Ok, I give. What wood is this?

A friend called and told me he had a client with a tree down, so like any good horder, I went and picked it up. Now the question is what the heck is it? As it sits in rounds, the wood has a very distinctive orange look. But, when split, the sapwood is very thick and ghost white with a reddish Orange center. The pics could be better, but light was fading when we got back. Any ideas?

 

I thought hickory also, but when I split it I was really surprised. No nuts around that I could find.

 

Leave was almost heart shaped - 2 lobes.

 

Thought crossed my kind that it may be ornamental, but after looking at the trees around the area (very wooded old neighborhood), I see a lot of these trees scattered around the ten acres or so he had, neighbors had some too. Also, very little limbs. Both trunks were about 20" or so is diamater and the first branch was 15' off the ground. Very little taper to the trunk. Needles to say, there is a lot of wood here.

Splits went fairly easy, but some were stringy, some split clean and fast.

 

I previously said a 2 lobed leaf, I remembered wrong. But here are a couple leaves.

 

Leaf looks a little like dogwood but not sure about the bark. I really don't know just pokin in the dark

 

Looks like cottonwood.

 

Definetly not cottonwood - I've never seen the Orange tones in cottonwood.

 

Yep looks even more like basswood. Either way, its shoulder season stuff at best.

 

I'm in Illinois. I thought of basswood, but the wood doesn't match what I'm seeing on line. I could be very wrong. Thanks for your help.

Horkn - will agree to disagree. Not shoulder season wood for me. I burn 15-20 full cord a year in my OWB and I really couldn't care less what I burn or when I burn it.

 

I scrounge for my wood every year and seldom can I get my hands on enough Oak, Hickory, Osage, for all of my wood needs. Besides, I also work 70 hour weeks and most weekends. Free is free and I will take what I can get when I can get it.

Most of the year, I don't care what I burn because I can load by furnace a couple times a day. When it's really cold I like Osage and will load it up with mostly Osage and then other wood. Would I prefer to have 20 cords of White Oak? Of course, but it's just not feasible for me to get enough of it. So, yea, I load it up and let her rip most of the time.