# Burning Larch Wood



## glassmanjpf (Oct 1, 2014)

Have to admit like some others say when you can get plenty of oak, maple and locust why burn the softwoods.  Here I would usually save any pine I get for the fire pit and camping.  My tree guy dropped off a free load of maple and larch wood for me to split.   Never even heard of larch wood.  I looked it up and it's a softwood with very low tar content.  Even said only few steps below oak (have my doubt on that). 

Anyway says it burns hot with lots of sparks.  Since I don't want to set the neighborhood on fire anyone burn this and whatcha think?


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## CTYank (Oct 1, 2014)

Good shoulder-season wood, once dried. Just be sure to close the stove door.


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## begreen (Oct 1, 2014)

Larch is excellent main season wood out here. Folks east of the mountains burn a lot of it. Like any wood just be sure to fully season it to have the best burning experience.


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## Seanm (Oct 1, 2014)

Larch is my favorite wood to burn and has almost the same btus as white birch. Like Begreen says it is a good wood and is considered in our area to be champagne firewood! It will season in one year and wont punk out like birch will. In my non cat stove I can easily do an over night burn with it. The trees are quite large and straight grained. Larch is a slightly different tree than Tamarack which is what most people would find out east. I've included a link to a description of both trees. If you look down the page a bit to the north american species you will see the one I burn and have in abundance here in the southern Canadian Rockies and the one I believe you are referring to. Western Larch is the one we have here but I notice on the map it doesnt show up in the South eastern part of BC but we have it in abundance here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larch


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## Seanm (Oct 2, 2014)

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 Heres some photos Ive taken over the last while. Very pretty tree. I get quite the display of fall colours from the Larch trees from my back yard. You can see them all the way up the mountain side.


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## glassmanjpf (Oct 2, 2014)

Seanm said:


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Thanks all for the information and the pics


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## Seanm (Oct 2, 2014)

glassmanjpf said:


> Thanks all for the information and the pics


Youre welcome! Enjoy the wood.


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## Rossco (Oct 7, 2014)

Sorry but yeah. 

Larch is one of the best firewood. Its the hardest of all softwood and is harder than some genuine hardwood, It    doesn't burn the hottest or the longest  but has characteristics that are ideal for wood cutters. It's fire proof, root proof, grows really quick, drys in 6 month, straight cut and easy to split. Av cut wood that's been down for a few year and its brand new with bark falling off. 

It's only 4 points below Oak without the head ache. 

Like Sean said, a few types. We generally cut larch and Red Western Larch that has a thicker bark (Probably Tamarack)

If you have it around and cut your own wood it's ideal.


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## blacktail (Oct 7, 2014)

Rossco said:


> It's fire proof, root proof, grows really quick, drys in 6 month, straight cut and easy to splitl.



Maybe you haven't read enough threads here to know better. [Sarcasm]But all wood requires three years of seasoning in a sunny and windy location. And a gas splitter is a necessity.[/sarcasm]


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## TMonter (Oct 7, 2014)

Larch (Commonly called tamarack here) and Red Fir are pretty much the staples for firewood here. Consider the ease of processing both of them compared to others like Oak, really nothing to complain about. 

I hand split 3-5 cord a year of both for the previous 8 years without a splitter and had no issues.


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## FionaD (Jan 24, 2015)

Just found this slightly old thread in a search for 'Larch'. I am trying a little larch for the first time just now, before committing to buying a load.

I'm disappointed so far. I was expecting a good experience, given the positive reports of others, but I'm finding that it seems to turns to large lumps of brittle, balsa-like charcoal pretty quickly and leaves absolutely no bed of coals whatsoever. The result is that subsequent loads are sitting on nothing at all - literally. I seem to need to keep the air intake comparatively high in order to keep the wood burning when there is no hot bed to keep things active.

The wood has a max of 16% MC on a freshly- split face. Splits are 16" long and between 4-6" at the thickest. My stove takes a max 18" - that would touch the walls, so I figured 16" would be ideal.

Is there some trick to burning larch that I didn't know? I've only ever burned mixed hardwoods so far - very different story. Guess I'm hoping I can learn how to burn larch as I like the suppliers, they're good local people.


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## EatenByLimestone (Jan 24, 2015)

Both the European and American Larch trees should have similar qualities.  Its really hard to tell them apart from looking at them.


