Preparing For The Cold When It's Warm!

With the ground being harder we've been moving some firewood around. 

As soon as it gets warm my mind automatically switches to preparing for the winter. Preserving food, getting the wood ready to heat us. 

 This short video talks a bit about that and talks about when I was on building sites collecting my offcuts. 

Let me know what you think!

When do you start prepping for winter?

Firewood Gives You Freedom - Cooking & Heating

With the cold snap gone it's worth evaluating what went well and what didn't. 

I like to also think what would happen if the power got switched off and water pipes froze? Remember that help often takes a long time to come from some service providers (they've been "fixing" a leaking gas main down our road for over a year now...). Maybe would be left without heat, as it is many are worried about the cost of their heating and having it on less as a result. 

When I put in our wood fired range it did feel like a bit of an extravagance. It was a lot of money at the time and created a huge amount of work with the fireplace alterations. 

Moving Firewood

 It's that time of year - the air has the Autumnal feel and it makes me think of the fact we'll be lighting the fire soon. 

We have plenty of seasoned firewood but there was a few loads down the field that needed bringing up closer to the house. 

A good job for the kids.

The Floor Is Lava

 These guys were supposed to be moving firewood, but stopped as apparently "The floor is lava". I love hearing them play outside, their days are just filled with laughter and they often stay out until dark. 

They did move some wood for me though. It's nice that I can cut some up then get them to bring it in that evening. Makes them feel part of the process to help keep us warm and they enjoy helping (that's what I tell them anyway).

Always lots of wood to process into firewood here, if I get my act together we have the next few years sorted, especially as it's oak! 

Who else is keeping up with cutting firewood for the future?

Idiot Stick

 I'll do some proper posts soon - things have been busy with Christmas and I have lots of magazine articles to write as well (not that I'm complaining - I love doing those) 

Today was a lovely calm day before my wife goes back to work tomorrow. I decided to start teaching my eldest daughter some axe skills. 

Just simple splitting of some kindling. In the end she filled two chicken feed bags, so she took one round to our elderly neighbours and put one in the woodshed for us to use. You could tell she was super proud of herself and also the fact she could carry the whole sack full - my neighbour even messaged me to say he couldn't believe she carried all that! 

Movable Firewood Store

Firewood storage is still something I struggle with here. I can fill up our old tin shed with dry wood but it won't season in there as there's no air movement. The other lean-to part of the shed has been filled to the brim with wood to season but I still have lots to store. 

I have messed about filling up pallets before now with wood to season, using collars to make them stackable. This really didn't work as the air couldn't get to the wood and it made it sweat and then go mouldy. 

I needed a different approach. 

Children Working - Moving Firewood

I've been trying to clear the fallen trees and branches from the storms damage this winter. 

I'm also trying to be better with future fire wood and process it before I store it. That way it'll season better and I won't be left with huge rings of wood that harden and are far more difficult to split. 

So I've been out there a few hours at a time and when out there I've been dividing my time with half and hour on the chainsaw and half an hour on the maul splitting the wood I've just cut. I can cut far more than I can split though! 

So my plan has been to leave some of the splitting until the evenings when I've got the kids back from school or nursery. That way I can split the wood while they're either playing or helping and it's great to keep them outdoors on these nice evenings. 

 As it turns out they didn't want to play at all, they were so keen to help me it was lovely! As I was splitting the wood they were loading it onto the trailer, they worked as a team and helped each other, they didn't even moan once!

 They did the full load themselves, I couldn't quite believe it.
They loved ridding in the trailer as well, bouncing around! Something I have fond memories of as a child as well.

They then helped me unload it when we got back to the house and didn't stop until it was all in the shed. They then ran off and played outside whilst I cooked tea, making disgusting mixtures on the patio, great to see kids being kids. 

Great to have my little helpers with me today. The fact that a 2 year old, a 4 year old and a a 6 year old actually can help and saved me lots of time this evening is amazing. I'm lucky to have such helpful kids! Long may it last!

