Dangerous firewood?

Tom Dunlap

Tom Dunlap

Here from the beginning
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Retired in Minneapolis
This has been discussed in the past but it's something to think about.

Trees are injected, sprayed or absorb from soil amendments all sorts of additives. Insecticides, pesticides, fertilizers etc.

Should there be a concern about using any of the tree for firewood? Is there any toxicity from contact with the sawdust while cutting? Maybe when rasslin' the chunks from the yard to the dump. Then, they get split and restacked for the fireplace. More contact. Wood smoke has its own toxicity issues. What happens to the absorbed chemicals from PHC treatments?

Do we even want to know or do we put our fingers in our ears and shout LAALALAALALA!?
 
I know from woodworking that walnut sawdust can be pretty wretched all by itself. I've heard that if you put it in with bedding for horses, it'll kill 'em. And I've seen where other-species trees were leaning/rubbing on BW trees, and they looked like they had cancer where the trees rubbed together.

Hey Tom! (Haven't been on in a while, but just visited to check what hitches you all are using with your HH2 devices...my hitch kept slipping today and getting too much slack while I was taking some problem limbs off my -- you guessed it -- black walnut.)

As a side note, I've read that wooden cutting boards are more anti-microbial than plastic, I guess due to the toxins in the woods, as well as the tendency for the wood to "wick away" moisture and thereby desiccate bacteria, whereas plastic cutting boards can harbor pathogens because they don't dry out as well and don't have toxins in the plastic...for a while the federal regulators were all down on wood (ewwwww a natural product!) and wanted to dictate that plastic cutting boards be used in food service...then they did tests and got surprised...

Jeff
 
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A few years ago, some old landscape timber’s were left in the backyard where I rent. After getting sick of looking at them I decided I’d dispose of them myself..... too heavy to move solo I used my chainsaw to make manageable pieces. I was wearing shorts and flip flops (I know I know, we were all reckless 20 y/os once too). Later that day a rash on my shins and tops of my feet started where the sawdust struck me. It also developed on my forearms from carrying it, it quickly progressed, and within 48 hours much of my body was covered in the nastiest, itchy, hot, and blistery rash. Topical steroids did nothing, and after 3-4 days of agony the Doc prescribed prednisone (I think). I believe I had gotten arsenic poisoning from the treated timber’s.
 
An old logger friend here in the PNW has a table made of alaskan yellow pine. It nearly killed him to make it. The sawdust even with a mask was potent enough to send his body into septic shock for MONTHS.

I'd be very interested to see what comes of this. It'd make sense. It's not like the tree has much of a way to relieve itself of the additives we may or may not purposely put in them.
 
Is organically grown food better than conventionally grown? Almost the same concept as your dangerous firewood consideration. The question being what and for how long a plant takes in chemicals. Definitely getting into soil science and tree biology. I think the one thing I would have some concern for is systemic insecticides because of how they are translocated throughout the plant. But even they have half-lives and are dissipated overtime. I wonder if just the act of seasoning would reduce that risk?
I can see how harmful Smokey chemicals could be though... we probably all have heard how burning poison ivy will release urushiol oil and can cause the same allergic reaction but in your mouth, throat, and lungs. Yikes!
I also have experienced the nasty smell that green tree of heaven wood releases when burned. It felt like an irritant at the time- yuck
 
So I'll weigh in here with my two cents:
Do not burn any kind of preservative treated wood in a fireplace or wood stove (manufacturer's info usually says such) or fire pit roasting weenies - there are salts, these days not usually arsenicals, but they corrode the flue liners as well as producing "toxic" smoke - the dose makes the poison. Cutting preserved wood, wear a mask and gloves and try and catch sawdust on a tarp. Landfill the sawdust.
As for ferts and presticides in a tree wood, the dose makes the poison - the tree dilutes stuff to probably ppb levels or some such, so I'd be worried more about the sawdust itself (softwoods are classified as nuisance dusts, hardwoods a little more "toxicity" and some exotic hardwoods are actually fairly not good for you, so again masks and dust collection systems). Asthma, dermatitis or other reactions are always possible in atopic individuals - the above are generalities.
(A thought: Bark-on firewood storage can be a no no anyway - remember our DED precautions). And pesticides have half lives and are degraded in the environment by bacteria or chemical reactions (some less so like DDT not in use anymore). Modern pesticides are developed for their efficacy and for limited half lives rather than their persistence.

