewood since it often makes better quality wood and usually costs less to buy. Green firewood is usually cleaner, has less decay, insects, mold and other types of fungus.

The key they have discovered is to buy it a year ahead of the time when they plan to burn it. Now in the fall or earlier in the summer they buy green wood when everyone else is trying to find dry wood. They are not buying it for this winter, but for the following winter. This way it has a full year to season and dry.

You may be having a hard time finding dry wood for this winter, but you can ensure you will not have that problem next year if you buy green wood this fall. That may not help you out this year but once you get in the habit of buying your firewood a year in advance, you will no longer have to worry about whether or not your winter supply of firewood will be dry or not.

Buy Green Humboldt County Firewood

When delivering firewood, I often hear a lot of stories from customers about their experiences with firewood dealers, many of them are not good. A firewood business is something that anyone with a strong back, a pickup and a chainsaw can get into. But a lot of intelligence is not always required. So sometimes firewood dealers are not always the most business savvy people. This is of course not all of them. There are many reputable firewood businesses that have had happy customers for many years or decades.

One of the best ways to make sure you get a full cord of wood is to know what the dimensions of a cord of wood is before it gets unloaded at your home. Don’t be afraid to ask the dealer what the dimensions of their delivery vehicle is before they deliver. Also let them know that you will be measuring the load before it is unloaded at your home. If they will not give you those measurements and do not allow you to measure the wood, you may be better to find a different dealer.

Measuring a cord of wood is easy, but most people are just unaware of what a cord is or how to measure it. And many might be afraid of offending the dealer by questioning their product. But there is no need to worry about that. Most reasonable dealers will likely just see you as being a savvy consumer and will be more likely to bring you a full cord of wood if they know you will be measuring it.

Most consumers will take the wood once it is delivered no matter what. But it is ok to inspect the wood before it is unloaded and decide if you want it or not. If the load of wood does not measure up to a full cord or is otherwise not acceptable, you are not obligated to buy it. Just make sure you make the decision before it is unloaded.

Learn about firewood measurements and cord of wood dimensions. Knowing how to measure firewood can help to make sure you get a full cord and know when to reject a load of wood if it is not the full amount.

This guy uses a jointer and a bandsaw but there are other cutting tools you could use to cut a piece of firewood into lumber. After you have some flat edges a table saw would probably work well to rip it into boards.

With any of this be very careful. Working with these irregular shaped pieces can be dangerous with power cutting tools so I suggest you not try this if you are not experienced and qualified. Actually I should take my liability disclaimer a step further and say don’t ever do this, ever, it’s too dangerous.

At a young age he taught me to always have a road flare in my backpack when going out in the wild like that. A road flare lights like a match and will burn with a hot flame for a long time. Once it is lit you can start putting dead branches or other dead wood into and around the flame. With a 15 minute flare even if the wood is soaked there is enough time for the hot flames to dry the wood and get it to burn.

If you don’t have dead wood available live wood can work too. It is more difficult to get green wood to burn but if you start putting small twigs in and around the hot flame from the flare they will eventually burn. Leaving the leaves and needles on the twigs can help since they dry out and ignite faster. It is much more difficult with green wood so always go for the dead wood if available.

Keep plenty of wood accumulated around the flame from the flare to make a hot core of burning wood as soon as possible and that will be hot enough to support the fire after the flare goes out. Place the wood so it holds in heat but can still get good air circulation to supply the fire with plenty oxygen. The tee pee shape can work good for this. Once you get a good hot core of burning wood with a bed of coals you can throw just about any kind of wood on it and it will burn.

It have heard stories of people going out in the snow and kids going on family outings and a kid or even an adult gets separated and lost and freezes to death. If they had a flare and were taught how to use it, it may have saved their lives.

Any time I am out in the wild in cold weather I always have at least one flare in my pack or at least in my vehicle if I know I am not going far away from it. It is a good habit to get into and something that is good to teach your kids. A road flare is very inexpensive and having one on hand may save your life.

To split firewood with a handsaw, make a cross cut in the middle of the log about half way through. Then hit the cut area of the log against a hard surface like a tree, rock,stump, log etc. The cut spot makes a weak spot where the log will split down the middle since it is easier for the log to split than break across the grain.

In the video he explains that if you are in a survival situation and you are tired, dehydrated or otherwise not performing at your best, an ax is especially dangerous and difficult to use. In a situation where you were injured and unable to swing an ax, the saw technique would probably be easier if you needed to split your firewood into kindling to get a fire stated.

With the old style splitting mauls there was a fairly consistent narrow taper from the tip back. Much wider than an ax of course, but still relatively narrow. But with the new mauls, the tip has a very blunt angle right at the tip. Then back a half inch or so, it goes to the more normal narrow taper. If anything, this is the exact opposite of how a maul should be made if you want it to split wood. With this blunt angle, trying to split wood with the new mauls is only a little better than hitting the wood with blunt sledge.

If you have any old splitting mauls that are actually good for splitting wood, you might want to save the heads when the handles wear out. You will probably be better off replacing the handle instead of buying a new maul. Or if you don’t have a good maul, you may be able to shape the new maul into a usable shape if you have a good grinder and plenty of patience. But this will require removing a lot of metal.

To the splitting maul manufacturers, please start building splitting mauls that are actually good for splitting firewood.

There are many firewood suppliers that bring logs into the area and let the logs season for a while and then cut them up into firewood. The problem is whole logs don’t dry out very well especially in a cool foggy climate. Whole logs can hold a lot of moisture inside for a very long time. It’s not until they are cut up into firewood size pieces that the moisture in them will easily evaporate. In order for the wood to truly be dry it needs to be first cut and split and then let it season.

Before you decide to buy seasoned firewood from someone make sure it has been seasoned after it was cut into firewood and not seasoned as whole logs. If not your firewood may produce more steam than heat.