Ok This is on a white oak I took down last week. I didn't get it all stacked and it got rained on. Being some kind of mold is this going to effect my whole stack? Is it bad? Is it going to spread? Should I even move it across my property? Am I just an over reacting and it is no big deal?
Wild, never seen purple before...but all the weird stuff that sometimes grows on wood, and most of the critters that chew on it, seem to disappear (eventually anyways) once it is cut split stacked (CSS) and starts to dry out. Likely the purple is a reaction between the minerals in that particular tree and the mold/fungus/whatever is growing there. Unless you have a Mulberry tree or Rasberry bushes nearby...then it may be just well fed bird poo
That is from the purple sap suckers that are known to live in your area. They slobber all over the wood as sap sucker's peckers normally do. Won't hurt a thing. Just burn it.
Oh no! I didn't realize it was that bad! I am taking a shot right now! Oooooooohhhh. That's smooth. I better take a few more.
When I worked on a portable saw mill as a teen my hands would be dyed purple after sawing oak. Was told by the operator that it was a chemical reaction between the steel band blade, cooling water, and oak. I wonder if this is something similar? Sawed lots of different types of lumber and it only happened with oak. A real bugger to get off too. Edit: was the oak wet when you bucked it up? That punk may have been holding water. Steel bar, water and oak?
I'd stack that oak under cover. The punky sapwood will absorb water and keep the whole piece wet if you let it get rained on. If dry the punky part burns just as well as the solid stuff.
CoreyB - here's what you do to get rid of that purple BTU eatin' fuzz.... Put it out by the road, tomorrow even. Wait til I drive out there with a trailer, then help me load it. When that Oak gets to my backyard in Va, that fuzz will be gone. Ain't no purple fur on any of my Oak. And I'm nowhere near the man that Chuck "the schlot" Norris is- I (well, my wife now) have to use a saw and a splitter on my wood, not just the edge of my bare hand.
Here in Indiana we get a blueish color in the log if there is steel in the tree somewhere, nail, clothesline hook, etc. Can't say I have seen the purple. I know White oak leaves a black discoloration on my hands when I cut and split it. Just White oak, never had it from Red, or pin oak.
Hellos sir, what part of indiana are you from if you don't mind me asking.... I live around Yorktown and I found a guy that's close to me on FHC yesterday..... You mentioned pin oak, I don't know if it's true but I have been told they are basically gone around me.... I had a older fella that had the last pin oak in his nieghbor hood cut down last year..... He has it dropped and I cut it all up, HUGE tree........ He said he treated it but it still died....I wonder what bug or disease killed them....anyway that wet pin oak is some heavy stuff... When splitting it, it gives off a very good smell as strange as that may sound.... I personally love the smell of all the oak woods!!!
May or may not be related at all, but it's interesting. One way to test white oak from red oak is to dilute a solution of sodium nitrate (saltpeter) and apply it to the end grain of the wood. If it's red oak, color remains the same. If it's white oak, the wood turns various shades of purple.
Purple is a unique color but it only grows on the ends with the humidity here we sometimes get some ugly shroom along with mold and what not growing on the rotting/decaying fibers. By January they freeze and fall off.
I am up North here in Indiana. I am about 14 miles Due West of the university of Notre Dame,/ South Bend and about 1 mile South of the Michigan state line. We have a lot of pin oaks up here, but most for some reason are yard trees. I love the smell of green oak. Oak is probably the most prevelant wood I get although Ash is making a strong push in my pile due to the borer problem.
Hey what town you around. I'm just on the other side of the boarder and maybe a little east in Buchanan.
