Gumboots and firewood
Podcast available.
Back in March, just as the fall weather was setting in, Rick and I were talking with our neighbors at a dinner party about getting firewood for the coming winter.
When you heat your home with a woodburner, getting wood in for the winter becomes an annual event, like the changing of the leaves and the onset of shorter, cooler days. Rick and I have been living in the country for over 3 years, and every year we’ve picked up the phone to have firewood delivered.
When I admitted to this, I received some strange looks from around the table that night. I didn’t understand. Had I said something wrong?
After somebody very quickly changed the topic of conversation, our neighbor Suzanne leaned over to me and said, “Surely you’ve got downed trees on your land. Why are you paying for firewood?”
She said this in such a hushed tone that it was clear paying for firewood was an unspeakable act – something that should not be discussed at full volume in polite company.
I felt compelled to deny everything, but it was already too late. Our terrible secret was out. For three years we’d been unknowingly breaking the First Commandment of Rural Living: “Thou shalt not pay for firewood.”
A good neighbor
On a bright fall morning a week later, our neighbor John stopped by. We didn’t know it, but he was on a mission to save our rural souls.
“You haven’t ordered any firewood yet, have you?” he said, scratching his grey beard with a worried look in his eyes.
Fall morning in our bottom paddock - click to enlarge
“No,” Rick said. “We’re about to. Would you like to order some together?”
John let out a shocked, insulted laugh and shook his head. “I’m here to see if you want to collect some free firewood. I’ll help you.”
It turns out that a local farmer had cut down a large crop of pine trees for export to China, and he’d left behind a huge tangle of trunk rounds and twisted branches. He’d given the nod to our neighbor John to collect it.
“Opportunities like this hardly ever come around,” John said. “Only a bloody fool would say no.”
Rick and I didn’t want to be fools — bloody or otherwise — so of course we said yes.
Gathering firewood
It was a Saturday morning in mid-March when Rick and I drove out to meet John where the trees had been felled. His big white ute was parked nearby. (For those who think they speak English in the Northern Hemisphere, a ‘ute’ is a pickup truck in New Zealand and Australia. It’s pronounced ‘yoot’.)
John was already out among the tree scraps, chainsawing his way through a large trunk. Although he’s in his sixties, he’s a workhorse and has more endurance than most men in their twenties.
When we climbed out of our little Nissan Pulsar still sleepy eyed, John turned off his chainsaw and began laughing at us.
Ute in paddock
“You’re late,” he said. “It’s already quarter past seven. I’ve almost finished loading up the first ute full of wood.” Then he waved his arms at the wood around us. “Grab the small bits and throw them in the back of the ute. The bigger bits I’ll cut up.”
Rick and I got to work right away.
We quickly discovered that the ‘small’ bits were not small at all. They were thick, massive rounds of trunks. It was hard work, and we were at it all morning.
Log splitting
In the end, we spent two Saturday mornings gathering firewood that way. We unloaded all of it next to the shed on John’s property. But even those ‘small’ bits were still too big for a typical woodburner.
Then one weekend John borrowed a log splitter, and Rick and I showed up early for our third Saturday of work.
We were originally scheduled to start at 7am as usual, but the day before John discovered the borrowed log splitter wouldn’t function in the early morning. It needed a couple hours of sun on it before it was warm enough to start.
“The log splitter runs on city time,” John said. “Don’t come until 10 o’clock.”
Now that’s my kind of log splitter.
The machine was a homemade job, mounted on a trailer. It was rusty and had tubes and pipes and hydraulic things I didn’t understand.
I had expected a swift, guillotine-like thing that would chop off your fingers in the blink of an eye. But this machine operated with a kind of mulish determination. The metal wedge came forward at a snail’s pace, stubbornly pushing through even the most knotty rounds of trunks.
The log splitter wedge
We fell into a pattern where I lifted the chunks of wood up to the log splitter, John operated the machine, and Rick and I would then toss the split pieces into the ute. Once the ute was full, Rick drove over to our place, unloaded the firewood into our hayshed, and returned again for more wood.
On one trip back Rick brought an old log that had been sitting by our chicken coop. When John and I split it we found it was full of life – earwigs, big black spiders, tiny burgundy spiders with bulbous bodies, orange fungus, centipedes, and slaters (called pill bugs in the States).
