By Elmer Beauregard

It's an old Native American belief that you can tell how bad a winter is going to be by the size of the whiteman's wood pile. Well judging by my wood pile its going to be a long cold winter. I have never had a wood pile this big, I must have 10 cord going. The reason its bigger than normal is because this year we added our 6th source of heat, a wood boiler.

Wood boilers are becoming quite popular in these tough economic times, and with the price of propane going through the roof we decided to give it a go. It was a big project, we started it this summer and just finished it last week.
A wood boiler is a wood burning stove that sits outside, in our case 50' from the house, it heats water which circulates through the ground below the frost line into a heat exchange unit in our propane forced air furnace. The propane has not kicked in since we fired it up, just the fan on the furnace, and it is a balmy 73º around the clock.
What are the other 5 sources of heat you ask?
• Propane furnace
• Electric base board heaters
• Electric in-floor heating
• Traditional wood burning stove
• Passive Solar
And let's not forget all the wonderful heat produced by incandescent light bulbs.
What's ironic is that the price of propane has dropped significantly since the start of the heating season, which must be a first. I wonder if its because a lot of people are coming up with alternative ways to heat their homes?

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