Were there any remnants of hickory nuts or hulls where you cut it down? The Shagbark nuts and hulls are much tougher than bitter or pignut varieties and tend to remain there for a few years even after the squirrels have cleaned the meat out of the nuts. Unless it was in a raked and mowed area, there should be evidence on the ground if it is Shag. The squirrels love 'em but Dad would beat them to it cuz Mom loved making hickory nut pies when I was a kid...
I agree with hybrid Honey Locust. The orange inner bark and the side curling bark are my clues. Shagbark around here normally curls upwards. The last couple of years I have cut some that was deep in a woodlot and very straight. The lack of thorns on these is a nice change. We burned a lot of it when I was a kid and I hated dealing with the thorns. I am surprised to hear it isn't heavy though, I have found it very heavy when green. Good firewood.
I’m not seeing shagbark. Outside maybe a little but typically there is some stringiness with the hickory and I see none in the original post pic.
I’ve been burning primarily shagbark this season with white oak mixed in. SB is dense and very heavy wood.
Once shagbark starts to die, does the heartwood darken over time, and does the "shag" start changing appearance?
If it did, I'd imagine it would take a very long time to change the bark. Shag has peel-able bark and the stuff is pretty resilient (for bark). I think there would still be evidence of that bark that I’m not seeing.
When striped, it (the bark) leaves a reddish color. And it doesn’t just fall off. Here a split in my basement stacks that have gone through felling, bucking, loading, unloading, splitting, stacking, seasoning, loading, being thrown in my basement, stacking. So you get the jist, it’s tough stuff.
I'm guessing that's probably tamarack (larch). All of your description and pictures point in that direction, although my experience has been that the heartwood is a little more orange and the bark is somewhat more flaky and thinner.
I doubt it's larch/tamarack, assuming Jason Bradford cut it in his home state of Tennessee. Neither tamarack or western larch, which closest resembles the bark in the picture, grow in his area. Because he is from Tennessee, and if it's not an ornamental honey locust, then second best would have to be shagbark hickory. That's a very common species there. It could very well be shagebark. Soil, climate and the like can affect trees of the same species differently.
I agree the outside LOOKS like shagbark. I'm gonna be the first one to say that the wood and interior bark look a lot like silver maple to me though.
Has to be. I have no issues, nor does my splitter, with SBH. It's no different than say.. apple, and I've split mountains of it.
got a bunch mostly smaller, tree trimmings, is it for smoking or ambiance? Apple burns blue and green in coal stage!! You know, miss hunny, valentines day
