White Ash or Not??

Bud · Jan 2, 2016

Hi, I need help finding out for sure what type tree this is. A guy told me it was white ash but in some ways it looks like basswood? it splits stringy and the other ash trees around here are all dead,[michigan] the wood is white and the trees are all growing good? When I first went to see them to cut I thought it was a maple from a ways away it had those long seeds on it, I went back and got some leaves of branchs and they were opposite from each other so thought was ash? But the bark is very rough as you can see in photo,
Any ideas would help I have alot of it and want to sell some next year, THANKS

CountryBoy19 · Jan 2, 2016

Ash and Maple have similar looking seeds,

Maple, Ash, & Dogwood are the primary opposite branching species.

Was the tree dead? Were there leaves on it or on the ground?

Without leaves we have wood/bark to identify it and we will need much better pictures of the wood. That bark is certainly unique.

Bud · Jan 2, 2016

CountryBoy19 said:
Ash and Maple have similar looking seeds,

Maple, Ash, & Dogwood are the primary opposite branching species.

Was the tree dead? Were there leaves on it or on the ground?

Without leaves we have wood/bark to identify it and we will need much better pictures of the wood. That bark is certainly unique.

HI, well the trees are alive and leaves were on the branchs from the top of the tree, the wood is very white and like I said stringy when I split it, but is heavy also to lift, I never seen a tree with this type of rough bark on it? heres a photo of some wood I cut yesterday with a chain saw lenth ways maybe this might help??? In this photo the wood looks somewhat darker but most is real white?? THANKS

PA. Woodsman · Jan 2, 2016

Look on the flat cutside for a "pinhole" in the center of it; that more times than not tells you that it is Ash, at least in my experience.

Parts of the bark look almost like Hackberry, other parts look like Ash. Basswood has a much smoother bark so I would rule that out.

Bud · Jan 2, 2016

PA. Woodsman said:
Look on the flat cutside for a "pinhole" in the center of it; that more times than not tells you that it is Ash, at least in my experience.

Parts of the bark look almost like Hackberry, other parts look like Ash. Basswood has a much smoother bark so I would rule that out.

HI, I never looked at a hackberry but the bark looks just like it, and might explane why there not dead, BUT the seeds that were on the tree looked something like a maple? I think it had little berry on it? and I remember the leafs were oppasite , might still be good firewood from what I seen on the chart for btu? This is very confusing for sure, I may take a ride over where I got the trees and see if any branchs are around, the farmer was bulldozing them in a pile to burn when I left,

Wood Duck · Jan 2, 2016

I believe this is Hackberry. The odd, warty bark is characteristic of Hackberry. This particular tree has bark with a more regular pattern than some Hackberries, making it look more like Ash than most Hackberries do. Almost all White Ash, on the other hand, have very similar bark to all other White Ash, and that bark has a regular pattern to it. If this is White Ash it has some sort of disease.

Hackberry is not very common in PA and as a result many people who are skilled at tree ID don't recognize Hackberry. I wonder if the same is true in MI, which might explain why the farmer didn't know what kind of tree this is.

I think I have heard that Hackberry is pretty good firewood, and is commonly stringy. I have never cut or burned any Hackberry.

FirewoodAddict · Jan 2, 2016

Bud said:
HI, well the trees are alive and leaves were on the branchs from the top of the tree, the wood is very white and like I said stringy when I split it, but is heavy also to lift, I never seen a tree with this type of rough bark on it? heres a photo of some wood I cut yesterday with a chain saw lenth ways maybe this might help??? In this photo the wood looks somewhat darker but most is real white?? THANKS

The grain pattern definitely looks like ash

Firefighter938 · Jan 2, 2016

I'm fairly confident that is hackberry. Some of the rounds in the background are not though. Hackberry seeds are little berries. It splits kind of stringy because it is an elm. The wood is white, and it's heavy when green. The obvious way to id it is the corky bark protrusions.

It seasons in a year if in a good location, but don't leave it on the ground because the bugs are attracted to it and will eat it up.
It is a good firewood and I cut a lot of it out of fence rows.
I will take a few pictures of some I cut, split, stacked if you are interested so that you can compare.

pyroboy · Jan 2, 2016

I also believe that to be hackberry....as I have some in my stove currently. the bark looks almost identical to mine

Woody Stover · Jan 2, 2016

If you've got some pics of smaller rounds, where it branched out from the trunk, that might help. Maybe Hack but it looks a little different from most I've seen here. Bark of many species can vary quite a bit, though.

Bud · Jan 2, 2016

Woody Stover said:
If you've got some pics of smaller rounds, where it branched out from the trunk, that might help. Maybe Hack but it looks a little different from most I've seen here. Bark of many species can vary quite a bit, though.

