Is anyone burning wood they planted themselves?

[coppiceer]

Hazel and Ash. Hazel on a 5-year cycle provides medium sticks and kindling; Ash on a 10-year cycle provides decent sized logs which can easily be processed with a home chainsaw and splitter.

[wrsni]

Ash on a 10-year cycle provides decent sized logs which can easily be processed with a home chainsaw and splitter.

 

Except that the only ash you can plant for now is whatever self-seeded stuff you can gather up around the back of hedges and such like.

 

I've gathered up some this past two years and have some more eyed out to gather up in the next week or two but it wouldn't support planting on any significant scale.

[Martin Jenkins]

Hazel and Ash. Hazel on a 5-year cycle provides medium sticks and kindling; Ash on a 10-year cycle provides decent sized logs which can easily be processed with a home chainsaw and splitter.

 

Me too on both hazel and ash - with absolutely tons of alder as well, in my coppice area.

 

I have ended up with a patch of land which really old maps have "Alder bed" written on them - so seems good.

 

The person from whom I bought the land scoffed at the alders, when I asked him about their firewood utility - useless he said - but I have found that it seasons really quickly and burns really nicely.

 

Ash takes flipping ages!

[Mortimer Firewood]

Alder and ash should be about the same for drying/ seasoning are the as logs bigger by any chance?

[spandit]

Hazel and Ash. Hazel on a 5-year cycle provides medium sticks and kindling; Ash on a 10-year cycle provides decent sized logs which can easily be processed with a home chainsaw and splitter.

 

I know the theory, just wondered who is actually doing it in practice, rather than harvesting wood planted by someone else? My hazel is only a year old but the chestnut I'm putting in is already older. I'm hoping along with the alder we should get a bit of firewood in years to come, although I haven't got enough space to be truly self sufficient

[spandit]

Except that the only ash you can plant for now is whatever self-seeded stuff you can gather up around the back of hedges and such like.

 

I don't really understand the logic behind this - surely we should be planting more ash rather than less, so there's more chance of a resistant one growing? I've only got a handful on my property and none of a decent size but there is the odd seedling coming up

[wrsni]

Well to be exact, you CAN plant it, but you can't transport it, so you can't go and get anything to plant!

 

Just shutting the stable door after the horse is long gone as usual.

 

I try to content myself with the fact that I'm doing all I can do by planting as much locally gathered self seeded stuff as possible. Also have a couple of friends who gather stuff for me as well.

 

You don't get the logic in their decision because there isn't any!

[Marko]

Just found this photo of our hybrid willow patch where we grew on whips to expand the stock so whilst the stools were about 4 or 5 years old the growth is approx 9 months (with the container is in the picture for scale).

 

This patch is to be left for me to see the optimum time to harvest this variety as logs / TR70 fuel. I suspect 5 years but it might be less. I didn't believe all the claims on the web so thought it best to test it out for myself.

 

Of the trees we planted, the ash and hazel is doing OK but the interplanted fields of Syc and Alder are doing spectacularly well.

[sandspider]

I know the theory, just wondered who is actually doing it in practice, rather than harvesting wood planted by someone else? My hazel is only a year old but the chestnut I'm putting in is already older. I'm hoping along with the alder we should get a bit of firewood in years to come, although I haven't got enough space to be truly self sufficient

 

When you say you don't have enough space to be truly self sufficient, do you mean self sufficient in firewood, or self sufficient in everything? I think two or three acres of woods would be enough to keep my going for a good while...

 

But then I don't just burn logs.

[spandit]

We could be self sufficient in food, plenty of space for that, but to have enough trees on a 5 year rotation would take more land than we have (or are willing to plant) I suspect.

 

Fortunately, at the moment, we have a good (free!) log supplier and I'm always on the scrounge where I can be...