Okanagan Question...

[schmeg]

Okies are made of White Spruce, (cat spruce). Thats why to some, they smell like cat pee when you open the bag.Burn great for me.

 

[DonD]

OK i finally took a look at my bags and was surprise to see the numbers 210 10 47. i have the new bags and i did buy 3 tons in may of this year so if it helps.

White bags?

I'm starting to think the 210 is irrelevant, second number is year and third number is week. That would make your's towards the end of Nov, 2010 and mine the first week of 2011.

 

[Fish On]

nope clear bags. but i don't think the numbers are a born on date. these were the clear bags the new style. last year was the white

 

[DonD]

That's what I meant - clear with red/black (this years, like the picture I posted) or white (last years). Jay said his info is that the red and black bags didn't start until spring of this year so I was trying to make sense of your code and figured if the '10' was for 2010 you must have the white bags. Since yours are the new bags and you have a '10' it can't be the year. Or like you suggested - the numbers have nothing to do with the date.

 

[warmncozy]

Okies are made of White Spruce, (cat spruce). Thats why to some, they smell like cat pee when you open the bag.Burn great for me.

I can't believe this doesn't bother anyone else. It drove us nuts last year. I had to dig out some other pellets over xmas last year because we had family over and it was embarrassing. Stunk up the whole house and all they could do was joke about it. I'll never buy Okies again. Thankfully we had only bought one ton.

 

[pej4130]

I have burned Oakies only for the last 2 years. Last year white bags, this year all clear bags. I have never had an odd smell from them. They have a very nice wood odor as they should.

 

[Evan_J]

I'm with everyone who believes the numbers printed on the bottom of the Okanagan bag such as "210 11 01" are not the dates. The date codes on the bags are actually not printed, rather made with what look like a series of pin pricks, and can be very tricky to spot. They are located roughly in the center of the bag, within about an inch of the bag seam and are easiest to spot when looking at the back of the bag. The numbers are in two rows, and seem fairly easy to interpret once you find them.

I picked up three 65 bag pallets of Oakies this year. Two were the new style bag, and one the old white bags. Based on the dates, the white ones had been sitting in storage somewhere.

Old Bags New Bags
0510 0527
2010 2011

I'd post a picture, but I'm having a heck of a time getting a good picture of them.

 

[DexterDay]

I'm with everyone who believes the numbers printed on the bottom of the Okanagan bag such as "210 11 01" are not the dates. The date codes on the bags are actually not printed, rather made with what look like a series of pin pricks, and can be very tricky to spot. They are located roughly in the center of the bag, within about an inch of the bag seam and are easiest to spot when looking at the back of the bag. The numbers are in two rows, and seem fairly easy to interpret once you find them.

I picked up three 65 bag pallets of Oakies this year. Two were the new style bag, and one the old white bags. Based on the dates, the white ones had been sitting in storage somewhere.

Old Bags New Bags
0510 0527
2010 2011

I'd post a picture, but I'm having a heck of a time getting a good picture of them.

American Wood Fibers had there numbers "perforated" into the top of the bag, just above the seam. I had a problem last year and this is how they.checked, date and batch.

I have bought a few bags of AWF's this year and can not find them on these bags???? WTF?

 

[343amc]

Okies are made of White Spruce, (cat spruce). Thats why to some, they smell like cat pee when you open the bag.Burn great for me.

I can't believe this doesn't bother anyone else. It drove us nuts last year. I had to dig out some other pellets over xmas last year because we had family over and it was embarrassing. Stunk up the whole house and all they could do was joke about it. I'll never buy Okies again. Thankfully we had only bought one ton.

Wow. Coming on this forum and saying you don't like Okies is like going to India and trying to order a steak dinner.

I've never seen them in my area, so I have no comment. I used to get Pinnacle Pellets which were also from British Colombia, but that dealer closed up.

 

[DonD]

I'm with everyone who believes the numbers printed on the bottom of the Okanagan bag such as "210 11 01" are not the dates. The date codes on the bags are actually not printed, rather made with what look like a series of pin pricks, and can be very tricky to spot. They are located roughly in the center of the bag, within about an inch of the bag seam and are easiest to spot when looking at the back of the bag. The numbers are in two rows, and seem fairly easy to interpret once you find them.

I picked up three 65 bag pallets of Oakies this year. Two were the new style bag, and one the old white bags. Based on the dates, the white ones had been sitting in storage somewhere.