Preparing Wood For Next Winter

When you're a smallholder or homesteader you're always preparing for something. When one jobs finishes you have to think about the next one, or what you'll do the next year, that's the cycle of things with this lifestyle.

Our wood burner is on a lot less this time of year but I still need to think how I'm going to fuel it next year.

Now is the perfect time to start topping up our firewood levels, there's plenty of storm damaged wood on the ground and it needs cleaning up before the grass starts growing, otherwise it just grows rubbish and weeds around it.

I spent a few hours out there yesterday and got one area cleaned up but still need to do more today. I'm out of practice with a chainsaw though and I know I'll ache in the morning as it uses muscles I'm not used to using!

Feels good to do some proper smallholding jobs rather than working on the house - although I have so much to do in the house but that's not as critical as getting the fields ready for the sheep!

Who else is doing some smallholder maintenance and tidying up at the moment?

Storm Damage

During the snow storms I noticed a bit of storm damage in the one field I rent. 

 A poplar tree had fallen over. In fairness to the tree I'd been on about taking it down since the two  next to it fell over a few years ago. The first one is here and the second one is in a post here.

 Now although I do get the wood from this tree (I've asked the landlord and they've had so much storm damage in their garden that they've got enough firewood for years), there is also a fair bit of work that'll go into sorting this out.

I'm going to have to log and split all the wood. Good because we burn a lot of wood, but it's not he best firewood in the world, but you don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

 I'm also going to have to repair the fence.

I've already repaired this section of fence before in atypical farmers fashion but shoving a few hurdles in the holes. I think when I get the tree out it might have to be a more permanent fix with fence posts and wire!

Some Of Next Years Firewood

Last weekend I managed to get round to cutting up that massive branch that fell out of one of our giant oak trees last summer. 

 The branch was the size a of a good sized tree, with plenty of wood on it to keep us warm. The smaller stuff will be alight to burn next year and the bigger stuff the year after. 

I didn't bother cutting up the main bit of cord wood though as I haven't got the time to split it and it's easier to move in two big lumps.

I then had a helper pick up all the wood with me.  

Bless her she worked really hard and kept telling me how strong she was. She moved wood for as long as I did and didn't stop until it was done. A little grafter in the making I think! 

Who else has started getting next years firewood (and the year after) already? Feels good to have some heat in the bank! 

Saw Buck

The weather was awful yesterday so I was a little undecided with what to do. I wanted to make the most of the daylight so I thought I'd just go and cut some firewood up for next year. When you're kitted up and the saw running you don't notice the weather too much, well I don't.

I am fed up of cutting branches on the floor though. It's no good for my back or for the saw blade, every time I skim the ground it blunts it slightly. So I decided to knock together a quick saw buck to make it a little easier and efficient for me.

My new saw buck.

Made from 4 lengths of rough 4x2

  It only took me half an hour to knock up and should last a little while so long as I'm careful with the saw. I used some old timber to make it with so it didn't cost anything other than a few screws and three bolts. 

Loaded with wood

First little batch done, wood given to me by a neighbour - I might add a bottom rail to the saw buck to strengthen it a little bit.

It's much easier than bending down for each cut. cutting the willow we pollarad the other day.

It's a little tricky to get the wood to stay where you want to start with, but once I got going it made cutting the branches much easier. I could do multiple lenghts in one cut and have a pile of fire wood in no time. 

With the light nights now it means I can spend a bit of time each night splitting this logged up wood ready for burning next year (if it dries enough). I'm planning on making up a palletised system for storing, drying and moving my firewood using pallet collars chicken wire and euro pallets. Last time I had them stored in just pallets with pallet collars but there wasn't enough air flow and some started to go mouldy.

Does anyone else use a saw buck for cutting firewood? Is it similar to mine? How do you store your firewood over the summer?

Pollarding Willow

My brother sprang a nice surprise on me this weekend again with a visit with his chainsaw. He's buying a house and wants to make sure he does some jobs for me before he need to be working on his own place (and so that I'll also be available to help him when he gets it).

The big tree inthe middle is an old willow tree leaning into the field.

