Back when I used to cut firewood, we always looked for the dead standing maple and elm trees. Pretty much all the elm was dead, but you would have to find it. A lot of the time, there would be no bark on most of the tree. The bottom part of the tree was always wet, but we took it anyway. We just piled it separately to let it dry. I remember back in the 1980s cutting firewood in the dead of winter with the snow up past my knees. You'd cut down the tree and it would disappear in a cloud of snow. Then you have to dig it out to cut it up. I didn't mind the cold so much back then.