We’ll continue to be glad we heat with wood here at Longleaf Breeze. It’s reliable, it’s cheap, it warms us more deeply than a heat pump ever could, and we just love the aesthetics of it. But – yeah, you knew there was a but coming . . .

We’ve slowly figured out that wood heat is not for everyone. We’re confronting right now one of the difficulties of heating with wood, so we decided to devote this week’s podcast to all the disadvantages of heating with wood. The result is a candid assessment and is a must listen for those contemplating installing a wood-burning stove. Heating with wood means the temperature in your home will vary more widely than it would using an electric or fossil fuel heater and a thermostat. Wood stoves produce more mess, both indoors and outdoors where you store your wood. You can’t – or at least we can’t – light a wood-burning fire by remote control, so if you come home late at night to a cold home, you’ll be cold for the time it takes for the fire to kick in. And finally, heating with wood requires that you think far enough ahead to maintain a supply of thoroughly seasoned wood. It’s this last one that we forgot last year, and now we’re paying the price for it in the form of fires that are more difficult to start.

Listen – 22:06

We entered the month of August 2014 with only two pallets of firewood – about a third of what we needed for the winter. By the end of August we had all 12 full, but it was too late. Too much of our wood was unseasoned, and now our fires are harder to start.

The Longleaf Breeze Perennial Farm Calendar