I think, anyway. It was another tree that was down when I bought the property, so I've never seen any leaves. I thought it was another red, but after I rolled one of the logs on it's side, I'm liking the bark a lot more for sugar. There were 4 logs from this tree that I cut to length earlier this spring. I thought I'd get to the milling a lot sooner than I did. The first and last were around 10' and the middle 2 were a little over 8. I slabbed up the top 2 logs today. The 2nd from the top looked like it would yield 4 quartersawn 6x6. But somehow I measured wrong, and so 2 of them will end up 5x6... Oh well. The very top log had a slight bend in it. So I decided the best way to use that would be to saw through the bend and just use the shorter pieces for live edge slabs. The fastest way to do that was to set up to saw through the center of each of them, then just set the mill for the thickness I want and make slabs. I didn't get the chance to finish up, because the battery died on the tractor out in the woods. I had to borrow the one from the other mower, but I had to charge it first too cause it's been sitting for a while. I did manage to get it all up to the house, plus a little bit of firewood too. I didn't really get any good grain pics yet - you'll have to stay tuned!
Yeah, it was a lot more fun than raking leaves... I've been thinking that the traditional first furniture project for all this lumber I've been making should be a proper woodworker's bench. Finding some hard maple to use for the top is like hitting the lottery for me....
Shawn if no leaves and bark is maple... look for half dollar sized whites spots on the bark. How gramps taught me to tap sugars and not reds
Well, there weren't any white spots on the bark, but I haven't seen that on any of my other sugar maples either. I wonder if that's more of a regional thing? What caught my eye was how the bark was broken into long vertical plates. The bark on my reds doesn't look like that - it has a look that I relate more to "shattered glass". Long vertical plates is usually how I can tell them apart quickly at a glance during wintertime (the most accurate way is to inspect the wintertime buds - sugar are pointy). I expected to notice a difference in the weight, but I guess when you're wrestling around an 8' long, 6" thick slab, they all feel pretty doggone heavy! The wood appeared a little different to me, at least in the way the decay affected it. In reds, it seems to easily penetrate the heartwood, causing some great looking pastel blue and red staining. In these logs, it was fairly advanced in the sapwood, but the heart seemed nearly unaffected. I'll probably need some sort of test to confirm. Since I don't have any fancy chemicals, I think I'm just going to check how fast the firewood from it dries, compared to soft maple at approx the same starting MC.
OK Shawn Curry, these are from maples I know to be sugar, these trees are about 12 to 16 diameter if you need bigger ones let me know... As I know you are a sugar maker, gramps and his 5 brothers always tapped hard maple first to make fancy. But would tap reds later in season to make more lower grade for baking. This started in depression and WORLD wars when sugar was rationed so syrup was substituted in everything except grandma white frosting recipes the pics show but the white spots range in size from dime up and become oval with growth easier to see in young tree or branches..
Interesting. I'll have to check mine for spots like that, but honestly I wouldn't have picked that one for a maple at all; mine look so different. Here's what mine generally look like. Note the long vertical plates of bark. For comparison, here is some red that grew about 50' from the one I sawed up.
Shawn I will get my pictures of my mature trees in morning ... if I only saw your bark I would not have guessed Sugar maple either. your bark with tap lines was a more plate look then I am used too. a lot of my old maple bark looks a little like shag bark. Your one on ground is a maple although I would guess red as my sugar tends to be almost white in coloration. This is odd, I have read your posts you are an intelligent woodsy guy! my family's been sugaring for 5 generations... In college all my buddies went to warm climates to party. I went to maple corners Vermont and tapped out 500 for my great uncle. with buckets and old bit and brace. He swore he could taste plastic in pipeline and could prove it.
I'm just a guy who owns a few trees in WNY and plays with his wood too much. And the forest ownership part only started 2 years ago. I grew up on a farm, and we heated with wood, but my dad always bought wood, or traded the hay we made for it. So I couldn't tell you what kind of wood we burned; it was whatever I stacked in the wood shed last year and wheeled into the house. I think it was mostly maple. I learned to steer clear of tree ID threads a while ago because I'm not very good at it. I've read a few books and studied my own trees enough to positively ID the living ones, and I just try to leverage that to make educated guesses about the dead ones. I guess I set myself up for one here... I'm glad you mentioned the lighter coloration. The color of the heartwood was different from the reds I'm used to seeing; nearly white. I wish I had taken more pics before it got dark but I was in a hurry and then I was tired. Probably should have waited to post this thread but I guess I was excited about the find. Ill post a better thread soon I promise... Wait until you see the lumber warehouse.
Some sugar maple ,that is now in my stacks, the color in top of round is because of rain night before
Have a look on the back of the trailer, in the 2nd from last pic, and tell me what you think. Ive got the logs that i halved up there - you can kind of see how light the heartwood is - basically the same color as the sapwood. Compare that to my reds, which are much more distinct. Maple is a tough one, it can express itself so much differently in different soils.
Yeah like a hundred different sub species! what you have milled and split in that pic I would bet is a hard maple (sugar or Norwegian)
LOL! Oh man... You're messing with me, right?! Was that just an FYI, or are you guessing silver for my logs? I'm gonna haveta drag these suckers into the garage now and get some new pics!!
No, I'm not sure what you have there, just showing how different the Maples can be. Heck, both silver and sugar are fine woods for woodworking
Look what you made me do!!! I hardly got a chance to look at these myself actually. Sorry for the poor lighting. Seeing them standing up like this seals it for me.
Oh it's sugar all right. I could tell just by how heavy those splits were! Good thing I noodled them first!
