With one final whack of a maul last week, I split the last of the oak logs that I have been slowly but steadily cutting up and dragging down the hill to my woodsheds.

Then I stacked the firewood neatly, stood back and did what every man has done at the completion of a long, arduous task: I gazed at the full sheds with happy pride. As Thoreau once observed, "Every man looks at his woodpile with a kind of affection."

Cutting firewood is a true labor of love. I now have 12 cords of wood — enough to heat our house for the next two winters, depending on how low the temperature plunges and how diligent I am about stoking the wood stoves instead of letting the oil furnace click on.

In my decades of heating with wood I have never accumulated such an abundant supply in advance. Some years, before I built a second woodshed, I ran out in mid-winter and had to trudge hundreds of yards in snow looking for standing dead trees that were suitably seasoned for immediate burning.

Since building my spare shed, though, my wood-gathering operation has become a task I can accomplish periodically throughout the year instead of frantically each fall. With this system I season my firewood at least a full year so the stoves burn hotter, cleaner and more efficiently.

Anyone who heats with wood knows there's no greater pleasure than coming in from a frigid day and plopping down next to a roaring stove. Is it the most eco-friendly way to heat your house? No.

But wood is a renewable resource, and loyal readers will recall that each spring I dutifully plant several hundred seedlings to mitigate my carbon footprint. Some seedlings I planted years ago are now 30 feet tall.

This year my labors were vastly assisted by Tropical Storm Irene, which literally brought a windfall of wood. More than a dozen large trees, mostly oak, toppled during the August tempest on or near my property. With my neighbor's permission, I salvaged it all.

Red oak splits cleanly and easily, imparting a heady aroma that I find pleasing. Old-timers evidently felt otherwise; Swamp Yankees call the tree "piss oak." It also burns fairly hot, unlike the poplars that grow like weeds.

A blight has been attacking the dogwoods, so I have been thinning them as well. They burn very hot but are a bear to split.

I have also learned that nothing dulls the saw faster, except for striking a rock, than cutting hickory. The sacrifice is worthwhile, though, since hickory burns hottest of the trees I harvest.

Silver birch burns medium-hot, grows abundantly and probably comprises half my fuel. No matter how many birch I cut a thousand more pop up each spring.

Of all the deciduous trees, I spare the beech, graced by such lovely, smooth and shiny bark. The silver beech also keep their leaves longer, sometimes throughout the winter, and they rustle pleasantly, like the sound of rushing water, in the lightest breeze.

Now that the sheds are filled it's almost time to begin my leaf operation. I rake all the trails near our house in fall and use the leaves as mulch for the seedlings. Then, in the spring, it's back to work, digging holes and transplanting. I have a year-round relationship with trees.

Meanwhile, I still have some felled logs scattered in the forest, but I'm waiting for the snow to fall to bring them closer to the woodsheds, using a plastic sled. This is easier than hefting them on my shoulder or carting them in a wheelbarrow.

My neighbor has a pair of Icelandic ponies, and I'm contemplating enlisting their service.

Of course, once I bring the logs to the sheds I'll have no place to put them, so I'll have to cover them with a tarp to keep them from rotting.

Hmmm. Maybe I need a third woodshed ....