My neighbor ripped out most of his landscaping early last spring and asked if I wanted the wood. I said sure, and he was nice enough to give me the stumps. He had several different bushes. I got the stumps in a wheelbarrel and tossed them into the pile and didn't think much of it.
Fast forward to last night and it was 9pm, about 39F, and I was feeling lazy. I grabbed this twisted, ugly piece of wood off the pile which I believe was one of his shrubs and I put that over some kindling. I grabbed it mostly because it was a completely weird shape and it occupied a lot of the stove but didn't leave room for much other wood. I lit the stove off and had problems keeping it going, so I ended up cracking the ash pan for about 10 minutes to get this to catch up. It was impossibly hard to get it going, but the wood burned with a low flame literally all night. Come the morning there was a nice ash bed in the bottom and I turned off the cat and opened the air all the way to finish off the embers and I was surprised to see the sheer amount of glowing coals left over in the stove from the wood.
So, given the general description of the wood, twisted, gnarled, heavy, slow burning and a shrub, what the heck was it? Privet hedge? Rhododendron?
I wish I had saved some, but it was the only piece. I honestly expected it to go up like paper. My neighbor, not seeing what it was I put in there, doesn't recall. When I order a cord, does anyone know where to get rhododendron?
Fast forward to last night and it was 9pm, about 39F, and I was feeling lazy. I grabbed this twisted, ugly piece of wood off the pile which I believe was one of his shrubs and I put that over some kindling. I grabbed it mostly because it was a completely weird shape and it occupied a lot of the stove but didn't leave room for much other wood. I lit the stove off and had problems keeping it going, so I ended up cracking the ash pan for about 10 minutes to get this to catch up. It was impossibly hard to get it going, but the wood burned with a low flame literally all night. Come the morning there was a nice ash bed in the bottom and I turned off the cat and opened the air all the way to finish off the embers and I was surprised to see the sheer amount of glowing coals left over in the stove from the wood.
So, given the general description of the wood, twisted, gnarled, heavy, slow burning and a shrub, what the heck was it? Privet hedge? Rhododendron?
I wish I had saved some, but it was the only piece. I honestly expected it to go up like paper. My neighbor, not seeing what it was I put in there, doesn't recall. When I order a cord, does anyone know where to get rhododendron?
