How many trees to a cord of wood?
If you were going chop a few trees by yourself, by hand (ax or chainsaw), how many trees would you have to fell to get a cord of wood? I’m assuming average size trees — not huge redwood type! Also can you use fresh cut wood or do you have to cure it? This is for a story – I live in the desert so I don’t know this stuff. Thanks!
5 Responses
Carlos R
05 Jun 2010
JamesB7476
05 Jun 2010
Variations in tree sizes and types of trees available to be cut makes it impossible to measure the amount of trees in a cord of wood.
In my experience in Texas, I can usually cut down a mature oak tree and get 3/4 cord of wood from it. A mature mesquite tree only makes 1/4 cord of wood at best.
Also, larger trees can produce larger cuts that can then be split into many pieces, our large oak trees can be cut at 16 inches and then split into 12 different pieces of cord wood.
chin
05 Jun 2010
a cord is 4x4x8 feet, and it all deepends on the trees size.
daughterofdrknes
05 Jun 2010
depends on the size and type of tree.. a cord is: 4 ft deep x 4 feet high x 8 feet long or 90 cubic feet of solid wood….
cowboydoc
05 Jun 2010
My Son and I living in the woods of Northern Minnesota cut trees for both the mills as a part time job on week-ends and for firewood. We cut fifteen cord of wood every winter for firewood and then we’d cut about three cord a day working pretty hard. This is cut, and hand piled, then we’d use the skidder to move it.
This was all Poplar wood, some Balm of Gilead, some pine. For the firewood, we’d cut Red Oak and ash, some Swamp ash. It would take about four days to cut the wood into stove lengths and then we’d use the tractor to split it.
Cutting wood like this is hard and takes a lot out of a person, it did me. We did this for almost 25 years.
If you’re writing a story, you want to make it believable. Do NOT have the person use an axe. That is WAY too much work, and far too time-consuming. Let them use a chain saw to fell the tree and to cut it into fireplace lengths, like 17". Then they would use a maul and wedges to split the logs into firewood sized pieces.
A cord is 4′ by 4′ by 8′, which is 128 cubic feet. And it is to be tightly stacked, meaning a chipmunk can get through, but probably not a squirrel, and certainly not a cat.
How many trees? Well, that obviously depends on the size of the tree, meaning both length and girth. A really big tree can render a full cord. But it would probably take two "average" trees to get a cord. Whether it’s newly cut or aged does not matter. If it’s a full cord of wood when you cut, split, and stack it, it will still be a cord a year later, after it has seasoned.
And don’t forget to have them save the twigs for kindling.
And see if you can work in this saying: "Firewood warms you twice – once when you split it, and once when you burn it."
Good luck with your story.