Why not use a mount like this in a basket? Why not cut it into slabs that would lie side by side in a basket and mount them. That way as the wood breaks down, you would have the chunks we all start out with anyways. On a drive yesterday I saw where a bunch of trees had been cut down and would have given anything to have gone through and picked out a few like sticks like the ones you have. Bugs could be eliminated with a thorough pre-soak.