However, some folks I know wear an N95 mask while using a chainsaw on their farm (everything *toxic you see) but are happy to sit in dense traffic behind belching diesel trucks or school busses. Risk perception when you get down to it is very personal. To quote from a news article today:
“Certainty is an illusion. Perfect safety is a mirage. Zero is always unattainable, except in the case of absolute zero where all motion and life itself stop.”
Attribution: "On Canada's Pathetic COVID Response"
Opening up a can of worms maybe, I find risk perception in the arb field, when I compare it to industry, to be kind of out of whack frankly. TRAQ and targets, v.s. in a process plant and modern process design and incidents - for me anyway the numbers don't always make sense, but that's just me.

Addenda: All of the above pales in comparison to Mark's Used Fancy Pants worn commando, mentioned elsewhere - off the charts for toxicity and SuperFund worthy in and of themselves . . . .

Cheers all.
 
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Wat back when I worked for a landscape company I was sent out to build a set of steps out of new RR ties. This was just before creosote was banished. The steps were to be 4 feet wide so cut the ties in half with a chainsaw spraying creosote all over. The day was hot, humid, and sunny and my skin started to burn. Wound up in the ER. Couldn't stand to be in the heat or sun for 2 weeks and every spring for the next 2 decades when I got the first dose of bright sun after the winter my forehead would burn.
 
Tom Dunlap said:
This has been discussed in the past but it's something to think about.

Trees are injected, sprayed or absorb from soil amendments all sorts of additives. Insecticides, pesticides, fertilizers etc.

Should there be a concern about using any of the tree for firewood? Is there any toxicity from contact with the sawdust while cutting? Maybe when rasslin' the chunks from the yard to the dump. Then, they get split and restacked for the fireplace. More contact. Wood smoke has its own toxicity issues. What happens to the absorbed chemicals from PHC treatments?

Do we even want to know or do we put our fingers in our ears and shout LAALALAALALA!?
Click to expand...
I have a pile of aspen that were killed with copious amounts of herbicide, and have had the same thoughts.. I chalked it up to burning in a wood stove is fine, campfire while cooking hotdogs (etc). nope... 'the solution to pollution is dilution' or some such tripe.. However, the residual stored in a relatively diluted material such as a entire tree would be much different than smoking round-up from a crack pipe.
 
Chris Schultz said:
A few years ago, some old landscape timber’s were left in the backyard where I rent. After getting sick of looking at them I decided I’d dispose of them myself..... too heavy to move solo I used my chainsaw to make manageable pieces. I was wearing shorts and flip flops (I know I know, we were all reckless 20 y/os once too). Later that day a rash on my shins and tops of my feet started where the sawdust struck me. It also developed on my forearms from carrying it, it quickly progressed, and within 48 hours much of my body was covered in the nastiest, itchy, hot, and blistery rash. Topical steroids did nothing, and after 3-4 days of agony the Doc prescribed prednisone (I think). I believe I had gotten arsenic poisoning from the treated timber’s.
Click to expand...
sounds like creosote from old railroad ties, pilings, or telephone poles... My gramps worked in a creosote treatment plant in the 30's-40's.

@oldoakman My dad use to tell me how gramps would come home and his skin looked almost like a strawberry... I never thought of chemical burns, I just thought it was the color of the raw chemical before exposed to wood and weather.
 
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evo said:
Sounds like creosote from old railroad ties, pilings, or telephone poles... My gramps worked in a creosote treatment plant in the 30's-40's.
My dad use to tell me how gramps would come home and his skin looked almost like a strawberry... I never thought of chemical burns, I just thought it was the color of the raw chemical before exposed to wood and weather.
Click to expand...
Evo I don't know if you'd find these interesting but fyi here's some creosote citations incl dermal exposure, that are pretty well done:



 
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