Category: self sustainability

It’s not unusual in Vermont to find a crew removing trees getting in the way of one thing or another. Often times they are contracted out do clean up whole roads and will be working for several days. Often times too, they need to drive a while to get rid of the resulting chips, which to us are gold. We can use them as green matter in compost, to keep weeds from growing while giving nutrients to the soil, or at worst as fill. We never have enough and so whenever we see these crews working, we ask if we can get some chips. Sometimes it saves them time so they’re happy to, and we slip them a twenty whenever we see them. We’ve gotten 3 big loads so far this year, right in time for Spring planting. It’s a really awesome win win.

We bought another woodstove to replace the Alpiner. We keep hearing about how we could burn so much less wood with a more efficient stove, and it’s hard to understand, a log burnt is a log burnt. Why would it make more heat in another stove? Well apparently it does, and I’m not yet convinced of it, but this new stove is riddled with soapstone so at least it’s better at spreading out the release of heat over time. In the very few mornings we’ve had with it, it’s true that it was really easy to get the fire going again with just a few embers. Everything else is… well, like any other stove, we need to get acquainted with it.

The first fire, which sounds great except it’s off gassing so it stinks up the house. It does seem to be a well thought out, modern stove.

It is the first time we have a stove with a window. That aspect is really super nice, there’s nothing like the glow of a fire warming up a room.

Now I can barely move the Alpiner by myself, and the new stove (it doesn’t have a name yet), well it weights 2 to 3 times more… We had it installed thanks to tax incentives, and boy am I glad I didn’t have to move it. I don’t think I fully fathomed just how heavy it is.

It was nice to geek out with a couple of stove guys, and to make sure I wasn’t doing anything stupid since I never had someone official review my stoves and flue builds.

The Alpiner is waiting on the porch for next Spring to be moved to storage with the tractor. It’ll be useful in a cabin or other down the road. I gave it a thick coat of olive oil to prevent rust. It’ll burn off next time we fire it.