Log Hunting

First of all, thanks for your suggestions and input on my last post about the videos. I am going to release the videos, plans and handbook for sale and also offer a “course” with weekly meetings and Q and A. I will be talking to other folks who have done courses to iron out the details. I am always open to suggestions and appreciate your willingness to help.

For something that doesn’t run away, logs sure can be elusive, at least the good ones. It’s a constant topic between me and my friends in the area. If I could only work with one species for the rest of my days, it would be white oak. But as much as I love my region, the white oaks don’t grow much this far north and when they do it’s often slow growth and small. Between the scarcity and the whiskey barrel makers, I’ve nearly given up on finding them. Recently the fellow who is sawing my pine for seats showed me one in his yard. It was a mixed bag of traits. It’s about 30” across on the small end, but it has quite a flare, but it looked like it has zero twist (turned out to be true), but it’s rather pricey ($280 for only the bottom 6’), but it has no signs of defects, but the pith is off center….Anyway, I took the plunge.

I end sealed it with Anchor seal to prevent small checks from forming because the small end it the best wood, far from the flare and I wanted to preserve it. It’s best to do this immediately after sawing. If this log had been twisted, it would have been a nightmare to split, but you can see the bark runs straight. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy the first split ran. On a big log like this, large wooden gluts are essential.

It made lots of amazing noises while splitting. I enjoyed taking a breath and listening to the sounds of the fibers popping. Turn the sound up and take a listen.

Once open, the surfaces were like tabletops

There’s lots of great wood in there! If you wonder how I came to think of medullary rays as playing cards between the pages of a book, take a look at this, clear as a bell.

This oak was so big that I had to split parts of it into eighths to be able to get them off the trailer. I used to have an A frame set up with an engine hoist I could use to lift logs off the trailer, I gotta make one again, it would truly improve my life. Plus it’s best to keep the logs as big as possible until you are using them so they don’t lose too much moisture. I would have much preferred to get this off the trailer in one piece, because it was just the start of my log handling for the day. My friend Pete had an ash he took down and offered up. So after the trailer was free of the white oak, I headed to New Hampshire to split another log. This one is a no brainer. Straight, even, no blemishes and free.

The only problem is that the bugs have already made it into the outer layers, but there is a lot of good wood to be had. We cut up a couple of sections and I split em up. If only everything split as sweetly and cleanly as ash. One wedge and one glut and the split ran the full 10 foot section. It was very physically demanding working at the bottom of a small slope. Some of the shorter pieces I flipped end for end up the slope to the trailer and some we used a tractor to pull out. I’ve said it before, I love this labor, especially when the logs are good. It can be demoralizing when the logs aren’t this his of a quality. The diminishing return on expense, effort and time requires that you get comfortable with the hard fact that some logs are meant to burn. One big difference I’ve noticed in handling logs for 25 years, is that now I often need a day off afterwards!

Here is an update on everyones friend Joel Paul.

I stopped by with Blake Loree (who was visiting from Texas, where he makes wonderful chairs) and had a great visit. He is walking around without a cane, working on mobilizing his new knee and getting back to doing what he can around the farm. His spirits are high and it’s in no small way due to the support of this community that really showed up for him. I’m so impressed with his strength and will to heal.