“This is a hardwood,” John said, as the insects went scurrying. “Throw one of these on the fire when you go to bed, it’ll still be burning in the morning.”
It was around then that Rick began bemoaning the fact that he had the hardest job. “Unloading this truck single-handedly is exhausting,” he said. “You two are just standing there watching bugs run around.”
John said, “Jared’s picking up these heavy trunks. Your job’s easy.”
“Umm, I don’t think so,” Rick said.
When we went inside to eat lunch, Rick’s comments about having the hardest job continued. I kept my mouth shut because I was grateful he was driving the ute.
Neither John nor John’s wife Aussie Bronwyn gave Rick any sympathy.
Driven perhaps by a sense of injustice, Rick’s search for pity continued well into the evening, when we all gathered for dinner over at Jim and Kiwi Bronwyn’s, our neighbors next door.
As soon as we arrived that evening, Rick launched into his great tale of log splitting and how he’d had the hardest job.
“Unloading the ute?” Kiwi Bronwyn said. She’s a small woman, and she looked up at Rick. “Oh, that’s my job. Those big trunks are too heavy for me to lift, so Jim does that.”
Everyone started laughing. And Rick finally shut up about who had the hardest job.
Our hayshed full of wood
But it didn’t matter.
As we sat down to dinner with our neighbors, Rick and I both knew we had a hayshed full of firewood we had gathered ourselves.
We were incredibly grateful to John. That wood was enough to last us two winters.
And we hadn’t paid a cent.
How do you heat your home? Have you ever done the unspeakable and paid for firewood? Leave a comment below and let me know.
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Never :-) Branches etc from hedge trimming, old wood from building jobs, pallets – there is always something to burn. It does sometimes mean we end up with a whole pile of nails, hinges etc in amongst the ash.
We once tried to burn some old fence posts but our neighbor Jim told us treated wood is corrosive when burned and can ruin your woodburner. He put the fear of God in us!
Treated wood also releases rather toxic fumes, and the ashes should never be put into the garden – it poisons the soil!
We buy trucks full of full logs, which we get at discount. We buck and split them ourselves, and use them for firewood. It’s cheaper than buying it split, though more expensive than doing it all ourselves. We’re not ready yet to do all the hauling necessary to get the free stuff, but it will happen soonish. :)
What’s ‘bucking’ mean?
‘Bucking’ is the term used for taking the big logs (basically trees with small branches removed) and using a chain saw to cut them into 18″ (or some other) size pieces, suitable for your furnace or wood stove. Our heater stove and furnace both take 18″ pieces, and the wood cook stove takes 18″ in a pinch but prefers 16″, so we usually cut a small amount in that size. Splitting is taking the round log pieces that are 18″ or so long, and splitting them into 4 or more smaller pieces suitable for going into whatever heater or cooker you’re using. :)
Thanks. Wonder if they call that ‘bucking’ here. I’ll have to find out.
Two winters’ worth of wood? I’m jealous. Especially since we have been…buying our wood.
Shock, gasp! :-)
Of course, we buy our wood. Like, we live in a Michigan suburb. Fires are only for snowy winter days. You know, drinking hot cocoa, wrapped in a snuggily blanket while sitting by the roaring wood fire in the fireplace.
Ah, yes. I remember those Michigan snowy days.
Alas! I too have not had to buy firewood in Iowa; but, that’s only because tornadoes, and straight line winds have felled two giant trees on my lot, the most recent an ancient, beautiful walnut tree. I picked up (Rick pay attention here)4 pieces that wouldn’t fit into the haul-away truck. I’ll not burn them but, my Colorado son-in-law will turn these pieces into a table, a stool and I will have that tree right with me again.
Yeah, I do the “unspeakable” all the time, haha. We buy all our wood in, then barrow it 50m up the section to the wood shed, the lawn is always too wet to drive a ute up there :(
On the odd occasion, we’ll drive around in the ute with the chainsaw in the back, and check what’s lying around on the side of the road. Most of the farms around here have a number of people getting wood off them, guess we were a little late in arriving .
