[realusername]

I live in western EU and I confirm that. There's so much forest in my place that nobody cares about that you could heat the whole area without cutting a single tree, just by picking up what fell down. I'm totally serious about that, there's so much trees on the floor that cutting new ones for firewood is mostly useless.

And despite all of this, we import processed pellets and the only wood we cut is sent to China for making furniture, that's absolute insanity.

[xyzzy_plugh]

I have first hand experience with this scenario: a large forest property that yields enough firewood for a season in the form of naturally felled trees.

The problem is that it's incredibly labour intensive vs clear cutting. It's hard enough to make paths to haul logs or equipment let alone all the work to prep and store the wood. It's doable, I've done it, but at the end of the day it's more efficient to import from someone else's lot. And pellets, even locally made, are even cheaper.

We've settled on partially supplying from felled trees (which is somewhat of a convenient byproduct of clearing trails) but the bulk of supply being purchased and delivered in the fall, to get us through the season. Pellets would be the obvious winner if we were willing to convert over, but I have too much attachment to the old stove.

The other thing is that felled trees provide a lot of resources back to the forest, and so at least for property I maintain, I prefer to let nature take course for the most part.