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## begreen (Jan 24, 2015)

Larch is a nice firewood when compared to pine and spruce. It dries out after splitting quickly and burns hot. But compared to oak, hickory, beech, etc.. it may disappoint. It will burn quicker. If you have both hardwood and softwood available I would burn the hardwood during colder weather and the larch during milder days when you mainly want a chill chaser fire.


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## Seanm (Jan 24, 2015)

FionaD said:


> I'm finding that it seems to turns to large lumps of brittle, balsa-like charcoal pretty quickly and leaves absolutely no bed of coals whatsoever. The result is that subsequent loads are sitting on nothing at all - literally


Are you making sure the mc of the wood is being checked at room temperature? I know you say you've checked the wood but humor me. If the wood is cold it will give you a false reading. Another indicator of not so dry wood is large coals. I burn larch for my overnight burns and have good experiences with it but I don't have the advantage of many on here that burn hardwoods so I cant advise on how they compare. My experience is that if I load my non cat stove to the gills with larch around 11 pm I have coals at 9 am for an easy reload so I'm not sure why you're experiencing the opposite. Larch cant compare to oak but it does have greater btus then many hard woods out there and would compare in ratings to birch. I always wanted to visit Scotland!  Ben Nevis was on my list of winter ice climbs I wanted to do.


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## FionaD (Jan 24, 2015)

Thanks for reminding me to read the MC on room temp wine wood Sean. It's is still around 16%.

BUT... I think I know what's going on... I brought some wood in earlier and noticed by the light of day that there are, I'm pretty sure, TWO kinds of wood in the samples sacks gave me. Now I'm looking at it in daylight, I think about half of it is white pine... And that's what Ive been burning so far... Ugh!

I picked out some of the more orangey coloured splits.. more likely to be larch... and they are a different thing to burn altogether. I have three large splits crackling away right now and they seem good to me. I actually enjoy the crackling, makes the burn. Ore interesting. Very interesting secondaries, bluish. I take it back.. This will not be the larch enemy I thought it was.

Now I just have to ask if they can sell me just the larch without the evil white pine in with the mix that stuff is _dire_... 

Hope you get to Ben Nevis one day Sean... Avoid staying in Fort William though - it's a dive..If you get that far you should carry on up to the Cuillins on the Isle of Skye.. great climbing there... not to be missed.


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## iluvjazznjava (Jan 24, 2015)

I burn mostly larch here in western Canada.  like others have noted, it does pop and spark somewhat, but it tends not to have large pitch pockets so it doesn't have as many large pops like pine.  It burns fairly hot for a softwood.  My favourite is still birch, but larch is way easier to find and 95% as good, so I burn that most of the time.  Like most others, I think moisture content is the most important factor - more so than the species of wood.


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## Rossco (Jan 24, 2015)

Glad you got that Larch burning well. It's pretty much The only wood I have ATM.


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## Seanm (Jan 24, 2015)

FionaD said:


> Now I just have to ask if they can sell me just the larch without the evil white pine in with the mix that stuff is dire..


Glad to hear you're enjoying it. Yes the quick little pops are a nice sound, much different from the loud ones you get with pine. The pine you are referring to is not a bad wood to burn, its just low on btus and therefor should be cheaper. Hopefully if you have to buy it as a package deal they don't overdo it on the pine. Thanks for the tips on Scotland, and come back to hearth after you do a night time burn and let us know how it worked.


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## Seanm (Jan 24, 2015)

Rossco said:


> Glad you got that Larch burning well. It's pretty much The only wood I have ATM.


I still have enough left for my night time burns but have lots more lodgepole than larch in the stacks. At least I will be good come shoulder season.


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## Rossco (Jan 24, 2015)

Seanm said:


> I still have enough left for my night time burns but have lots more lodgepole than larch in the stacks. At least I will be good come shoulder season.



Yeah I still have some really really long dead pine. I mix it in with the larch. Already Burnt all my Fir.


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## FionaD (Jan 25, 2015)

As others have said here, the larch will be great for the shoulder seasons. Looking forward to trying an overnight burn with it, not that I need to do them in the mild winter we've been having over here so far ... it's been mostly shoulder season weather here in Scotland all winter so far ... Today it's 10/50 out there... Coldest it's been round here so far this winter is -3/26, that would be about the norm for winter in our part of Scotland, but we've only had it for a very few days so far. Mostly big storms... The usual disturbing global warming kind of weather.


