~~Growing Firewood~~

Beechwood fires are bright and clear

If the logs are kept a year,

Chestnut's only good they say,

If for logs 'tis laid away.

Make a fire of Elder tree,

Death within your house will be;

But ash new or ash old,

Is fit for a queen with crown of gold

Birch and fir logs burn too fast

Blaze up bright and do not last,

it is by the Irish said

Hawthorn bakes the sweetest bread.

Elm wood burns like churchyard mould,

E'en the very flames are cold

But ash green or ash brown

Is fit for a queen with golden crown

Poplar gives a bitter smoke,

Fills your eyes and makes you choke,

Apple wood will scent your room

Pear wood smells like flowers in bloom

Oaken logs, if dry and old

keep away the winter's cold

But ash wet or ash dry

a king shall warm his slippers by.

The firewood poem was written by Celia Congreve, is believed to be first published in THE TIMES newspaper on March 2nd 1930.

 

We scored some Ash trees for $10 each. We are now growing our own firewood!! (just a little excited about that, I get excited easily) We picked the ash tree based on the poem, no not really. :)  We picked the ash tree for our woodlot because we've read that they grow pretty fast and that they are excellent to burn. The poem just confirmed what we had read.

 Dusty and Austin are out in the rain planting them right now. We picked up 10 trees to start but hope to get a few more in the future.

 The trees are 7-10 feet tall. We will be staking each tree for added security. To keep costs down we picked out some wood scraps from our scrap pile and will use them as stakes.

 We picked an area of the property that isn't currently being utilized. Dusty installed irrigation piping in that area last year so watering shouldn't be to hard.  We hope that each tree will grow big enough that we will be able to harvest at least a cord of wood per tree.

Cost breakdown: 
$10 per tree
Irrigation water $1-$2 per tree per year (approx)
Electricity to pump the water. (I really don't know, probably a few bucks a year as we only water in the summer)
Total cost per tree for the first year:  $15
Total cost per tree each year after: $5 or less
If we grew each tree for 5 years and then harvested, assume we got a cord of wood from each tree that would make the total cost per cord $40 or so, plus we wouldn't have to spend the gas money driving to Timbuktu for firewood. We would be able to harvest in our own backyard.

We have some unused space between some fencing and the lawn, while I was out running errands today the boys planted some snow peas. Great use of space!!