what's the fastest growing pine??

[marty]

What's the fastest growing pine? I think red pine my bud says white pine. Who's right??...........Marty

[Tom]

Loblolly, of course!    :-/

[Don P]

We had log corners on this house that ran around 10". They came in Red and White. The reds had high ring counts, one I counted had 53 in that size. The whites ran low. The one I counted on the same break was 24.The timbers I assumed were both out of WI. The white was putting on twice the diameter of the red. Can't say much about height gain as they both only grew to 16' in my observation.

The reds checked more as a big timber than the white.Kinda counter to what intuition tells me looking at the woods. So for log cabins give me the low checking and fast diameter gain of white. For high strength in joists,rafters,headers and framing give me the strength of red anyday.

Just hogged one of my  White pines a minute ago. Just PO's me to have one survive 5 or 6 years only to lose it and mow  the bloomin thing.

I'm right above the line for loblolly Tom. They grow at the base of the mountains around here but can't take the winters I guess. Ice does make a mess of them. They compare just above red on the wood strength values charts.

[Ron Scott]

White pine on a good site will outgrow the red pine, but then on a poorer site I've seen the red pine outgrow the white pine.

The red pine usually has better survival where it doesn't have to content with blister rust or the white pine weevil as the white pine does. Again site and soil moisture are important to their growth rates and survival.

[Texas Ranger]

I have a "cookie" in my office of a loblolly that has a radial growth average of one half inch plus.  80 years old and 42 inches in diameter.  Purty good for a southern weed tree.

[Ron Scott]

Yes, we can't compeat with that southern pine growth.

[Tom]

I have sawed Loblolly pine with 1 1/2 to almost 2 inch growth rings which equates to 3 and 4 inches in diameter per year.  It is frequent enough that I mean to get pictures and put on the site for all to see the next time I find one that has grown that quickly.  I know, it sounds like I am joshing you but I'm not.  I feel this thread is too important.

Usually the wide rings are within the first 10 years of growth and then they close up.

Needless to say, this doesn't make the best construction wood.  I think #2 needs to have a minimum of 4 rings to the inch and this wouldn't qualify.  

It does make some pretty interesting paneling if it can be dried straight and really makes good posts.  Loblolly doesn't produce the Heart Wood that Long Leaf and Slash do, so it takes treatment much more effectively.

[Don P]

Although I'm still unconvinced that slow growth is far superior wood, this was leading into a question of whether we should be trying to grow that fast. I have seen the 4 ring per inch limit on  sel str. lumber. Should this be considered a speed limit that would be economically unwise to exceed? Will it be akin to selling a fat pig in a lean market?

When I was working out west the treated pine was mostly ponderosa that had been incised and treated in the rough, doing all they could to get penetration of the CCA.

[CHARLIE]

From a consumer point of view, I don't like the crap that's being sold today for "construction" lumber. Maybe for 2" by X" dimension lumber, wide  growth rings might be acceptable, but in most cases I look for close grain because the wood is more stable. Not as prone to cup, bow or twist, doesn't expand and contract as much and it'll stay straight when something is built from it. Also, that wood between the rings is soft and really sucks canal water when sanding. I understand why lumber corporations plant stands of trees and try and grow 'em as fast as possible so they can turn a profit, but the quality of the wood a lot less.  Then it gets pawned off onto the consumer because that is all that is on the market. Then the products built with this stuff ends up being of questionable quality and doesn't really last because of the excessive movement of the wood.  Of course I could get into the degradation of quality for the sake of profit in the whole dang U.S. economy, but I won't.      I'm gonna stop here 'cause I'm getting too fired up about this..........  

[Tom]

Don,

In calibrating the strength of wood I will have to stand aside for others to make the decision. Most really fast growth woods I handle are prone to more movement than slow growth.  Pines with a great amount of summer wood  seem pretty strong but more springy than woods with a greater percentage of winter wood.  Slow growth pine seems to be much stiffer than its fast growing counterpart.

