Name That Wood

[Gehl Family]

Hello everyone,
This is my first post on this forum, but I have been reading the site for months. My husband and I just got our stove (Avalon Olympic Insert) installed and approved yesterday and we lit it up for the first time last night. We spent a couple hours just staring at it =) Slightly better than the beautiful flames was the cooked apple and ice cream that we shared though.

I am totally new to wood burning stoves and have been trying to absorb as much as I can through this forum and reading articles on various sites without bothering you guys with newbie questions -- but some things are just too specific, so here I am.

We moved into an old farm house that had a hefty stack of wood waiting to be split, it was pretty varied in the types of wood, I am not sure how the previous owners accrued small quantities of so many different trees. My husband took 75% of it and has split that (were are pretty sure most of that was Honey Locust) but there are some lingering pieces that we (read: he) is not sure what type of tree they are. We suspect a lot of it in pine, but since I don't know anything about trees I was wondering if you could ID them for me.

Also, is there a good website or book to check out that would help us ID wood in the future?

Thanks!

 

[gman1001]

Looks like a variety of Cherry to me. I burn tons of it - its great.

 

[gpcollen1]

I am good with enitre trees but will see how I do. The piece on the left looks like either Bird Cherry or Sweet/Black Birch; the piece on the right may be spruce/pine; middle-left looks like it may be a red maple (silver or other); middle-right may be pine/spruce too. Try smelling it - but that works better when fresh.

 

[Matt_W]

far left looks like some kind variety of cherry, 2nd from the left looks like black cherry, is the 3rd maple?

 

[philaphire]

All I can tell is second from the left looks nasty to split

 

[Gehl Family]

All I can tell is second from the left looks nasty to split

Ah but that is my husband's job -- I just have to tell him which ones to split

 

[JustWood]

1st is fire cherry 2nd possibly sassafras 3rd white oak or iron wood 4th possibly white oak

 

[Gehl Family]

This is great guys, thanks for all the replies.

Since some of you think that a few of those pieces might be pine, how much of a problem is it? If the majority of the wood we are burning is not pine, but there are a few pine pieces here and there, are we at risk of a chimney fire? Are we better off just saving those for a bonfire next year or can we just go ahead and burn them?

Thanks again.

 

[jpl1nh]

Piece on left is either cherry or apple, piece second from right probably is white oak, possible sugar maple, piece on far right is possibly hemlock and the gnarly piece 2nd from left, I don't know. Oak, sugar maple, & apple are all pretty heavy, hemlock is lighter in weight. Freshly cut it smells evergreen like. Cherry bark tastes very bitter, sweet/black birch bark tastes like wintergreen. Oak is fiberous when split, maple splits fairly clean. Red or silver maple are no where near as heavy as sugar maple or white oak. Hope those few clues help. And enjoy chewing on the piece on the left! %-P

 

[jpl1nh]

This is great guys, thanks for all the replies.

Since some of you think that a few of those pieces might be pine, how much of a problem is it? If the majority of the wood we are burning is not pine, but there are a few pine pieces here and there, are we at risk of a chimney fire? Are we better off just saving those for a bonfire next year or can we just go ahead and burn them?

Thanks again.

You are not no more at risk for a chimney fire burning pine than any other wood. Creosote and resulting chimney fires are a result of burning any type of wood that is not well seasoned or is quite wet or from burning your fire with so little air that it smolders and you get incomplete combustion. PS, piece 2nd on left possible red oak. When you spit it it would smell kind of vinegary or acidic from the large quantities of tannins in the wood. Could be willow too which would be lightweight where the oak would be very heavy.

 

[WILDSOURDOUGH]

I think jplnh1 has most of them right- we don't have any sasafrass up north (here). I'll take a guess that the big one (2nd from left) is hemlock or douglas fir. Pine is fine to burn- makes a nice hot fire, mix a piece or two in the load for your new unit, you will like it.
Also makes great kindling- out west that's about all they have.
There is an autubon book- can't think of the name, something like "Trees of the Northeast US" which has pictures of the trees, bark and leaves in the summer and winter.
Welcome, and all the best to you(s).

 

[Gehl Family]

Thanks again for all the replies. Why does pine have such a bad reputation? Everyone always says "don't burn pine." Is it because the low BTU output may not create a hot enough fire to cause a secondary burn? Or is it just plain wrong?

 

[fbelec]

welcome to the forum


just split some stuff that looked like the first from left and was told it was apple. if it were a touch lighter in color i would say it were cherry. the second from left looks a lot like some stuff i just split a few days ago and that was catalpa. if i'm spelling that right. it has a strong nasty smell when just split. and the third looks the same catalpa. the forth looks like spruce. if the catalpa is dry it is as light like the wood is hollow in the middle.

 

[Dunadan]

I too thought the one large piece looked pretty green (still fresh) when I first looked at the pic.

You may want to reconsider burning that wood, if indeed it is green.

