Wood ID?

Hi all- Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm trying to ID a wood type I have harvested before on my friend's acreage where I usually take various types of Oak, mostly Red Oak. The wood in question was standing dead, no leaves available. Generally found as smaller, 4-6in dia, although I have taken it as large as about 10in dia. The bark reminds me of some coniferous types, but I strongly suspect this is deciduous. Fairly heavy even as semi- seasoned deadwood. The core has a distinctive brownish beige color. Rings have a white portion (believe it's called the sapwood part?) Burns more like a hardwood than a softwood, does coal at least a little as I remember.


People with cats may recognize the edge of a yellow Hartz Mountain play mouse under the edge of the round, keeping it from rolling. My cat was kind enough to loan me the mouse long enough to keep the round in place until I could get a shot of the bark.
The round in the photo is about 6in dia. Will post a closeup of the ring pattern if there isn't a positive ID from what's shown.

I'm definitely going to take a couple more shots of the wood and post them here later tonight. I didn't give enough info. I do have Sassafrass here, but it's always found as a short, scrubby sort of tree, never as big ones. That is a much lighter, more porous type of wood. Burns more like Pine. I know it's distinctive 'catcher's mitt'- shaped leaves well, and of course the delightful aroma.

What I have here is more of a medium size tree. It seems to run in the 20-50ft size range. A lot are found standing dead or fallen. It usually grows with a very straight trunk. Regular parallel grain, extremely easy to split. It has the heft, feel, and burning characteristics of a hardwood. Not near as full of knots as the Oaks.

The core wood appears as a uniform, light chocolate color with thin rings of whiter sapwood. If the tree had no bad years, the rings are very uniform from the core right out to the bark. When split, it's more light, beige brown and very straight grained. Deadwood trees tend to get a little punky on the outside, just like Red Oak. But not as deep as the punk gets on the Oak.

I agree, the bark pattern reminds me a little of some Locusts. Also looks slightly like that of some Pines, some Oaks, and even the local Tulip (Yellow) Poplar

More photos later...


BTW I suppose I can't totally rule out some sort of conifer, but it would sure be at the extreme opposite end from Balsa. This wood has some heft and pretty good duration burning. About all we have around here natively is a type of Cedar. That has a very distinctive, furrowed, straight trunk. My stuff is almost perfectly circular with no furrows. Very straight and regular, no 'character' like the straight growing Cedars.

tfdchief said:

By the look of the bark and density, it might be Black Locust, but BL wood when first cut is a washed out yellow color.

Click to expand...

I have some wood here that burns and coals great. Likely a Locust type or some have suggested perhaps Mulberry. That wood is distinctively yellow and turns a deep rust color in air. Split it and its still yellow.

My stuff in question is much more a light amber brown when split, or more beige-y actually. About the color of carpenter's wood glue. But the bark pattern does indeed remind of Locust. Nowhere near as dense and heavy either. Heft is more like Maple or Cherry. Like a medium hardwood.

Here are a couple of other shots.

The grain is straight, splits easily- color is fairly accurate here,
but it's slightly less reddish, slightly more beige-y brown:




An end view- I just couldn't adjust the hue and saturation
to come out right on this poorly lit closeup:



The first photo is more representative of the true color.
The split in the photos was about 4in dia.

The apparent light outer ring is really just some thinner 'bad years' rings.
This stuff usually has near- identical growth rings from the core clean out to the bark.