Rotating Firewood

by Skip Stocks
(Federal Way, WA )

Question

I am a disabled vet, due to extensive back problems. I purchase one to two cords of firewood a year.

I have a shed to keep it dry; but when I get firewood, it often needs to be seasoned some more.

My goal is to put new wood into the back of my woodshed, use wood at the front first, and once the new wood has had some time to season, move it to the front of the shed. However, apart from manually rackin' & stackin' it all again and again to move it, I can't seem to find a way to move the firewood around in the shed (it's 8' w X 10' h X 12' d).

Any ideas?

Answer

Although they work great for keeping your firewood sheltered from the weather, a firewood shed does make rotating firewood difficult.

Most people (including myself) begin filling their firewood shed early in the spring by stacking the freshly cut wood in the back of the empty shed. Depending on how much wood you burn and the amount of time you spend cutting firewood, it could take weeks or even months to fill up your firewood shed.

Unfortunately, when you're all finished cutting firewood, the greenest and wettest firewood is stacked last and it's the first wood you grab to burn. Meanwhile, the driest wood is located in the back of the shed out of reach until you use the wood in front of it.

I just had a conversation on this topic a few weeks ago with someone who has been burning firewood for over 50 years. The experienced firewood user also complained how all the driest wood was in the back of the shed and the wettest wood was near the front door.

In a perfect world, you could just stack seasoned firewood in the shed and not have to worry about it, but that's not usually the case. Unfortunately, I only have 2 suggestions to cure the problem.

First, as you suggested you could rotate and re-stack the firewood but that's a lot of extra time and labor. When it comes to firewood, I'm always looking for a way to make it faster and easier so I don't think I would re-stack the wood in your shed.

My only other suggestion is to install a second entry door on the rear of the shed if the design allows it. A set of sliding doors (like barn doors) or maybe a roll up door (like a garage door) on the back of the shed would make it really easy to access the back of your wood stack where all the fully seasoned wood is located.

With the second door you could have full access to which ever side of the firewood you want. Of course, this idea would involve buying and installing some type of door, but it would be a solution you could benefit from every year. This would eliminate the need to re-stack your firewood and save you a lot of time and hard work!

I hope this helps,

Nick
Firewood For Life