When my small woodburner

stopped heating the house one

winter, I thought it was birds.

The chimney sweep checked it out. He declared it was fine. The flue was a little dirty but nothing that would impede it, let alone stop it heating altogether.

There were another couple of failed fires, with flames but no heat. I changed firewood, although it seemed hard to believe the beautifully dried wood I was using could be to blame. Not when that same wood in my brother’s fireplace created so much heat, they had to open the doors on a freezing night.

I decided it was poor judgement in buying a cheap woodburner (all I could afford when I built the house) and I gave up. It became a big dust bunny magnet.

I took solace in heated throws. I can highly recommend these super efficient (electricity-wise, compared to a heater) and very, very cosy blankets. Only a little bit cold? Put it on a low setting. Freezing? Turn it on to warm-the-cockles-of-your-heart mode.

The only issue is you will start to suffer pins, needles and backache because you’ll soon be buried in pets who quickly discover how warm and snuggly they are too.

Then I made friends with a man who installs and repairs fireplaces for a living. What I described was perplexing to him and he vowed that when he was next in the area, he would figure out the mystery of the bad, bad burner.

I was out walking the dogs when I saw his van go up to the house. By the time we got to the gate, we could hear very loud banging. Minutes later, Greg was holding the culprit. A round steel plate. That plate turned out to be a flue cover. My little fire has two options for where you can place the flue: straight up and out the top or out the back. The plate Greg had was the cover for the hole at the back but the fire cement holding it in place had failed. Without it, the woodburner was never going to work. Ten minutes later it was fixed.

The economics of this are a bit depressing. If your woodburner does something odd, please call someone who knows what they’re doing. Right now.

You will quickly become buried in pets which will discover how warm and snuggly they are too