Wood

With autumn here and winter approaching its time to make sure there is a good supply of wood ready for the winter. Our major source of wood comes from the Eucalyptus trees, which have been invading the farm at the top of the Castañarina meadow. Rather than clearing them in one go we have been taking a couple of trees down each year; more or less what we estimate we will burn in one winter. We cut these large trees in late summer; split the wood while it is still green (as it is easier) and then store the wood for a year, ready for use the following winter when it is drier.

Dead trees and windfalls are another source of wood. The dead wood tends to be drier so we normally use it the same year. We’ve slowly been changing our approach to this type of wood. We use to only use the larger branches for the wood stoves, burning the smaller twigs and branches on the farm. However over the last couple of years we have been using the smaller twigs for kindling.


We break them into small pieces and store them in boxes or wherever. Preparing so many small twigs for burning is quite labour intensive, but I’ve come to learn that’s normal with a more sustainable lifestyle, you substitute petrol and machines for human labour!

Some of the wood is used in the hotel in the open fire in the downstairs lounge, but most goes for use in our own house where all the heating is done with wood and we can also heat the water and cook on wood as well. So with the wood prepared we are now ready for those wet days in winter (if they come) when we can just sit in front of a log fire and chill out!