# Stinky wood?



## warno (Aug 31, 2015)

Which wood smells the worst when burnt? For example,  I have heard that Chinese elm smells like urine when burnt.

On the other side of that question, which wood smells the best burning?


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## NordicSplitter (Aug 31, 2015)

On the chart....Popular comes up as  *"Putrid"*.....Good for when the riots break out. Haha


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## blades (Aug 31, 2015)

Elm maybe green, properly dried not in my book. But it's ok in my book if you want spread that old wives tale around.  right along with impossible to split one.  
 I 've heard of people who complain that oak or hickory is bad. The best one was my neighbor across the street that complained about Maple- she said every time she got wiff of it it made her hungry for pankes and she gained some 20 pounds over the winter.


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## DougA (Aug 31, 2015)

There really should be very little to no smell inside the house with a properly operating wood stove.  Outside, nothing I've ever burned smells bad.  Black cherry and hard maple smell nice though.
When splitting green, I hate box elder smell.


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## owingsia (Aug 31, 2015)

Last year I had gotten a hold of some very punky black locus... the heart wood was still good but not much of it was left.... the rounds were about 6-7 inches at best. It had been "rescued" by me and it was dry. I did not want to split it for the mess it would make. It did not smell good at all, so I thought when I burned it it would be nasty... well in the end because I had mixed it with other woods and the punky stuff burned very hot it had no smell outside. 

My in laws have an open fireplace and one year they brought it some kind of funky wood that smelled odd and when they put it in the fireplace it was nasty. We do not know what it was but it smelled like a combination of old chicken crap and stale urine. needless to say they didnt burn any more of that.


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## warno (Aug 31, 2015)

blades said:


> Elm maybe green, properly dried not in my book. But it's ok in my book if you want spread that old wives tale around.  right along with impossible to split one.
> I 've heard of people who complain that oak or hickory is bad. The best one was my neighbor across the street that complained about Maple- she said every time she got wiff of it it made her hungry for pankes and she gained some 20 pounds over the winter.




Maybe all the elm rumors were green burners. My dad said that my elm tree did split up nicely to his amazment.


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## Applesister (Aug 31, 2015)

Poplar and Black locust are on an even keel for creating a smoke that you do not want escaping the stove. Fills your eyes and makes you choke.
Sugar maple is sublime. Its my October wood. 
Black cherry is for barbecued meat.
Apple for Christmas, hickory for snowstorms in January...


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## bunfoolio (Aug 31, 2015)

Black locust smells terrible when burned.   Good for night burning because I do not want to stink out the neighbors. 

I really like the smell of white pine and red oak when burned.  Thus far White Pine id my favorite.

This year I will trying for the first time Hemlock.  Any opinions on its smell while burning?


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## bag of hammers (Aug 31, 2015)

Agree with the opinions on sugar maple.  Especially when I'm walking down the driveway shortly after loading the stove and the breeze is just right.  Poplar seems to sting the eyes a bit more, like if a bit of smoke spills out on reload, or out in the firepit, but it burns fast and hot so I'm not too worried for the amount I burn.  I've heard people also comment on yellow birch being ok but I burn quite a bit and although i love the burn, some big splits with that old thick bark clinging on can sometimes let the neighbors know I'm reloading for a few minutes or more.   

At the end of it all I'm not sure if it's all in my head, but I swear I can pick which of the above 3 just went in the stove if I'm outside and my better half just tossed in a few splits.


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## warno (Aug 31, 2015)

OK I'll keep all those in mind. This is my first year heating with wood I'd like to avoid annoying the neighbors as much as possible. I know someone near me heats with wood but I can't pin point which neighbor it is. So if I'm only as bad as that person I will be just fine.


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## kennyp2339 (Sep 1, 2015)

I have always hated the smell of really wet red oak, to me it smells like someone puked behind the wood pile, but I have gotten use to it because I realize the fantastic heat that comes from it.


