Wood ID

It may be some kind of Hickory, but I'm not quite sure. What about Red Maple?

One of the joys of woodburning is getting to know trees from a whole different perspective. My degree is in plant science, I've taken courses in dendrology (tree ID), my dad was a landscape architect by education. But cutting up wood brings me to another place, lets see, can you pick up a split piece of wood and ID it...hmmm? It looks like it could be maple. The way the branches come off the smaller piece and the variance in bark type from the older pieces are typical of maple. In my woods, with lots of red maple, the bark varies moderately from tree to tree! Plus it smells like maple? Just guessin though. Where do you live?

I'd say red maple.

WOODBUTCHER said:

These were all cut from the same 20ft trunk sections. Its very heavy and has the same smell as cut Maple. Its dark center and very differnet bark pattern on the smaller crown branches reminds me of some Sweetgum I cut years ago.
My maul seems to bounce right off the bigger trunk sections. Can anyone confirm this type of tree?

Click to expand...

Could it be Osage Orange (also known as Hedge or Hedge Apple)?.......

There are definitely sections of bark that look sort of like red maple. But I've split a lot of that over the years, and never seen a uniform dark center except when rotten. All maples I've split (sugar, red, silver) have been pretty uniformly white. I think it looks like some type of hickory, especially the fibers at upper right (the curling) and the bark at lower right (smoothish plates with horizontal cracks). Try burning a sliver and smell the smoke?

woodbutcher, I think I agree with disco about the maple, the red center just doesn't fit. I always think of shagbark hickory when you talk about hickory but there is also pignut hickory which doesn't really grow as far north as I am. I have not split any hickory either. Where did you get this mystery wood? Could it be an ornamental of some type? The older I get, the less I realize I know!! :-S

All what was said below. I didn't respond, because to touch and see and feel and smell is the only way to tell, but my first response was shag-bark hickory. If you let it season awhile, say three months, six, the true heart wood characteristics will show. There are more woods it is not than known. For the foresters it is best to have a bark, leaf and cross split sample. Always remember where it was grown and the soil and minerals will add a lot to the "look of the wood."

jpl1nh said:

woodbutcher, I think I agree with disco about the maple, the red center just doesn't fit. I always think of shagbark hickory when you talk about hickory but there is also pignut hickory which doesn't really grow as far north as I am. I have not split any hickory either. Where did you get this mystery wood? Could it be an ornamental of some type? The older I get, the less I realize I know!! :-S

Click to expand...

I say Hickory

Whew, glad to know it wasn't Westfalia, shamshuck, spacial spalted locust. We could have had a real mystery there. Wood cutters, save some leaves and bark, we truly aren't magicians. Photos help, but stories about hauling the log 10 miles up hill, don't.

Sure looks like the shagbark hickory we have here in upstate NY............

The shagbark Hickory we have here in NH looks exactly like this. http://biology.clc.uc.edu/graphics/...k Hickory/JSC 0005 Shagbark Hickory 1 big.JPG Can't mistake it for anthing else. Then there is pignut hickory which looks like this http://www.tarleton.edu/~range/New Photo Slides/Photo Slides 1-137/pignut hickory.jpg. Like Uncle Rich corectly points out, with bark like that, without leaves, fruit, flowers, etc you could possible confuse it for one of those infamous Westfalia shamshucks. :-/ Unfortunately I have cut and split neither shagbark or pignut so I'm not familar with the wood inside.

Hey WB?, if you go to the new blog section and look at the wood the "hippie" is cutting in the webmasters blog, doesn't it look pretty much like the stuff you have?

Nice pics! Not familiar with the shellbark or mockernut. So much to learn...

WB, I think this link should take you there. I'm not poistive of this but I believe the "hippie" in question is none other than our illustrious webmaster. The wood?? hmm.. https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/hearthblog/

It doesn't look like the shag bark hickory by me.

I'd say pignut, too. Dense stuff.

"MAD Horse" (Maple, Ash, Dogwood and Horsechestnut) have opposite branches, so a maple should be easy to identify by that alone. Most other tree's branches 'alternate' sides up a limb.