I am embarrassed to say that although our land butts onto forestry we still buy our wood but from a neighbour who has felled pine on his land. I know it’s free if you have the right gear but we don’t and I think a chainsaw is best left in the hands of experts. Sounds like you got a great deal!
I agree completely with the chainsaw thing. Frankly, they terrify me. I suppose I need to learn how to use one, but I’m not very keen.
You are blessed to have some great neighbors. It’s amazing to me how many stories you write include this wonderful bunch of folks.
Another fun story! And yes…I’ve always bought for firewood but only for the random crackling fire in the winter.
this wood business sounds way too hard to me…how much could it cost?? At least you will keep the wood economy going, I am sure they miss your business and purchasing sure beats a sore back and missing fingers from a chainsaw…YIKES!
Wowzers! I was reading this and thinking, ‘Geez, that’s a lot of hard work and I’d be tempted to just pay someone to deliver it,’ but… it must feel extremely satisfying to sit around your warm fire in the knowledge that a few Saturday morning’s of hard graft were well worth the effort. Free firewood = seriously toasting! Great effort boys and glad your rural souls were rescued!
As for paying for fire wood – oh yes, been there, done that (when we had a log burner). But then we are city folk ;)
Have to say you can’t beat a real fire to heat your home – magic.
We’re supposed to have under floor heating (oooo, tres swish sounding in NZ I know), but the boiler is broken so we’ve got plug in electric heaters scattered around – thankfully our home is well insulated.
Enjoy your toasty free warmth :) I can just picture you with your feet up, sipping a pinot noir and eating olives :)
Living in suburban Wellington, I have to buy firewood – at $375 per cord (delivered) it’s an expensive practice!
I had a woodburner installed the year before last, which is noticeably more economical than the open fire, so one cord – if ordered early, dried and stored well – now lasts the whole winter.
I adore your blog – as a true-blue Kiwi, you make me laugh out loud at your wonderful summarizing of our quirky way of life.
Way-ta-go, mate!
$375 per cord, that’s outrageous!! We’re in the Wairarapa, and pay $160 for a cord, delivered. I shall no longer grumble about the price ……..
And I can testify to the fact that the amount of time it takes to collect that wood yourself makes plain ol’ buying it very, very appealing. Maybe Rick and I will return to buying wood… in secret. Don’t tell the neighbors! :-)
We bought logs in our first year here, 5 years ago, and our neighbour was equally horrified. Now Ian gives him a day’s worth of help to fell and chop and we take as much as we like for ourselves. I love our woodburner. In the winter I would marry it.
“It’s pronounced ‘yoot’”, HAHA! Love it. I never thought something I’ve been used to my whole life could have a laugh squeezed out of it.
:)
We have had so many downed trees lately that we haven’t had to pay for wood in awhile…but we used to! I love your stories Jared!
We bought wood the first *spring* we lived on the Farm, because we had just moved in and everything was still too wet to burn. By fall, however, we’d taken out two pesky alder trees in the lower pasture and burned that all winter. We’re nearly out of pesky alders on our own land now, but there’s a national forest up the road and we can get a permit to take wood from there ($15 for the season).
I’m learning to use the chainsaw. Jim got me a “girly” chainsaw, hooray! I can handle the regular saw, but getting it started requires a bit more hurk than God saw fit to endow upon me…and I always feel stupid having somebody else start my saw.
Good on you for learning to use the chainsaw. They terrify me. Rick uses our chiansaw but I so far refuse. I’d like to learn, especially with a little pruning chainsaw to prune the olive grove on my own. Recently I was eying the pruning saws at Fieldays (the big New Zealand agricultural show). Who knows?
Curious to catch up on the neighbors at Martinborough. Great story, Jared, to which I can relate. I have just spent many, many days myself, with some hired help with great big chainsaws, to help me get in my stash of winter wood. I’m coming back to New Zeanand soon to enjoy your Springtime and will return to N.California in November, just in time to sit by my cozy woodfire and read a book and reflect on my great adventure in N.Z.