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## Fred Wright (Sep 1, 2015)

Damp gum burning is some stinky stuff. We don't even cut gum anymore. Couple years ago I was working in the woodlot next door. The Shewolf put some in the stove and the breeze carried it my way. It's an acrid smell, just stinks.

Best smelling smoke to me is cedar.


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## Scooter422 (Sep 1, 2015)

+1 on the Gum! Stuff smells pretty bad!!


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## saskwoodburner (Sep 1, 2015)

DougA said:


> There really should be very little to no smell inside the house with a properly operating wood stove.



 Funny you should mention that. I tried my hardest to never let smoke escape my first year burning, that it was such a rare occasion. The odd time it happened I'd apologize to the better half and she'd say "That's okay, it reminds me of campfires." So there I was all proud of myself to not have the shack all stunk up from smoke. And then we had all those forest fires up north in Saskatchewan.....so much for no stink.


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## BoilerMan1812 (Sep 1, 2015)

Hard to beat black cherry


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## DougA (Sep 1, 2015)

saskwoodburner said:


> And then we had all those forest fires up north in Saskatchewan.....so much for no stink.


We could smell the 'campfire' in southern Ontario the end of last week.  Just a slight 'whiff' in the morning but that's what it was. Sure travels a long, long way.


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## saskwoodburner (Sep 2, 2015)

I think you can blame B.C. and Washington state for that one, as we've had smoke from there in the last few weeks.


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## turn_n_burn (Sep 2, 2015)

This is a fun question. I'm surprised nobody has mentioned willow or cottonwood. I'm not a wood snob by any stretch of the imagination, but there are some that even I won't burn. Cottonwood smells like sour piss when green, whether it is split or burning. Willow is a little better, but they smell just like you'd expect something to smell that lurks in stagnant riverbottoms. Everybody around here calls Box Elder "Sh-t Maple". Black Locust smells horrible when cut green, but the smoke is a little better, but acrid, but seasoning seems to mitigate this, once dry it ain't that bad. I happen to like really dry Red Elm, kind mildly sweet, not punky like American Elm. I try to stay away from Ailanthus (tree of heaven, no idea why they call it that), kinda like burning tires. I happen to kinda like tulip poplar.

It kinda depends on where you live, as I notice certain regions seem to prefer different smells, based on what they grew up around. In Idaho, everybody loves the smell of Pine, Fir, and Tamarack. My personal favorites are Western Redcedar, Juniper, and White Pine.

Down south, hickory of all varieties seems to be king, slightly ahead of the hard Maples and Ash. I always see fierce debate on whether people like oak, some say it smells like a glass of sweet bourbon, and some say it smells like piss. Never burned it myself, oak goes almost exclusively as lumber around here, as it is rare. I always see vitriolic debate on this one. We have lots of orchards around here, so Cherry, Apple, and my favorite fruitwood, Plum, seem to be getting popular. My wife is from the Puget Sound (Seattle area) and occasionally a neighbor of her relatives burns Madrone, and I would stab someone in the neck with a butterknife to have that stuff in Idaho. Great for smoking meats and Fish. Almond is very popular there too.

There are a lot of middle-of-the-road varieties that seem to be neither loved nor hated, like Silver or Norway Maple, Hemlock, Balsam Fir, Bois d'arc (Osage Orange), Aspens, and Sycamore (which I think is a subtype of maple). Some folks tell me black birch smells like black licorice when burned, which I would love as much as Jagermeister, my favorite drink. Yes, I'm still something of a damn kid. 

That all said, it gets 20 below here sometimes in winter, and I wouldn't hesitate to burn anything that would keep me from turning into a popsicle. I'm a dedicated scrounger, and when you are like me, you can't be super snooty about it. But everybody has preferences.  I got bored once and smoked some hotdogs over wet Tamarack chips in my BBQ and freakin' loved it. I'm sure to get flamed for that one.


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## Bret Chase (Sep 3, 2015)

I agree with everyone else... Black locust smoke stinks... to me it smells like burning dirty gym socks..


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