Ironwood the Perfect Thing to Keep Home Fires Burning

In Canada’s province of Ontario and in New England and the northern Great Lake states, there’s a firewood so tough that it stalls hydraulic log splitters.

Yet it’s worth the herculean effort necessary to build up a pile because it burns well through a cold winter’s night. Ironwood, as it’s called, has such complete combustion that it leaves little ash, according to Wood magazine.

Ironwood grows in Texas, too--and in Australia, Brazil, Ceylon, England, India and other parts of the world as well. Wherever the wood appears, it attains legendary stature, taking claim to the titles of hardest and heaviest.

Despite the wood’s renown, however, ironwood isn’t a specific species. Rather, it’s the colloquial term for a state or region’s toughest wood. All told, there are 80 distinct species around the world known as ironwood.

In Texas, for instance, it’s honey mesquite. The ironwood found in the northern United States, Canada and Europe is actually hophornbeam. Florida has horsetail casuarina as its ironwood. In Australia, it’s Queensland red ironwood; in Ceylon, gangsaw. Brazil touts pau ferro and quebracho.

Trees designated as ironwood frequently become homemade tool handles, mallets, fence posts, levers and warming fuel.