Sometimes when I consider the time, labor costs, equipment expenses, etc..I ask: “Is it worth it?” I say “Absolutely!”. I love the whole process of gathering wood. If one lives close to the land and her abundance, receiving her gift of wood for my comfort is an honor. Sounds goofy? And as I enjoy the warmth, see the fire, remember the sweaty days and sore muscles as I sought out, cut down, hauled, cut into lengths, and stacked the wood, I am grateful. It is all part of sustaining my own lifestyle.
As an older woman, losing some of my strength, pulling the rope to start a chainsaw has become too difficult. I have found that an electric chainsaw is cheap and no hassle to start it. Now, I have help getting the logs to my house, then I finish off the project with the electric saw.
My woodsheds are full and what a comforting feelng to have it all from my own property!
Good job, guys! Now you have your story. Who can tell such a good story after a delivered truckload of wood??
So nice the hear from you. I do hope you’ll be stopping by Martinborough this spring. Your sentiments don’t sound goofy at all. I completely understand. Now if I could just have the courage to use a chainsaw…
Readers – Lily made an appearance in the post ‘Yurts and magic underwear‘ which is also available as a podcast.
We live in the 21st Century, so we use Heat Pumps…….
Have y’all heard of ‘central heating’ down there?!
We recently bought a house in suburban (Man, we live in the burbs now!) Wellington and ordered a cord of mixed, seasoned fire wood which was delivered to the house… I am a full on city girl from the UK used to central heating… this malarky of having to shift a huge pile of wood was EXHAUSTING in the Wellington rain! (Husband at work in a warm office) My back ached for two days!! But that said, on our wee section one of the trees was blown over last Sunday so this weekend’s chore will be to chop up the tree, then shift the bits down under the house to be next year’s firewood.. heh heh! I am jealous of all your free wood!
when i worked as a caregiver for my favorite 95 year old lady, beatrice, she was very strict about her fires. From the time I started caring for Beatrice in January, all the way through to May (and even the beginning of June) we had fires going every morning and she’d want them to last through the entire day. We would have firewood delivered to the house and two men would unload it out of a giant truck and pile it nicely into her garage. She would always want them to come inside so she could thank them for their hard work, and pay them herself. She would yell at me when I would let the fire get too low (old people like to keep the house at about 95 degrees), or if I had trouble getting the wood to light. “You’re not a girl scout are you?!” She’d growl at me as I had my head buried in the fireplace trying to get bits of newspaper to catch the big logs on fire. Once I was finished and had everything settled Beatrice would always compliment me on the nice blaze that I’d started, and tell me, “jeepers I love that smell.”
Hilarious! You sound like Cinderella. :-) I like that quote from Beatrice. “Jeepers, I love that smell.” Great stuff.
I always heated my house (an ex-state house in Strathmore, Wellington) using the fire, mostly burning some old dead trees that had been down the bottom of the garden, and pine cones that I collected wherever I went. Last year we did pay for firewood, but that was the first time. I was quite snobby about it as the best, and most romantic and natural way to heat your home. Then, at the end of last year, we got a heat pump put in. Oh, man… the simplicity and speed of it is amazing. We haven’t lit the fire once all winter.
We’ve had some friends try to convince us we need a heat pump. But call me old fashioned. I love the wood burner. I’m practically Amish, I suppose.
Wow! All that wood and hard work is so rustic, so natural. Too bad that wood stoves are many times over as polluting as coal or nuclear power.
In Africa, heating and cooking with wood causes more deaths than AIDS, from respiratory illnesses. It’s like having a race of giants smoking cigars.
A passive house is so much cleaner than a wood stove.
Since wood is a renewable energy source, we’re pretty happy with it. The environmental impact of using a woodburner depends on how you burn your wood. Fortunately modern wood-burning stoves send out far fewer pollutants than the ones from even the 1970s.
Key things for lower environmental impact are: drying wood outdoors for at least six months (dry wood burns cleaner), using clean newspaper and dry kindling, having your woodburner inspected regularly, and never burning things like household trash, plastics, magazines with colored inks, treated and painted wood, etc. They all release toxins.
Coal will eventually run out, and it releases its own toxins. And fortunately for us New Zealand is nuclear free!
I thought pine was not a good one to burn because it caused creosote build up in the fireplace….does it?
Everyone around here burns pine. We clean our fireplace once a year and have never had a problem. Also, I believe the drier the wood the less creosote. Hope that helps!