The Reason I Prefer Softwood Firewood (Nobody Talks About This)

Added: 2026-06-04

[00:00:00]Most people have been taught burn hardwood firewood. We have my drone here which some people consider to be the best hardwood firewood in the world. I burn some hardwood, but after several decades of heating with wood, I prefer heating with soft wood. Much of my hardwood pile from last winter is still here. My softwood pile, which was over here, is mostly gone because that's my go-to wood. That's what I burned. I burn softwood for a couple reasons. The main reason is something I think most people don't even think about. It would be a little hard to show you what that reason is here. So, let's go way over there where I'm cutting some firewood and I'll show you.

[00:00:57]I just realized something the other day.

[00:01:00]I've been so busy fooling around this year, I didn't get much firewood cut. I already have enough hardwood left over from last year, but I'm almost out of soft wood. I need to get to work. Cut more of the good stuff, the soft wood.

[00:01:14]I'm cutting some of this wood for my mom. She also prefers burning soft wood, but for a much different reason than why I do. to show you my reason. We're gonna have to do more cutting so I can really show you One of the reasons she prefers to burn softwood is the ash reservoir in her stove is very shallow. If she burns hardwood, she has to clean the ashes out every few days because hardwood produces more ash. Softwood doesn't produce as much ash. And Douglas fur makes pretty good firewood. I burn a lot of it, too, for other reasons, which we'll get into.

[00:02:24]Let's go get another tree.

[00:02:27]After I cut a few more of these trees down, I think it'll be easier to show you why I choose to burn softwood.

[00:03:28]Some people might be wondering why on earth would you be burning softwood when you have what some would argue is the best hardwood firewood there is in the world. Some people on the east coast think they are the only ones who have the good hardwoods to burn. I heard one popular East Coast YouTube guy say out west they basically are burning styrofoam out there. Little do they know we have this Madrron. It's a dense hardwood. Burns long, burns hot, relatively low in ash for a hardwood. I could cut down these mad drone trees and have the best firewood there is. But why? Why cut down good trees just to make sure I have the absolute best firewood? I do have a lot of mad drone here, but I don't have a ridiculous giant oversized mungous just so out of control overstocked huge enormous amount of it. I sure do have a way with words. But some people I know are going to get upset with me because I'm calling it mad drone instead of madrona or arbutus.

[00:04:44]Some people call things different things in different places around here. People call it mad drone. We spell it that way too. The mad drone trees in here are doing quite well. They are adapted to this climate. They do well in droughty conditions. But the Douglas fur are not doing so well.

[00:05:04]But 50 years from now, what's going to be more important? That I took down these trees that are doing well here just so I can get the absolute best firewood and leave the ones that are probably longterm just going to die. or in 50 years will this be a better property because I left the trees that are doing well here and took the Douglas fur, cut those into firewood since they're dying anyway. When it comes to Douglas fur, I do have a huge ginormous what was it I said earlier?

[00:05:37]>> A ridiculous giant oversized mungus just so out of control overstocked huge enormous amount of it. I don't have that with Madrron, but I do have that with Douglas fur. Would it make more sense to get my firewood from thinning out? Look at this back here. These Doug fur are jammed in here so tight they can hardly grow anymore. It's ridiculous. And it's the kind of thing that fuels catastrophic wildfire. Does it make more sense to get my firewood from thinning out this overcrowded forest so I can have a more healthy, more productive forest long term? create a forest that is much more likely to survive a wildfire. Each one of these stumps is a tree that's no longer pulling limited water out of the ground. Now the rest of the trees have a better chance of surviving. Does this make more sense? Or does it make more sense to come in and cut these trees down, cut them up and burn them just so I can have the absolute best firewood? When we go out in the forest, is our objective to just take what we want or is our objective to go out in the forest and do what's best?

[00:06:48]When we go out into the world, is our objective to take from the world what we want so we get what we want? Or is our objective to go out in the world and do what's right? Which of those two things makes a better place to live? I don't know about you, but I'm going to go with these ones. Instead of taking what's best from the place, I'm going to try to do what's best for the place to create a better place for myself to be. After I cut down these last few trees, I'll tell you the other reason you might want to pay attention to this. How this same concept has brought me much success in a lot of things I do.

[00:08:17]It is now tomorrow, the next day. I took a break for lunch, got distracted, never did make it back over here yesterday.

[00:08:25]So, what did I do here? I got the type of wood my mom likes to burn. That's a win for her. I got wood for myself. It's maybe not the best firewood, but it's still good firewood. That's a win for me. It's going to accomplish the same thing. These really nice mad drone trees that have been growing for the last 150 years are still here, still alive. And well, that's a win for the forest, but it's also a win for me because I like my mad drone groves. Now, what did we do over here? We thinned out this forest.

