Natalie. Thank you for your comment. Yurt Week sounds like a lot of fun. We would love to have you stay... only... I'm a complete git and misplaced your email address. I have a horrible feeling this isn't the first time either. It's a completely unforgivable personality flaw. Please forgive me.
Now, let's get our wood on.
I've spent a good deal of time this winter, thinking about wood. How can I find the yurt building materials that match my values? What are these values that I want to match? What kind of wood is available where I live?
What I would like from the materials I choose is for them to have a story of their own, to be affordable, and to have some consideration for environmental sustainability.
There is the standard big box store supply of wood. This is convenient, surprisingly affordable, and even sells 1x2s in 8 foot lengths. Buy 100 of these and I don't even need to turn on a power saw. For very slightly less I could buy 25 2x4s 8 foot long and rip them down to size. Or x number 2x6, or ... you get the drift. They have a large supply so I could simple pick out the best ones they have that day and go from there.
However...There is nothing amazing about this wood. No story, no history, just clinically precise, practical hunks of wood. I have no idea what sort of forest management these boards would come from, Or who milled them, what were their work conditions like, or how far the wood traveled.
Next thing that came to mind was to find a local mill and buy wood from them. These are surprisingly difficult to find, although I'm told there are many. I managed to find one, about an hours drive from home, and visited it over the winter. I was impressed with the variety of products and the general operation.
However... The prices from the local mill were more than triple the big box store, and well beyond my budget. What's more, I got the 'girl treatment'. This what we call wood, this is what we call lumber. I try so hard to be polite. When I told them the size range I'm looking for and the final purpose for the project, they acted all impressed and then insisted I needed to buy something that impossible to use for this project. 4 foot lengths of tongue and groove stuff, less than 1/2 an inch thick. How does one make 8 foot long 1x2s from that without going completely batty? It was obviously leftover stock they just wanted to shift.
Reclaimed wood has completely captured my heart. I love this idea, of using wood that has a previous history and would otherwise be destined for the chipper heap. If I could find this, I would be all over it, gushing poetic, happy as Larry (Larry being the name of one of our particularly joyful sheep). I would even drastically alter the dimensions of my yurt if I could find the perfect reclaimed wood.
However... There are concerns as to the previous life of the wood. Was it from a home filled with asbestos or some other highly toxic whatcha-thing? As wood ages, it hardens... if it's kept dry like in a house. Eventually it gets so hard, you need special tools or lots of saw blades to make a dent in it. And then there are nail and screw holes, which may reduce the structural integrity of the wood. Also, I'm not currently dating a demolitions guy - I couldn't find one that would wrestle a ram for me on his day off... his loss I'm sure.
I could rivie my own wood with a froe. This is a very old method to cut a log by hand, lengthwise. Wooden shakes (shingles) are made using this tool. It can also be used to make long boards by cutting the log to length, then riving it with a froe. On our farm, we have a small, managed forest that we use for firewood on occasion. I could cut down some especially straight alders - a very fast growing tree of which we have many - and use it to make my yurt wall lattice. I figure I would get 10 to 15 pieces per tree - so that's 10 trees.
However... I've never rivied before, never used a chainsaw, never felled a tree taller than myself... These are actually quite daunting to me, especially the chainsaw. But the most problematic aspect of this wood source is that the wood I create would be green, aka wet, aka, not dry. It will probably go a bit twisty as it drys, which I think might cause problems later on.
If I could have my druthers and acquire the most renewable wood I know, I would use coppiced branches. This is an amazing source of wood, and highly renewable. The root is left alive, and from time to time, the branches are cut off. Then more branches grow from the stump, grow especially straight, and when they are large enough, are cut off and used, and new branches grow...
However... although common in europe coppicing is seldom seen here except by the occasional basket weaver. To acquire 3/4 to 1 inch thick, 8 foot long branches, I would have to find a managed coppiced forest, or wait half a dozen years until my willow is large enough.
These are the sources of wood I've found so far. To tell the truth, given my budget and how eager I am to get on with building the yurt, my least favourite source is the most likely. Good old box store lumber... la sigh. But not quite yet, there's something that doesn't feel like it's time to buy the wood yet... some sort of instinct saying that a better option is coming soon.
That's okay, I'll get back to working on the door. It's looking good, if a bit slower going than I had hoped.
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