Do you have a wood-burning fireplace? I just love the crackle sound of a fire in the fireplace–and I love the dry heat that pours off them. Here in Washington, it feels wet most of the time, so a nice dry heat on a cold day is awesome.
Yesterday we had a cord of wood delivered so I thought I would share some tips about how to store and dry firewood that I’ve learned over the years.
If you are new to firewood storage, there are a couple of things to keep in mind.
First, drying the wood. Dry wood burns cleaner and more efficiently. Green/wet wood puts off a lot of smoke and not as much heat–so the extra step to make sure your firewood is dry is totally worth it.
The easiest way to dry firewood is to split it and then leave it in a sunny dry spot to dry completely. Split wood allows more surface area to get air and dries the wood faster. Resist the urge to cover your wood {unless there’s rain, of course}. More air means faster drying time.
Once your wood is completely dry, you’ll need to stack and cover it. Move it to a shed, garage, or cover it with a tarp. If you go the tarp route, you’ll want to anchor it down with something to keep the moisture out. To stack the wood, it is best to get it up off the ground, if possible. A firewood rack is ideal, you can buy it or make it out of 2×4’s. The goal is to give the wood good air circulation. After that, stacking is simple–take a little extra time to make sure the wood is stacked well, and retrieving it will be a lot easier.
That’s it. A little work up front and you’ll be sitting in front of a roaring fire in no time.
How do you dry and stack your wood?
~Mavis
Cecily says
We stack our wood twice. After its cut we stack it in a single log rows about three feet high and thirty feet long bracing with poles every six feet. This allows the wood to dry faster and more completely than if it was left in a pile. After 4-6 months we move the wood to our woodshed and re stack it. Our woodshed holds ten cords of wood so it is a lot of stacking, but drying the wood completely keeps it free of mold and fungi and makes for a good even heat.
Chris C. says
We stack our firewood on pallets we get for free from the local hardware store — nothing fancy needed! Those racks don’t give us enough space. Since we live in Maine and heat primarily with wood, we go through a lot of wood every year!
Shannon says
Like Chris, we scavenge for pallets.
Mavis Butterfield says
That is a great idea Chris!
Pat H. says
Help! Next year I want to have a raised garden bed but my neighborhood is infested with rabbits. Any tips to help me protect the precious vegetables from them? Any and almost all welcome!
Pat
Bubba says
Shoot ’em in the head with a pellet gun, clean ’em up & cook ’em over your wood burning stove. Tastes just like chicken, no foolin…. ; D
Diane says
Also, store your stacked wood away from the outside walls of your home, so insects that love to build apartments in the pile of wood don’t decide that your siding is an even more desirable address (or, better yet, INDOORS).
sally rawlings says
I lived in Alaska for 23 years..on Bristol Bay I tried to heat soley with wood as heating fuel was very expensive , trees dont get real big and wood takes at least 2 years to dry out for the burn.. learned the hard way… its very knot filled and hard to split ( had a power splitter) some would just about explode when split but most was small enough to not need splitting.I converted a coat closet indoors for wood storage and used the rack you show out side in a protected area.Now in Australia we dont really need a heating source in the winter . Sally
Stacey says
My husband is Pallet-Man. He gathers pallets around our nearest town (forty miles away) that businesses no longer want, and pulls them apart for firewood. It gives us a quick-starting fire that gives us a good bed of coals to add juniper logs to if we need to. He stacks all the cut-up wood on – yup – recycled pallets. We have 2-3 years’ worth of wood stacked on pallets behind and around our storage shed.
Noah says
You should dry your wood as a safety reason. Wet wood produces more smoke and as that smoke goes up the chimney and cools it builds up on the inside of your chimney, this is called creosote. If enough builds up you can have a chimney fire that has good potential of starting the rest of your house on fire. If you do burn wet wood you better check your chimney often and clean it out to prevent this build up.
Mavis says
Noah, thanks for the tip. That’s a great reminder for everyone!
Dale says
When stacking wood for drying or storage it is best to stack it bark down. this will help keep the wood from going punky on you.