[00:08:59]Now it is more wildfire resistant. The trees that are remaining have more water. They have more space. Now they can grow faster. They'll be more resistant to disease and insect attacks.

[00:09:10]That's a win for the forest. It's a win for me because I get a better forest.

[00:09:14]Now, if we take a close look at this wood, look at these growth rings.

[00:09:19]They're so tight. We can hardly see them because the trees are so crowded.

[00:09:23]They're barely even growing anymore.

[00:09:25]Since I'm getting my firewood from cutting down trees that are hardly growing anymore, thinning them out of this overcrowded stand, the remaining trees will now be able to more quickly produce even more wood than I took.

[00:09:38]Contrast that with going out in the forest just to take the best wood I can get. If I was to take this mad drone, that would be a win for me because I would get the world's best firewood. It would set the forest back 150 years, though. trees will grow back, but we just set it back 150 years. That's a lose for the forest. So, it's win lose.

[00:10:04]And I will lose and no longer have this nice grove of mad drone trees. So, it's win lose lose versus choose the firewood that might not be as good, but it's still good. It accomplishes the same thing.

[00:10:22]But in that scenario, we had win win win.

[00:10:27]I I lost track. There were so many wins.

[00:10:30]What's better? Win, lose, or compromise a little, but still win then win win win.

[00:10:40]Cut wood over here where long-term we're going to increase the amount of wood the forest can produce. or cut wood from here where all we are accomplishing is taking what we want out of the forest and it's going to take the forest 150 years just to grow that back. This video is really not about hardwood versus softwood. If things were different here, if Madrron was the tree that was ridiculously overstocked, overcrowded, I would be saying thin out the mad drone. Cut your firewood out of Madrron.

[00:11:12]Leave the Douglas fur if they were the ones that were doing fine. But that's not the way it is here. When you go into a forest, look at the forest. Notice which trees need to go. Those are the better ones to target for firewood. Not just taking the best ones. If you go into a forest, only take the good trees, leave the junk trees, what are you doing? You're just creating a junk forest. In that case, you might as well just take it all, start over from scratch. Then at least you can grow back a good forest instead of a junk forest.

[00:11:45]I'm being a little bit dramatic here just to try to make a point. I burn hardwood. I burn mad drone. I like to have a mixture of hardwood and softwood.

[00:11:53]I was cherrypicking extra nice mad drone trees just to try to make a point. I have plenty of junk mad drone around here I can cut up for firewood, but I probably burn around 90% dug fur just because it's so ridiculously abundant. I imagine there will be some comments, people saying, "You are wrong. Softwood doesn't make better firewood than hardwood. Hardwood makes better firewood than softwood. Hardwood is more dense.

[00:12:20]It burns longer, hotter." Everybody knows that.

[00:12:24]Thank you, Mr. Obvious. But I think you missed the point of the video. Just like a previous video I made about why I prefer cutting up green trees for firewood instead of cutting up dead trees for firewood. They told me all the reasons why I shouldn't burn green firewood.

[00:12:42]Well, thank you, Mr. Obvious. We appreciate that. But I didn't say burn the firewood green. Obviously, we want to season it first. Apparently in that video I missed one major but obviously but obviously we want to season our firewood first. I think you missed the point of the video. Since I decided to get my firewood this year from these green Douglas fur trees, I finally got to thin out this spot I've been wanting to thin out for many years. People commonly tell me how great this property is, how good the forest looks. There's a reason for that. Over the years, instead of taking the best trees, seeking short-term temporary gain long term, I've ended up with a more valuable property with far more wood on it than if I would have taken the best trees. And it sure is nice that somebody came through here and cleaned up all the poison oak before I came in here and did this. Let's see how our friends are doing over here.

[00:13:45]Yep, they're still at it.

[00:13:47]It's a warmer morning today. I can tell they're a little more spunky. I'm not going to get close to it. No poking it with a stick today. I'm going to leave these hornets with a question for the day. I'm leaving it for them because you probably already know this.

[00:14:01]Is it better to go through life focused on getting what you want, even if it creates win-lose situations?

[00:14:10]Or is it better to look for situations where you may have to compromise some on what you want, but it creates win win win.

[00:14:22]Then the sum total of all those wins brings you far more benefit than what you may have had to compromise on. What do you think, Hornets?

[00:14:36]All they said was Bz.

[00:14:39]There you have it, the wisdom of hornets.

[00:14:43]This has really turned into a preachy video. I'm glad I'm not the one who has to watch these things.