Hello All, I am going to go over to where I got this tomarrow [sunday] and see if I can find a branch or leaf and will take another photo, Want to thank all of you for helping figure this out, will get to the bottom of it , that other wood in background is a mix of two kinds maple, mullberry, some oak, I got around 8 cords of black walnut from this farmer also last spring from a fence row and thats only half of it, I moved here from maine year ago and cant believe how much wood there is around for free if you want to go get it and cut it up,

3fordasho · Jan 2, 2016

Dead ringer for the hackberry I've cut, and I've cut plenty. My previous property had 6 or 7 on my city lot and many more on the other side of the alley. I like it as firewood, gets fairly dense here due to slower growth rate in MN, other parts of the county it's not as good judging from other posters comments.

Oldman47 · Jan 2, 2016

Where is the diamond patterns of ash? My guess is something else. The seed from ash is in long straight samaras that are not at all like the propeller type samaras on a maple. Ash leaves are compound leaves that are more or less spear head shaped leaflets, not at all like a maple.

tigeroak · Jan 2, 2016

It is 100% hackberry. String to split . 100% hackberry I have about 3 cord of this for 3 years from now.

Ralphie Boy · Jan 2, 2016

Dats hackberry! Verry good firewood,but it needs to be split and stacked off the ground quickly as its prone to rotting quickly. Get all you can.

Stinkpickle · Jan 3, 2016

Hackberry

D8Chumley · Jan 3, 2016

Wood Duck said:
Hackberry is not very common in PA and as a result many people who are skilled at tree ID don't recognize Hackberry. I wonder if the same is true in MI, which might explain why the farmer didn't know what kind of tree this is.

I think I have heard that Hackberry is pretty good firewood, and is commonly stringy. I have never cut or burned any Hackberry.

I have a bunch of hackberry on my property. Had one fall across my road onto my power line 2 winters ago, that's when I discovered it. Now I look around as my ID skills are getting better and I see a bunch here. Maybe it's more so on the eastern part of PA? I know I've seen it out into Lancaster. I have burned a few splits as I get to it in my stacks and it's decent stuff

Applesister · Jan 3, 2016

Dear Bud,
You DO most definitely have White Ash in your pics. And You have Hackberry. Your splits are White Ash and you may have the other mixed in.
Hackberry has VERY irregular, warty bark ridges. Very distinct, no other trees have that bark. Except Cottonwood will look like that when young.
Ash has very uniform even spaced ridges in bark. And the wood grain is very obvious and easy to see with naked eye.
It seems you have unfortunately mixed up the two trees when splitting. Its not really that important firewood wise as the 2 types are fairly close in BTU output. And they probably season at the same rate.
Im sure both will be great firewood.

Applesister · Jan 3, 2016

Your pic

Applesister · Jan 3, 2016

My phone doesnt do links but just looking at wood database. Love that site.
There is an article on Ashes and everything inbetween. It seems Hackberry is substituted for Ash wood wise. They appear very similar except Hackberry has more Elm like characteristics.

D8Chumley · Jan 3, 2016

I just checked Sweeps and it shows Hackberry slightly better than Elm at 19.5. White Ash is shown at 21.6, I wouldn't turn my nose up at any of it. I have some hackberry in the stove right now

Bud · Jan 3, 2016

Applesister said:
Dear Bud,
You DO most definitely have White Ash in your pics. And You have Hackberry. Your splits are White Ash and you may have the other mixed in.
Hackberry has VERY irregular, warty bark ridges. Very distinct, no other trees have that bark. Except Cottonwood will look like that when young.
Ash has very uniform even spaced ridges in bark. And the wood grain is very obvious and easy to see with naked eye.
It seems you have unfortunately mixed up the two trees when splitting. Its not really that important firewood wise as the 2 types are fairly close in BTU output. And they probably season at the same rate.
Im sure both will be great firewood.

Hello All, I want to thank all of you for helping with this, I did go out to the place today and could only find these two branchs one with some seeds I took them off one of the smaller trees that was there in the pile, one had little berrys on it still,,, here they are;

Bud · Jan 3, 2016

Bud said:
Hello All, I want to thank all of you for helping with this, I did go out to the place today and could only find these two branchs one with some seeds I took them off one of the smaller trees that was there in the pile, one had little berrys on it still,,, here they are;

Hi again,, I do see now what you mean about the white ash it is very close to the hackberry,, never to old to keep learning,, here some photos of my wood pile and mt homemade splitter I made 7 years ago, just want to show off some,LOL,, Thanks!

Applesister · Jan 3, 2016

Holy cow!
Nice splitter! Vertical is the way to go. Wow...
Are you hankering for the 30 cord pile?
The winged seed pods are Norway maples so your thoughts about maple and the white wood was correct. Theres not much on those trees, statistically, but that is really nice, clean and clean burning wood. I guess it is close to Sugar maple in BTUs but havent found any numbers on it.

D8Chumley · Jan 3, 2016

Is that mulberry in pic #2? That's a nice size round. That splitter is no joke brother! How many ton you figure it is? Nice stacks as well

White Ash or Not??

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