Old Bags New Bags
0510 0527
2010 2011

I'd post a picture, but I'm having a heck of a time getting a good picture of them.

Where exactly are you seeing the numbers? Top seam? Above the seam or below the seam? You said on the back? I just brought in a few bag of Okies and I'm not seeing it yet.

 

[mpcm]

I burned okies last year, and am likely to pickup another ton or two for the worst of the winter months coming up, though I can always buy them by the bag from my local store, and tend to do small stockup runs while I am there anyway.

I can relate to people with the smell issue, but in general you shouldn't really 'smell' your pellets beyond some minor dust coming into the air. They do have a smell that could be taken to smell like cat urine, but to me they just smell like wood, as I have 2 cats and that smell is pretty distinct. I imagine it is something more like cilantro, which always tastes like soap to me, no matter how much I try to like it.

 

[Evan_J]

The date codes are on the back of the bag about an inch under the top seam. I've seen some right in the center of the bag, and others slightly off to one side or the other. Since they are perforated with no ink involved, they can be very trick to spot, darn near impossible without good lighting. I'll try later to see if I can get a picture to come out, but I'm not sure if it'll work.

As far as the smell comments, none of the Oakies I have purchased smell anything like cat urine to me. Smell more like lumber than anything else to my nose. They actually make my garage smell better when I stack them in there.

I used to be able to purchase them by the bag close to home as well, but unfortunately my local supplier isn't carrying them at the moment.

 

[Fish On]

The date codes are on the back of the bag about an inch under the top seam. I've seen some right in the center of the bag, and others slightly off to one side or the other. Since they are perforated with no ink involved, they can be very trick to spot, darn near impossible without good lighting. I'll try later to see if I can get a picture to come out, but I'm not sure if it'll work.

As far as the smell comments, none of the Oakies I have purchased smell anything like cat urine to me. Smell more like lumber than anything else to my nose. They actually make my garage smell better when I stack them in there.

I used to be able to purchase them by the bag close to home as well, but unfortunately my local supplier isn't carrying them at the moment.

If its Home and Hearth there not buying them anymore, from what i was told they Jacked up there price from what they were buying for.

Seems weird to me because westwood fibers are re bagged okies if I'm correct? have not seem any yet though?

 

[Evan_J]

Nah, I was getting Oakies from they local Agway. They stopped carrying them in October because they were receiving too many damaged pellets every time they received a shipment. Decided they were loosing too much money dumping the damaged pellets (I can understand the decision, 18 bags were damaged on one of my pallets). They were considering carrying them again once the Oakies started getting shipped in bulk to be bagged in MA and distributed from there... Maybe the re-bagging is why the cost went up...

 

[jtakeman]

The date codes are on the back of the bag about an inch under the top seam. I've seen some right in the center of the bag, and others slightly off to one side or the other. Since they are perforated with no ink involved, they can be very trick to spot, darn near impossible without good lighting. I'll try later to see if I can get a picture to come out, but I'm not sure if it'll work.

As far as the smell comments, none of the Oakies I have purchased smell anything like cat urine to me. Smell more like lumber than anything else to my nose. They actually make my garage smell better when I stack them in there.

I used to be able to purchase them by the bag close to home as well, but unfortunately my local supplier isn't carrying them at the moment.

If its Home and Hearth there not buying them anymore, from what i was told they Jacked up there price from what they were buying for.

Seems weird to me because westwood fibers are re bagged okies if I'm correct? have not seem any yet though?

Here is a quote from Mr. Warm on the Westwood/Okies thing.

Let me clarify once and for all about Westwood/Okanagan Pellet Company. Viridis Energy bought Westwood Pellet Company in May 2010 and changed the name to Okanagan Pellet Company or OPC. Same pellet, same product. Cypress Pacific Marketing is the sales division of Viridis and sells all product thru that company. CPM is owned 100% by Viridis, who is the parent company and they don't do any sales directly. The current red/black and clear bag was first used in November 2010, but the white/green bags were still used and shipped to NE dealers right up to fall of this year. That is how long it took to use all the plastic and even some stored product, so that is why you will see the white/green bags even now. Both bags were used to bag product and there is NO DIFFERENCE whatsoever between the different bags as far as the quality of product in each.

