Today I started my wood cutting. Each year I fell and cut up enough birch trees to last through the next winter. There is a batch, cut last spring that is already dry and will be moved to make space for the next lot. It's a nuisance to have to move the wood but it's the only way it can be done so that it can be easily loaded, in carriers, onto a sledge for transport to the house some 60 metres away.

Cutting the trunks into the short lengths to fit the stoves is easy when there is snow on the ground. The trunks can be cut up quickly and easily without needing to be lifted and supported so that the chain won't run into the ground by mistake. If this happens it will cut nothing more until it has been re-sharpened. A task that takes me more than half and hour and uses up one file. The chains are hard (some makes harder than others) and the files don't last long.

I cut down five 25 metre tall birches today and cut them up -- but somehow my chain went through the snow into the ground and it's sitting in the garage ready to be filed in the morning before I can start again.