Woodpile

Most people are aware that the wood from different species of tree varies in appearance as well as in strength, but not all realise how widely the working characteristics also vary; some are excellent for green-wood work, some are easier to work when seasoned; some cut cleanly with the chainsaw, some are more suited to hand working; and when it comes to recycling the left-overs into thermal energy, their burning qualities differ enormously too.

Here is a traditional Wood Verse which used to hang over many a mantelpiece:

Beech-wood fires burn bright and clear

If the logs are kept a year:

Store your beech for Christmastide,

With new-cut holly laid beside.

Chestnut’s only good, they say,

If for years ‘tis stored away;

Birch and fir-wood burn too fast,

Blaze too bright and do not last;

Flames from larch will shoot up high,

Dangerously the sparks will fly.

But ash-wood green and ash-wood brown

Are fit for a queen with a golden crown.

 

Oaken logs, if dry and old,

Keep away the winter’s cold;

Poplar gives a bitter smoke,

Fills your eyes and makes you choke;

Elm-wood burns like churchyard mould,

E’en the very flames are cold.

Hawthorn bakes the sweetest bread,

So it is in Ireland said;

Apple-wood will scent the room,

Pear-wood smells like flowers in bloom.

But ash-wood wet and ash-wood dry

A king may warm his slippers by.