After a year of trying sticks, sawdust, shavings, "smoker fuel" sumac berries, burlap, pine straw, wheat straw, cardboard....and any other darn thing i have seen posted here, i have found that the easiest thing to do is light a handfull of wood stove pellets with a propane torch, then jam some old blue jeen scraps (cotton) in there. Lots of smoke and the darn thing almost never goes out unless purposefully neglected. there are about 20 "best things to use in a smoker" but the jeans scraps work well for me. they make terrible shop rags so they used to just get thrown out anyway.