Chop

It's true that having a wood burner warms you up three times: once when you fell the tree, once when you split the logs, and once when you burn the wood. It's actually only twice for me: a friend fells trees on the property for me. I know my limitations.

One of the advantages of living in a series of small cabins is that they don't take long to heat up in winter. However, one of the disadvantages is that the woodburners used to heat them are by necessity small, and therefore the wood that fills them also needs to be cut small.

As a result I have to split slices of tree into what would be considered close to kindling-size to most people with 'proper' woodburners. It is time-consuming. 

This is a particular issue with the burner in the new cabin (living room / bedroom) which has a tiny tubular body and burns only five pieces of wood at a time. 

In fact this burner is a problem child in all respects. It's difficult to get started and once it is going there's a real knack to regulating it. It is very good at blast-burning the wood, and equally good at going out. It also gets clogged up with soot very quickly. 

At some point towards the end of last winter it became even more temperamental than usual and smoked from every tiny orifice, filling the cabin with wood smoke. Everything I did resulted in the same outcome. I gave up and used the wee electric heater for the rest of winter. 

I bought it with the cabin because it was recommended by the builder. I should have checked it out much more: I regret the decision. When I get my next new cabin (to replace the truck - bathroom, kitchen, dining, pantry) in four years time it will have a more conventional small woodburner.

The chimney sweep will be here in a couple of weeks to clean both the new cabin burner and the potbelly in the study, to get them ready for winter heating. Hence the wood-chopping. My wood-store needs replenishing. 

The property is bounded by more than a dozen huge (live) macrocarpa trees and a few felled dead ones. There is a large pile of chainsawed slices of various old trunks in the 'wood-yard' which I have started to split at a rate of one barrow-load a day. In that way my back and arms barely notice they're being stretched and exercised and the wood-store fills as if by magic.

Sunny today. Perfect for wood-chopping, picking more apples and walking with Bean.