 Looking around the fields we decided that the one oak that needs a lot of work doing to it was too big of a task to do on a Sunday and he'd possibly need another climber with him, so we settled for some willows on the property line. 

The whole hedge is overgrown and neglected but provides a nice barrier so I'm not going to attack it too much, but there are a few trees growing out over the field that need attention. The one willow was very rotten in the middle and would probably fall if left for too many more years. We decided to pollard it, so new growth would be produced at the top of the tree trunk (away from rabbits) and in this way it would have a new crop of wood on it in a few years time. 

Trees used to be pollarded for many reasons, to produce a leaf hay to store food for animals in the winter, to produce timber for different things like basket making or hurdles and now people pollard to produce an attractive shape for their trees. 

It needed climbing to tackle it so not a job for me!

The tree pretty much finished with Dave just roped into the last branch

The tree finished, this should regrow well and produce some more fire wood in a few years time

One pile of firewood

Even the smaller branches get used for fire wood when I'm cutting it up

The second pile from another willow

The piles of brash ready to be burnt when it's dried out a bit.

 As well as this willow Dave also managed to do another, much more awkward willow and a few small ash that were growing from the base of a much bigger tree, adding to the pile of future firewood.

Hopefully all this wood will go some way to provide for next years heating (once I've got it cut, split and stacked) and although I know it's not a great wood it still burns well in our wood burner if it's dry. 

Anyone else been pollarding trees for firewood or other reasons?

Branch Out Of the Oak Tree

With some heavy winds at the weekend one of our oak trees suffered the loss of one of its limbs.

 Typically this is the only tree that we've done some major work on trying to preserve, but the damage isn't too great. It amazes me when what seems like a small branch falls out of a large tree like this, the branch is as big as medium tree! Huge amounts of wood are in these trees! I'll do a post on the nine large oaks we've got here at some point.

I'll have to get the chainsaw out next weekend and log the branch for some of next years firewood and then get my brother to climb up and tidy it all up a bit.

Anyone else having to do work to try to stop their old trees falling apart?

Hybrid Willow Coppice - Two Plots Planted

With my talk of planting a hybrid willow coppice some family (smallholder) friends said that they'd started to plant one last year and would I like some cuttings. They planted around 700 cuttings and as you have to cut them back after the first year they had plenty of wood spare.

 They gave me around 200 cuttings which is plenty for me to be going on with. It's two different varieties Q83 and Chinese.

 This is enough for two out of my five plots that I'll be growing on a short rotation coppice (SRC). So last Saturday I marked the two plots out with 1 metre spacings so all the cuttings would be going in at 1m x 1m square (which is what I've read is recommmended on some websites).

 I put the cuttings in by making a hole with a metal bar (an old muck rake tine) then pushing them into the wet ground leaving about 2 inches showing. I plan to mulch round it all quite soon with wood chip, as I'm meant ot have a few loads coming my way, this should stop it having to complete with the grass and keep other weeds down.

My little helper did get a bit distracted towards to end of the job though!

Hopefully I should see some growth in the next month or so. I've got to get the airgun charged up to make sure I keep the rabbits numbers down, as apparently they don't react well to being chewed by the white tailed little blighters (mind you what tree does!).

Anyone else planting trees for firewood at the moment?

Tree Over The Footpath

Just the other day I said to our neighbouring landowner that there's a dead poplar that looks like it could fall at any time. Normally this wouldn't be such an issue but it was leaning over the public footpath so I thought it was worth mentioning.

Right over the footpath!

Then on Saturday evening I had my first proper walk round my fields in a week & I noticed this tree hanging over the stile. Not good. Not good at all. I never want anyone to get hit by a tree but least of all when it's on my land (even if the tree isn't mine!).
I popper over to see "old" Ken (who helps look after the neighbours land) and we decided to sort it out first thing in the morning.
It was a little more tricky than we would have liked, as it was hung up in the other tree and we didn't want it to land on either the stile or the fence if we could help it.
I managed to get my little John Deere 2020's loader under the main trunk to take the weight whilst Ken cut it from the stump, I then (only just mind you) managed to lift it on top of the hedge. The weight of the tree however meant that I couldn't get the back wheels to grip.
We had to try something else. I got a ladder and a long chain, climbed up and attached it to the trunk, turned the tractor round and pulled her off the hedge at a good enough speed that it would miss the stile as well! It all went to plan in the end!

