Wood ID

[bigealta]

Not sure what this is? I Got some from the town temporary storage area about 2 years ago. It's 18-19% moisture when tested on fresh split. Burns very nicely. Originally i thought it was from an ash stack but i'm almost sure it's not ash.
Could it be hickory? I've never burned much if any hickory.

 

[bigealta]

Tree ID app is saying red oak. Hmm it's not like all the other red oaks i have or have cut in many many years.
Red oak is my primary wood. I guess it could just be a different variety i don't usually come across?

 

[stoveliker]

I think the app is wrong. Looks to be in the maple family to me. So ash could be right too.

 

[bigealta]

I think the app is wrong. Looks to be in the maple family to me. So ash could be right too.

It's much heavier than the maple i usually see here. Mostly norway maple

 

[Dieselhead]

Looks like it may be white oak, If you get some better closeups I can confirm.

 

[bigealta]

More pics

 

[bigealta]

I don't see any radial rays?

 

[Dieselhead]

I don't see any radial rays?

I don't see any radial rays?

When I zoom in on the end grain I can see em, if it’s heavy I’m sticking with white oak.

 

[Dieselhead]

Medullary rays are a bit different on the white

 

[Dieselhead]

 

[bigealta]

Thanks for those pics, it's still hard for me to see. I guess i just don't know what those rays look like on this dirty end grain.

Thanks.

 

[bigealta]

Oh i think i get it now. with the open grain rings when zoomed in very close.
The 1st pic above i think shows the open grain when zoomed into the light gray area close to the tip of the pointy side of the split (furthest away from the bark side)

 

[Dieselhead]

Yea all those little dots

 

[hickoryhoarder]

Not sure. White oak wasn't my first thought, but it's possible.

 

[bigealta]

White oak or not it's burning great.
2 big splits and a big locust chunk to moderate the burn on a nice coal bed, and it's cruising along steady, hot, clean and long.

It definitely is burning like oak.

 

[stoveliker]

Nice find then in your stacks. Who doesn't like a white oak (near) Christmas surprise

 

[Woody Stover]

The bark, and the split wood faces, don't look like the White Oak I see here. The bark also doesn't look like the hard (Sugar) Maple, Red or Silver Maple that I see here, but the split face does.
To be fair, I think the Maple here have been planted, I don't think they are native species. Out in the woods, I see a lot of Red and White Oak, Pignut and some Shagbark Hickory, and White Ash. The few Maple I see out there, I just figure they spread from the ones along the drive that I assume were planted. I think the Maples predominate more in the Northeastern states.
I think this split face, posted by the OP, looks like Maple. It has an almost "iridescent depth" to it when viewing it at different angles, if you know what I mean.

It's much heavier than the maple i usually see here. Mostly norway maple

Hard Maple is quite heavy..

Here are a couple pics of some Red Maple I've been burning:


Here are some White Oak pics, showing rays both on the ends and on the split face (the light-colored squares.) The light-colored ray lines on the ends of these splits don't always show up as well as those I've pictured here.
Notice that the bark on the standing tree gets quite flaky and shaggy as you get further up. Actually, Sugar Maple can be shaggy as well.

White oak or not it's burning great.

Hard Maple burns about like Red Oak, coals well and burns long.

 

[bigealta]

Ok I cut some off one of these splits with a sawsall to try to get a cleaner look at the grain. I did a deep dive into red vs white oak last night and it got me thinking maybe AI was right with the Red oak verdict. I tried blowing thru the cut off pieces as red oak is supposed to blow air thru like a straw but i didn't seem to be able to get any air thru.

 

[bigealta]

So i just sanded it on the belt sander to get a better look.This is it dry

 

[bigealta]

And wet with water. FYI i could not blow any air thru this 3" long or so piece.

 

[bigealta]

And the other piece sanded end grain.

 

[Woody Stover]

I'd like to see more examples of the bark on this stuff. A lot of these later pics you've posted look pretty Oaky. And it looks like rays on pic 804, and in this last set.
Interesting with the wide-spaced rings, sandwiched by narrow rings of older and younger wood. I guess you got more rain in some of those middle years?
But could it be that there are a couple different types of wood that we're looking at? For example pics 742 and 749 look nothing like Oak to me, more like Maple, and to some extent 747.

 

[bigealta]

Same wet.

 

[Woody Stover]

I see no sapwood on 749, very un-Oaklike..

 

[bigealta]

Here are more bark pics.