This is what happens when you get a torrential downpour while the kilns are being lit! These are brands or browns, and are a result of the temperature being too low to create charcoal. We had a biblical downpour (ok, maybe a slight exaggeration. But only slight!) the last time the kilns were lit. The rain creeps into the kiln and dowses the growing fire. The rain also made its way through everything I was wearing. I was saturated!

This here is about 2/3 of the wood that went into the kiln! Luckily the other kilns were much less affected.

Right, note to self, must do much better! My record for these updates are appalling, so I apologise. Anyway, the charcoal season is now in full swing and you should be seeing the bags in both Co-Op stores and independent shops around Lincolnshire. The weather has been as good as you can ask for so far, and long may that continue!
As for the winter, it was very productive. There was some serious timber felling operations, one of which has just been extracted from the woodland and looks like a sheer wall of timber! The woodland was on a coppice rotation and had been left a little too long, to my benefit. The timber should be at my base within 3 weeks and will be in the bags and in the shops a couple of weeks after then.

I promise to update more often with goings on around the kilns and in the woodland. So keep an eye out and have a nice bank holiday.

Paul.