Ken clearing a path for the footpath

 I decided that I might as well log the wood there and then so logged it all up and we split it 50-50.

Firewood for my efforts

Poplar isn't much good as firewood but it's better than nothing and it's cleared up the path without anyone moaning at us. I was quite pleased with my efforts for a Sunday and felt like I'd been a good neighbour again (although to a different one this time)!

Moving Firewood

 Last Saturday, between the rain showers, I managed to get organised with the rest of our firewood.

Moving firewood the easy way

As the ground was quite dry I decided to move all the pallets of wood I split in the spring up with the tractor. There's still some to split so I stored these in a separate pallet as a job to keep me warm in the winter (all the big difficult bits unfortunately)! 

Firewood split and stored in pallets covered with a sheet

It's not the prettiest way of storing firewood but it means I can move it easily and the bottom layer won't rot on the ground. I do have the first load of wood stored in an old shed but until I can get planning to build some more buildings this is looking like my best option.
Five pallets cut and split. I'd say three of these can be burnt this year (the tree was felled last year) and two need another year to season (which I hope they will in this storage - I might drill holes in the sides of the pallet collars to let the air circulate more), I've marked them up ready and I'm already planning where more of our firewood is coming from.
Anyone else have ideas for firewood storage?

An Hour A Day

To keep on top of the work on my little small holding I've adopted my new ethos, which is to work "an hour a day" on it. This can be any job from gardening to fixing household appliances.

I always want to do more, but the trick is not to burn myself out as I have quite a full day anyway.

Although I have Mondays off to spend with my little girl, I do normally end up working on a Saturday, just moving my weekend forward one day. During my normal working day I tend to get up just before 6, do my chores, have breakfast and leave for work by 6.30 so I can start at 7.30. I then work a full day as a carpenter, finish just after 5 and get home just after 6 (I've no idea what 9 to 5 is like as I've never done it). I then spend time with my little girl and wife, have some tea before putting her to bed (the girl not the wife). This is when I go and do my extra hour.

 

Splitting wood seems to be a task that never ends but for some reason I love it.

In truth it can end up being more than an hour but I do seem to be getting a lot done lately.

I've split piles and piles of wood, planted loads of seeds, maintained tools, weeded the drive, cleaned out chickens, etc.
Big jobs can still be done at the weekend, and most of Sunday is normally dedicated to this, but getting rid of a lot of the smaller ones in the week makes it all more manageable.
Now if I could just get to bed before 11 I'd probably find getting up a whole lot easier!
How does everyone else manage their time to get things done?

Firewood

Our first year using wood to provide some of our heat has shown me how woefully under prepared we were!

Quite a bit of wood lying around that needs splitting and storing

 Luckily we had my tree surgeon brother to bail us out and provide (give) us more seasoned wood when we needed it. The trouble is I had plenty of wood cut from trees that we'd felled, I just didn't do anything with it. Chucked outside in a heap it isn't going to heat anyone.
This year I'm going to make more of an effort with using wood fuel. Every night I'm splitting some wood and storing it in an old shed I absolutely hate, but I also need to finish cleaning out this shed from the last people who lived here (anyone want a workout gym from the 70's or a collection of plastic snooker trophies?). The shed is falling down slowly but it should last long enough to season some firewood for a winter or two.
I think by the time I've split and stacked all the wood and the wood I get from work as kindling, we should have enough for a few winters.

This sheds very existence offends me, but while I've got it I might as well use it

 As well as this I'm going to look into putting in a wood burner in the summer as our open fire is just too wasteful of wood. So tips and advice on wood burners will be gratefully taken! Also doing this will let us lay out the sitting room differently, which in turn might help some of our space issues.

Who can tell me what the top tool is called?

How do other people tackle the cutting, splitting and storing of their firewood? And what time of year do you normally do all of these things?