 

[jpl1nh]

Thanks again for all the replies. Why does pine have such a bad reputation? Everyone always says "don't burn pine." Is it because the low BTU output may not create a hot enough fire to cause a secondary burn? Or is it just plain wrong?

Most of the discussion of that question here centers on the theory that this is probably a carry over from the old airtight stove days. Since pine burns hot and fast, there was a tendancy to really damp down the stove while burning it which caused lots of smoldering which leads to creosote build up. The current experience among members here with newer stove technology shows little difference in creosote deposits between burning well seasoned pine and other woods. Many western wood burners burn mostly pine. BTU content varies considerably among pine varieties with white pine common here in the east having very low BTUs. I know red pine also prevelant here in the east is comparable to elm in BTUs and I believe yellow pine is actually a moderate BTU producer. There are many other kinds of pine sucha s lodgepole, scotch, pitch pine, longleaf etc. I often hear other conifers such as hemlock, spruce, and cedar classified as pine here though that is not correct. They are completely different species. Pines are characterized by long needles and generally larger cones. Many conifers are also softwood and quick burning though again I see many western members burning Douglas fir and believe that is a high BTU producing wood even though it is a conifer. I use pine to start up fires, to re-kindle fires and to give quick heat, but don't try to use it for long burns since I can fit many more BTUs of hardwood in my stove than I can with pine.

 

[MrKenmore]

The one on the left reminds me of black birch. But it also looks a little like cherry. I had quite a bit of black birch.

 

[Gooserider]

Thanks again for all the replies. Why does pine have such a bad reputation? Everyone always says "don't burn pine." Is it because the low BTU output may not create a hot enough fire to cause a secondary burn? Or is it just plain wrong?

Most of the discussion of that question here centers on the theory that this is probably a carry over from the old airtight stove days. Since pine burns hot and fast, there was a tendancy to really damp down the stove while burning it which caused lots of smoldering which leads to creosote build up. The current experience among members here with newer stove technology shows little difference in creosote deposits between burning well seasoned pine and other woods. Many western wood burners burn mostly pine. BTU content varies considerably among pine varieties with white pine common here in the east having very low BTUs. I know red pine also prevelant here in the east is comparable to elm in BTUs and I believe yellow pine is actually a moderate BTU producer. There are many other kinds of pine sucha s lodgepole, scotch, pitch pine, longleaf etc. I often hear other conifers such as hemlock, spruce, and cedar classified as pine here though that is not correct. They are completely different species. Pines are characterized by long needles and generally larger cones. Many conifers are also softwood and quick burning though again I see many western members burning Douglas fir and believe that is a high BTU producing wood even though it is a conifer. I use pine to start up fires, to re-kindle fires and to give quick heat, but don't try to use it for long burns since I can fit many more BTUs of hardwood in my stove than I can with pine.

By definition, Conifer = softwood, no exceptions... The terms softwood and hardwood are very fuzzy, there are low btu hardwoods (minor trivia, BALSA is a "hardwood") and high btu softwoods... However in the commonly burned firewoods, most of the hardwoods are better than most of the softwoods. Per the charts, Douglas Fir is excellent as a softwood, but it's only 'mid-range' on the overall scale. However if well dried, it all burns and makes good fuel.

Gooserider

 

[Gehl Family]

what is the consensus on burning smaller stuff? we have close to a full cord of branches (1 to 3 inches in diameter) that are too small to split. whenever pple talk about burning wood i never hear mention of wood this size. do you folks burn that as well?

 

[fbelec]

that is usually good for starting a fire or small hot take the chill of the house fire. never more than a half of a fire box or you could overfire the stove and turn it cherry red. if you want to burn it you might be feeding it every half hour.

 

[Gooserider]

what is the consensus on burning smaller stuff? we have close to a full cord of branches (1 to 3 inches in diameter) that are too small to split. whenever pple talk about burning wood i never hear mention of wood this size. do you folks burn that as well?

They burn nice... I generally process everything from about an inch or two up. - Although it's borderline when stuff gets that small, it almost is more work than it's worth. What I typically do is use a pair of hand held pruning scissors to get rid of anything small enough for them to deal with - I cut off the ends of branches at the point where they are hard to do a one hand cut, then a limb lopper to get what's left to length, then switch to the chain saw. I wouldn't bother with the stuff smaller than 2-3" if I wasn't cutting close to the wood sheds, as the small stuff just takes up too much room to transport easily for the heat it gives. I find that I 've been dropping 2-3 trees a year (standing deads, or severely rotten trunks, etc) in the yard, these give me all the small stuff I can use.

Good for kindling, getting a near dead fire going again, and other small fire stuff, don't burn in large quantities as stated earlier.

Gooserider

 

[Lignums]

The first piece is cherry, and the next 3 are maples.

And I agree that Pines and Spruces are ok to burn if seasoned. I just had my chimney inspected and got the ok that everything is perfect, no creosote buildup at all, and this after a few months of burning pine skids from where I worked when the wood supply got low. Nothing wrong with Pine, just a victim of year of bad reputation of being used in fireplaces.