Save On Heating Costs

If you're fortunate enough to have a woodstove, or fireplace, you can help heat your home, and help to save money by reducing your electric, oil, or natural gas consumption. And, if you enjoy going for countryside drives, you can save even more. How?

When we lived in a large city, my wife and I both enjoyed a quiet drive in the country whenever we felt we were overwhelmed by the noise, or the hustle and bustle. Since we had a fireplace, we were constantly buying kindling to start it. Because we enjoyed both our fireplace and our drives in the country, we thought of a fun and simple way to get kindling.

How many country roads do you know that don't have trees? Not many, unless you live in a desert area. We used to put a couple of cardboard boxes in the trunk, and when we spotted a large old tree, we'd stop. And, there on the ground was our kindling just for the taking. We would break the pieces so they'd fit in the box, and when that tree offered no more old, fallen branches, off we'd go again. Not only did we enjoy our scenic drives, we'd also simplified our kindling needs.

Now that we have moved to the country full-time, and own our own 10 acres of bush, we have all the kindling we could ever want. Plus, there is enough deadfall to simply cut up without having to fall a tree.

Besides the woodstove in our living room, we also have a combination wood-electric furnace. Both of these need kindling. Rather than pick up branches from our woodlot, an even simpler task is to drive a few kilometers up the road to a local sawmill. Here we are able to load our trailer with scrap wood, and cutoffs. Then, it's an easy task to unload our free kindling into our basement wood storage area.

So, the next time you go for a scenic drive, throw a few cardboard boxes in the trunk, pack a lunch, and enjoy the countryside as you stop along the way to harvest your free kindling.