Heating with wood burners/fire places only?

[TwoCrows]

We heat exclusively with a wood stove in the winter. I couldn't live without a wood stove in the house. I grew up with one and it is the only way to heat. I love how it heats up everything in the house unlike a furnace that blows warm air around only dissipate moments later. We live on the edge of BLM land and along with the land we own, fire wood is free. Manual labor is the only cost. Heats you up several times....cutting, splitting, stacking and burning! Ha! Well you can add cleaning out the stove as well to the list of heating you up....the dusting required around here is just crazy!!

 

[Yaya]

Hi. Recently moved to Europe and not used to the cold!
Always had wood burners before and am hating central heating and oil burners!
Wood is great and eco friendly too, as a tree has been taking in carbon dioxide and creating oxygen. A carbon neutral fuel Even better is topping tree's, then the tree continues to do so while we get to enjoy the wood and heating/cooking.

 

[sumi]

I've gone and moved to a house with no fireplace/stove And last week, right in time for our coldest temperatures so far this winter, our heating oil tank sprung a leak and we lost all the oil. I haven't had time to replace it, so are freezing and dreaming of fire places here at the moment lol And to add insult to injury, there is an abundant supply of wood everywhere around here. Free for collecting.

 

[Beekissed]

Awww, Sumi! I'm praying you resolve this issue swiftly, your place is warmed and your pain is eased.

Wish I could park you by the big ol' barrel stove and put your feet up, feed you some homemade chicken soup.

 

[Beekissed]

Returned from Uncle Jim's house with two truck loads and a trailer load, but that big pile of stumps at his house barely notched! That's a good thing, in case you were wondering.

One bad thing, after rolling and carrying those big oak logs up to the splitter for awhile, coupled with doing the same with pine the day before, my tricky back went out on me and I was down for the rest of the day. Hugely frustrating, as this is my favorite fall seasonal chore....LOVE working that splitter and rendering logs into neatly stacked wood piles.

One good thing, Eli is here to fill in the gap left by my inability to even stand from a seated position without yelling out. He has really pitched in and taken a good hold on helping us this year and I praise God for it~He sends help just in time!

So, mixed oak and dry pine on the porch for bad snow days when one can't get a cart from the woodshed and up the ramp onto the porch~check! Porch is loaded!

Rows starting to fill in the wood shed? Check!

Enough oak at Jim's and pine here to fill that wood shed and part of the extra hoop structure beside it? Check!

God is so very good!!!

 

[Beekissed]

Been using this cool weather to get in firewood for the winter. A few trees came down in a recent storm, the wind uprooted live oaks that took other trees down when it fell. It's green wood, but I'll split it anyway and hope it dries out before winter.

In case it doesn't, I'm placing it into the wood shed along with dry pine that came down in storms last year. I split that last fall and tarped it so I could seed it into the hard wood collected this year. Dry pine makes for a hot fire and will help more moist wood hold a good fire. Our type of stove can burn pine easily, even green pine, whereas other wood stove styles would form too much creosote from burning it.

Yesterday, Eli, my son, also took down some standing dead wood and some trees that show signs of heart rot, though still mostly green. Also more pine that came down in recent and past storms, some hung up in other trees, etc. Eli brings them down and I'll follow along behind him and trim them up, stack the brush and cut them into stove lengths. Then I'll move the splitter down and split them, then place them in storage. Right now I have a mountain of wood right here by the splitter that is needing split and placed in the shed.

This summer we intend on building a pole shed extension to the wood shed~if the Lord wills it~ so as to store more wood at a time.

Feels good to have the wood shed getting filled and to have good, hard work to do. God has blessed us with these fallen trees~that's one step we don't have to do and often the most dangerous step.

Any of you getting in wood yet?

 

[Mini Horses]

DD has 3 trees on ground & cut to length -- from my stand of trees and they are only about 3 weeks down. She has a splitter, so they will get done in a couple weeks. One more tree poss to get cut -- or not. Depends on other sources coming in.

Since she works 3 & off 4, she will be using a LOT more wood this yr to heat with being home to tend the unit. Always a job.

 

[baymule]

My Daddy had a barrel stove, but he used two barrels, stacked on top of each other. A short pipe connected the barrels at one end and the exhaust? pipe came out of the top of the top barrel at the opposite end. It heated a large area.

We don't heat with wood, but I sure wish we had a wood burning heater. I have used wood before as sole heat twice and never froze to death, still here and kicking! I like the convenience of the control on the wall, but wish we had a wood burning heater for the $avings and for back up.

The funny part is, while clearing for a fence row this summer, we cut several large trees, then chunked them up. Neighbor brought his splitter and we stacked up some firewood! neighbor took his share home, we had a stack for our DD and family, plus a stack for another neighbor. The other neighbor came tonight and got his firewood, DD and family coming Saturday for their stack. There was no way we were going to waste that valuable wood and just cut the trees and let them go to ruin.

 

[sumi]

@Beekissed I'm with you there. I love collecting wood, when I get time to, sawing logs, splitting logs, making fires (now I finally learned how to do it!) and enjoying that wonderful heat. In SA we called camp fires "Bushveld TV" It is relaxing to sit and watch a cozy fire burn. I had a love-hate relationship with fire, on account of developing a kind of pyrophobia in childhood, which I finally beat, and I'm now grateful for the cheap heat source. I just wish I had a chance to collect more wood! The weather is not playing along at the moment.

 

[sumi]

I started the fire at lunchtime today and kept it idling since then, it's been about 11 hours now and though the house is a bit cold upstairs, it's bearable. Downstairs it's nice now, not warm, but comfortable. It was 37*F outside early this evening, so the fire had it work cut out today, with us in and out the door too.