Depending on what part of NE you are in, since we have shipped from 4 different warehouses in NE, all on different rail lines, 1 or 2 of those warehouse might have gotten the white/green bags long after we stopped shipping to the other two. We have just started custom bagging product in Upton, MA., and if you want to see if you got product from there, the bottom of the bag has printed on it "Product of Canada. Packaged in the USA." So far, you will only find this product at dealers in MA and CT. You will also see 65 bags and 50 bag pallets, and that depends on which warehouse the product ships to dealers. This has to do with railway restrictions (weight and loading patterns) which is why some markets can only get the 65 bags and others both.

He had more on the price stuff, But I might get scolded for posting it. Basically the price went up and the dealer didn't think he could sell for a reasonable profit. So they elected not to purchase Okies and went with other brands. There are many other dealers that have Okies and do sell them for reasonable prices. Maybe it was the dealer that got gready?

 

[Pellet Man]

I am getting a Ton of Okies this week and hoping all is well with them. Im not a cat person so i hope there's no related smell. Never used them before.

 

[Cooper]

Where can i buy okies close to boston?? Anyone from near Ma??

 

[Hoot23]

I have been burning 5 bags of Barefoots over the last couple of weeks and cleaned the stove good today, measured temps and ash content and am moving on to my Okies for the next couple of weeks. Very happy with the Barefoots. The first thing I noticed about the 1st bag of Okies is that they are very dusty and very short, at least compared to the Barefoots

Dust all over and the pellets seemed to average about 1/4 inch in length and a high percentage of smaller bits of pellets. Not sure what defines a 'fine' but these seem small. I'm concerned about them even moving up the auger. It almost looks like someone took a 2x4 to the top of the pallet and crushed the top bag. Would this be considered normal for Okies? It's my first time with them. Maybe the top bags of the pallet were damaged?

They seem to be burning OK so far.

What defines a 'fine' anyway?

 

[Hoot23]

Tested 3 bags of Okies and found same results. Bags ar full of fines and very small pellets. But burned hot and clean. Very expensive, 319 a ton in my area

 

[Breckwell77]

First year with the okies and im a very happy customer. Will buy the same next year. They are expensive and I will buy during the spring hopeing it will come down on price. But, it does burn hotter than the others I have used so it makes up for the high price as I don't have to keep the stove at higer settings.

 

[tinkabranc]

Been burning Okies the last 2 winters (not exclusively) and had no stink issues with em.
Stock was mixed with both the white bags & the clear bags.
Last season I had a few bags that were really dusty but I blame that on too much handling
before I got em.

If the price is decent, I will purchase more for next season.

 

[md2002]

Where can i buy okies close to boston?? Anyone from near Ma??

I don't know how close your looking for but Royal Fireside in Mendon, Ma. sells them. They also sell LeCretes. I tries them both and found the LeCretes to be a better pellet.

In response to the OP, I bought a few bags of Oakies that were exactly as you described. In my case I think it was more that they got wet before I bought them. The bottom 3rd of the bag was literally COVERED in sawdust, I never seen anything like it. I just wished I noticed before I brought them home. I bought a few bags from the same place a second time and they were fine. This probably isn't much help but that's all the advice I can give you.

 

[Breckwell77]

I know the Oakies are a softwood pellet. It may or may not be a reason. I have tried the Country boy, Thurmans and the American pellets. None of them burned as hot as the Oakies. But the ones i mentioned are hardwood pellets and I on the other hand see more dust in general with the oakies. But that won't stop me from buying them next year also. Not that bad but a little more dust. I also see more when i clean the stove also. But again I clean it regularly so its not that bad.

 

[jtakeman]

I know the Oakies are a softwood pellet. It may or may not be a reason. I have tried the Country boy, Thurmans and the American pellets. None of them burned as hot as the Oakies. But the ones i mentioned are hardwood pellets and I on the other hand see more dust in general with the oakies. But that won't stop me from buying them next year also. Not that bad but a little more dust. I also see more when i clean the stove also. But again I clean it regularly so its not that bad.

A quote from Mr.Warm on this.

Here is the trade off…the less moisture content in a pellet the hotter it will burn….But the dryer a pellet is, the more dust there will be…so that is the trade off….heat produced vers the dust. The new bagging in Upton has helped big time with dust and fines…I think you will find this year the dust reduced a lot in the Okies….

 

[Ejectr]

My local dealer's pre buy price for Okanagan ordered in April and May with delivery within 30 days is $289/ton with 1/2 off delivery cost. That's $10 more than he was selling in the winter.