M. H. (Dutch) Salmon is the author of two novels and three books of non-fiction. He enjoys fishing and hunting and exploring the roadless regions of Southwest New Mexico. His latest work is: The Catfish as Metaphor: A Fisherman's American Journey.
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I have no particular expertise in the matter of putting up wood for the winter. Indeed, I consider myself lucky to have cut and chopped and split cordwood for years without ever slicing my leg open with a chainsaw or losing a toe to an ax.
But I do have a greater variety of experience than most. The firewood business holds a separate character all its own in different parts of the country.
In Upstate New York, elm used to have something of a following as a firewood, before the Elm Beetle did away with the trees. From the point of view of heat, elm was a good wood, but it smelled funny when it burned. Some would even say it smelled god-awful when it burned. As firewood, the demise of the elm was not a great loss.
I recall putting up some cherry in New York state. It burned hot and smelled good but did you ever try to split a cherry log? This fibrous tree refuses to yield. A chunk but a foot in diameter would take every wedge you had then leave you cussing and still swinging your ax.
Up there in the Northeast I recall maple as the best wood. It burned hot coals that lasted for hours, and it was not bad to handle. And for a while there we had a friend who owned a bowling alley and he would give us truck-loads of used pins, back when bowling pins were made of maple. Bowling pins, made of maple and free-of-charge, are a great firewood; that was a strike!
I wasn't prepared for the wood gathering I found when I worked on a ranch in South Texas. There, mesquite was the thing. Compared to the lofty and prodigious forests I was used to, Texas mesquite was more shrub than tree. No chain saw was to be had at the ranch, so I cut them with an ax and skidded the logs in with a horse.
Mesquite will keep you busy all day cutting, and sharpening your ax, and when you're done it's not much of a log. And when you consider how hot and savory mesquite burns under a barbecue grill, I think it's a shame to waste the wood heating your house.
In Northern Minnesota, heating with wood is a serious business. I used to go through nine cords a winter heating my house in Lake of the Wood county. The preferred woods were tamarack, and the white paper birch.
I've never gathered or burned any nicer wood than the white paper birch. In Northern Minnesota, it grew wild in great, dense, lofty groves; you could cut your winter's supply on a half acre permit. It went up straight and true, not many branches to trim, and it wasn't hard to get a sixty-footer to fall where you wanted it.
Back at the farm it split good, burned hot and sweet all night, and the paper-like bark was a ready-made kindling. Great stuff.
Sadly, there is no white paper birch in New Mexico.
We do have some good firewood in Southwest New Mexico. None has all of the good traits presented by white paper birch but, so long as the wood holds out, we needn't complain.
Basically, we have three good possibilities for firewood locally: piñon, and the several varieties of oak and juniper. In BTU's, the piñon and juniper are good, and the oak is excellent.
Piñon of course is our quintessential southwestern tree. Just to cut, put up and burn a cord over a winter makes you feel like a native.
And juniper should receive its share of accolades, particularly the big, alligator juniper. It is distinctive for the way it pops and crackles in the fireplace or stove, all the while providing a pleasant cedar-like aroma.
And a good chunk of Gambel's oak? Well, it burns like hard coal.
It is easy enough to savor the particular pleasures involved in cutting, gathering and burning our distinctive southwestern trees, all the more so when we know that usable stands are increasingly limited.
None of these trees grows in the vast, thick groves that I recall from the evergreen and deciduous forests of the North and East. Oak and alligator juniper in particular grow in a very scattered and disparate fashion.
And the piñon pine is a very slow-growing tree. A Minnesota birch, for example, will grow to maturity in a fraction of the years it takes a piñon, and when it's done the birch is a much bigger tree. In most areas, it is already unthinkable to cut other than dead or dying piñon, alligator juniper, or oak.
On my own small acreage, there was for years a big juniper that was the first thing you saw as you crossed the creek and entered the property on the dirt road. It was our little homestead's first landmark, and I was rather attached to it. But every year its branches were aging more and more brown, sporting less and less green.
You hate to cut down an old friend, but the time had come and a couple of weeks ago I lopped it over with a chain saw, and the whole family trimmed the branches, and sectioned it up into fireplace wood. I'll age it for a year and then it will yield one final purpose, even though it's dead.
Increasingly, we must think of each large piñon, juniper or oak as a scarce gem that provides a rare gift. Henry David Thoreau, among other writers, has commented on the pleasures of firewood, and has noted that such wood allows you to beat the cold of winter twice; once as you cut it, gather it, and put it up, and again when you're seated near it as it burns.
On private lands, we must cut our southwestern firewood with discretion and an eye to long-term conservation. On agency lands, we need to follows the harvest regulations set up by the Forest Service, BLM, and the State.
Firewood is a renewable resource. But in the Southwest, the rate of renewal is slow. If you've a mind, cut and gather a truck-load this fall. Split it to the proper size - kindling and logs - and lay your fire. Give it to the flames and enjoy.
To retain this pleasure, be gentle with our southwestern trees.