Get the most out of your fire with African Firewood

African Firewood provides an incredibly intense, long-lasting heat for your fire as a result of their extremely dense and highly calorific properties.

AFRICAN FIREWOOD

Naturally deprived from water and baked by the unforgiving African sun to a moisture content between 0-1%, our African Firewood has the lowest moisture content of firewood logs available on the market. Its commonly used air-dried counterparts have anywhere between 8-25% moisture content – a huge contrast!

African Firewood provides an incredibly intense, long-lasting heat for your fire as a result of their extremely dense and highly calorific properties. African firewood burns with minimal flame and smoke, and creates a serious amount of charcoal, making it perfect for use on a BBQ or braai, as traditionally used. Its flavour-enhancing adds to the many properties that make Sekelbos such a superb cooking wood, but its uses do not stop there. It can also be burnt on fire pits and chimineas, as well as in the home, filling your rooms with a beautiful aromatic fragrance.

The low moisture content of the wood means there is no energy wastage with burning off excess moisture, giving the absolute best return in calorific value. Whatsmore, you will get an exceptionally long and slow burn time and virtually zero smoke production, perfect for both entertaining outside and cosying down inside.

All of our African firewood is responsibly cropped with governmental co-operation with local landowners and farmers. We offer two fantastic species of African Firewood, Sekelbos and Kameeldoring. As you have already read, their properties are pretty spectacular and perfect if you want a truly great quality firewood to burn as efficiently as possible. Here are some more interesting facts about each of our African firewood that add even more to their incredible story…

SEKELBOS SUN-DRIED AFRICAN FIREWOOD

The Sekelbos tree, also known as Sickle Bush (Dichrostachys Cinerea), is an invasive shrub that is cropped for firewood to keep it under control. The tree is spiny and deciduous and can reach up to 3.5 m in height, with any fallen branches dried naturally beneath the hot African desert sun, stripping the wood from any moisture, and making it the perfect wood for fuel.

The wood looks remarkably like driftwood, with extraordinarily little bark. The predominant colour throughout is a rich russet with a paler outer band – it is almost too beautiful to burn!

Sekelbos is very well known for use with potjies, with the natural oil enhancing flavours of the food cooked above creating amazing tastes and aromas.

There are so many other uses of this firewood, including its bark being used to make strong ropes and string, and the wood also being used as fence posts, as they are able to withstand veldt fires is and termite and borer-proof. Pretty impressive!

Some other less conventional uses include its medicinal properties. It can help with stomach pains, wounds, bites and is also able to clear your head during a cold. It is also said that if you plant a Sickle Bush by your home it will ward off evil spirits!

KAMEELDORING SUN-DRIED AFRICAN FIREWOOD

Kameeldoring firewood is known as the driest, most dense Namibian Hardwood on the market, at 0-1% moisture content, with many users claiming that there simply is not a better braai/BBQ wood! 

Kameeldoring comes from a large umbrella shaped tree with a feather-like foliage that grows in the African savannas, a favourite of wildlife such as elephants and giraffes. It is also known more commonly as Camel Thorn (Vachellia Erioloba), loosely translated from the Afrikaans name “Kameeldoring”, derived from the word kameelperd (giraffes). Giraffes love it so much that they even have specially adapted tongue and lips that can cope with the vicious thorns on the Kameeldoring. There is no stopping them! And it is not only super-size mammals that are a fan of this tree species, the ear-shaped pods the trees grow are favoured by many herbivores including domestic cattle. Something for everyone!

The firewood is taken from the branches that fall from these trees due to their exceptional weight. It is so dense that an axe would even struggle to split it. It can grow up to seventeen metres high and the tap root can descend to a huge sixty metres providing access to deep ground water. The bark is a grey/black-brown, and young branches are a glossy burgundy. Kameeldoring is considered iron wood due to its density and has one of, if not the lowest moisture content of any firewood in the world.

Much like the Sekelbos, there are some superstitions that surround this wood too. Allegedly, lightening will strike at the Kameeldoring more readily than any other trees! And, again, like the Sekelbos, the Kameeldoring tree has many medicinal uses including treating ear infections, headaches, and toothache treatment.

ORDER YOURS TODAY!

UK Timber provide both types of African Firewood in 20kg (approx.) large polypropylene easy to handle sacks, or pallets of 10, 20 and 30 x 20kg if you require larger volumes. Pallets will be delivered on a burnable wooden pallet to your kerbside by our nationwide pallet courier for your convenience.

To encourage air flow around your logs, we recommend that you store them in our raised Log Store or on a pallet to keep your logs away from moist ground. We do not recommend stacking them up against a wall or placing them on grass, as air will not be able to flow and the logs can become damp.

For ease when building your fire, we recommend our boxes/nets of Kindling and our Ecofire Natural Firelighters.