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## ailanthus (Jan 25, 2015)

Seanm said:


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That is a larch tree...but I've seen larcher ones.  

Anyone who's spent time in Pennsylvania dutch country knows what I mean


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## begreen (Jan 25, 2015)

FionaD said:


> As others have said here, the larch will be great for the shoulder seasons. Looking forward to trying an overnight burn with it, not that I need to do them in the mild winter we've been having over here so far ... it's been mostly shoulder season weather here in Scotland all winter so far ... Today it's 10/50 out there... Coldest it's been round here so far this winter is -3/26, that would be about the norm for winter in our part of Scotland, but we've only had it for a very few days so far. Mostly big storms... The usual disturbing global warming kind of weather.


The jet stream has been unusually strong across the Atlantic lately. Upper atmosphere winds are so strong that some flights from the US to England are at near supersonic speed. And that stream is delivering storms right at you.


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## FionaD (Jan 25, 2015)

...Tell me about it!

It's in weather like this that I really wish I could do something to temper the strong updraft that my chimney has pretty much all the time, but when it's windy it's just ridiculous how much more wood I go through. My secondaries are jet streams in their own right! No gentle, Northern-lights-like blowing in this stove


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## TMonter (Jan 26, 2015)

FionaD said:


> Just found this slightly old thread in a search for 'Larch'. I am trying a little larch for the first time just now, before committing to buying a load.
> 
> I'm disappointed so far. I was expecting a good experience, given the positive reports of others, but I'm finding that it seems to turns to large lumps of brittle, balsa-like charcoal pretty quickly and leaves absolutely no bed of coals whatsoever. The result is that subsequent loads are sitting on nothing at all - literally. I seem to need to keep the air intake comparatively high in order to keep the wood burning when there is no hot bed to keep things active.
> 
> ...



 Larch is not a hardwood and you'll likely need to use a large split size. Do you have a picture of what the stove looks like loaded to gauge what is going on. Pictures help a ton with diagnosing issues.


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## FionaD (Jan 26, 2015)

Thanks TMonter..  The issue was that some of the wood I was burning wasn't larch at all (see a couple of posts up). I just didn't like the way the other wood - White pine, I think - burned at all. The larch did fine. 

Splits were large for my stove...  but I'm afraid I can't post a pic as it was a sample selection of wood for me to try out and now it's all turned to ash!


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## Seanm (Jan 26, 2015)

FionaD said:


> it was a sample selection of wood for me to try out


so the question is, did you place an order with them for a load of larch?


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## FionaD (Jan 26, 2015)

No I havent...

I might do in the spring. I had told them it might be a while before I ordered some.  I think I'd prefer to stick to burning hardwoods till then as I've scored some good, low MC mixed hardwood this week. In the meantime I will ask them if it would be possible to get a load of 100% larch without the pine mixed in, in spring... or at least to get a sense of what % of a load would be pine... Don't like that pine at all!

I belive they hope to sell some kiln dried hardwood later in the year. I would definitely go to them for that, they are good people, I think.

Aye.. And larch can look beautiful when it's growing too. Lots of it in Scotland as well..


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## TMonter (Jan 26, 2015)

FionaD said:


> Thanks TMonter..  The issue was that some of the wood I was burning wasn't larch at all (see a couple of posts up). I just didn't like the way the other wood - White pine, I think - burned at all. The larch did fine.
> 
> Splits were large for my stove...  but I'm afraid I can't post a pic as it was a sample selection of wood for me to try out and now it's all turned to ash!



Ahh I missed the post my bad. White pine is pretty terrible firewood, much worse than lodgepole pine which is actually quite good in comparison. Good lesson in segregating your wood pile by species to know what you are burning assuming you cut it yourself.

Larch/tamarack is pretty easy to identify by the bark on it once you're used to seeing it.


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## begreen (Jan 26, 2015)

Another benefit of larch is that is dries much quicker than hardwoods like oak.


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## rsw49 (Jan 27, 2015)

begreen said:


> The jet stream has been unusually strong across the Atlantic lately. Upper atmosphere winds are so strong that some flights from the US to England are at near supersonic speed. .



You are being facetious correct? Mach does not change because of a tailwind. You are no closer to the speed of sound flying in the Jetstream than out of it.


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