PETER Biram has an axe to grind, but nothing to chop after his two-year wood supply was stolen last week.

The Gembrook artist and partner Anne-Marie had been looking forward to plenty of cosy nights beside the fire this winter until opportunistic thieves took a pile of sawn-up logs from his Beenak East Road property.

“Bloody mongrels, I hope they put their backs out doing it,” he said.

The wood, estimated by Mr Biram to be probably two years’ supply, was an unexpected windfall from the recent storms.

When a tree blew down on to his property, the limbs were sawn up and left on the Birams’ property not far from the road.

Mr Biram said he naively thought they could wait there until the weekend.

“Now we’ll probably have to buy wood in,” he said.

“It’s shaping as a cold winter, I definitely would have been relying on it.

“It’s a pretty low act. Somebody has driven past and seen it and thought ‘Oh nobody would want that’.

“But what sort of idiot would do that? You’d reckon they’d see the two chimneys on the house roof.”

Mr Biram said the thieves built a ramp on the edge of the road to help them access the wood.

Regarded as one of the district’s leading artists, Mr Biram has had several works in the Archibald Prize and the highly acclaimed Salon de Refuse.

As somebody who works from home, Mr Biram said he liked to keep the fires burning.

The fact the Birams would have been home at the time made the theft all the more brazen, he said.

Police are investigating.

Anyone with information can contact Emerald Police on 5968 4422.