I have noticed that the juvinile wood at the center of the tree or the first 6 or 8 growth rings seem to lack shearing strength.  The young wood cut into 2x4 studs today may suffice for compaction as in a studs holding up a roof but I don't think it holds a candle to a piece of tight grain, long leaf when used laterally such as a beam.  Much of the strength of a piece of wood comes from the direction of the load relative to the orientation of the growth ring.

Now I'm talking out of school and wish I knew more. The 4 rings to the inch is a rule I was told by a softwood grader one time and have used that information when cutting load bearing construction material for my customers to make sure they don't end up with something that won't work.

I'm not convinced that something else won't work but haven't the data to verify it.  My favorite in-house documentation for stuff like this is The Encyclopedia of Wood. by Sterling Press which is a reprint of "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material,"issued by the U.S. Gov. Printing Office.

I have noticed that the "big" commercial outlets don't seem to adhere to the 4 ring per inch rule.

[Ron Wenrich]

I finally found the growth/strength relationship in "Understanding Wood".  

In conifers, stronger latewood is least affected by changes in growth rate.  As a tree grows faster, there is more early wood.  Slower growth is less early wood.  The higher the percentage of early wood, the lower the strength.

In ring porous hardwoods, the width of early wood doesn't vary much. so the rate of growth comes in the latewood.  Therefore, fast growth produces denser material and higher strength.

For diffuse pourous woods, growth rates have no predictable relationship to strength.

I remember that ash had to have 11 growth rings/inch for hockey sticks.  Also, white oak had to have 8 rings/inch for veneer.  I don't know if that still holds true.

I do know that veneer will be rejected if the growth rings are too wide.  Wide rings will result in very little grain.  Since veneer is the money crop in hardwoods, it doesn't make sense to grow them too fast.  1/4 inch in dbh/year is a reasonable target.

[Don P]

I have paid attention more to softwoods and was always amazed that the light colored earlywood that makes up most of a years growth happens in about a month. The  darker latewood takes the rest of the summer to form, before the tree goes dormant for the winter and it all starts again.

So what you're saying is that this isn't the case with hardwoods. Sounds like their growth growth rate is steady through the whole season. Simply cell walls thickening as the season progresses

I have heard red oak with greater than 1/4" rings is called lowland and is dried with a more moderate schedule due to less stability.

[Kevin]

Jack is the fastest growing pine up here the north country.
That`s what they`re farming these days.

[lylera]

I didn't hear anyone mention Scotch Pine or Larch I have 40 year old Larch that is 18 to 20" dbh, think I could do better with proper thinning.[Finger Lakes area, NYS] lyle  

[Ron Wenrich]

Scotch pine has bad form and many other pines will grow faster.

I do like larch, and have seen a few plantations.  The problem is end use.  I did saw a cabin out of larch.  Really nice color. I believe they  use them for telephone poles, especially up in your area.  

[L. Wakefield]

   Is larch not the same as tamarack?      lw

[Jeff]

Yes, Eastern Larch is Tamarack.  I have heard it referred to as Rackmatack also, but that may just be dyslexic logger talk.

[CHARLIE]

Hey! I just had a brainstorm!!!
Everybody pick your tree of choice.
On a predetermined date/time (hopefully before the ground freezes) everyone plant your tree.
Then you can water it, give it vitamins, sing to it, stretch it....whatever you want to do.
On a predetermined date/time (20 years?) everyone will measure the height and circumference of their tree.
All entries will be sent to Jeff and he will determine the winner tree and award a valuable prize to the tree (like a bag of fertilizer).

[Don P]

"On a predetermined date/time (hopefully before the ground freezes) everyone plant your tree."

OK, but there's a coupla' guys here wondering what frozen ground is. They have a 13 month growing season too .

When I was working just south of Duluth a few years back, the jack pines were looking really sickly and they were removing them and leaving the reds. Never heard what the problem was.

[CHARLIE]

In 20 years I'll be...uhhhhhhhhhh..... .....1,2,6, uhhhhh.....77 years old.  Does someone have a good stopwatch?
DonP, there is some sort of pine disease they are fighting up in the Arrowhead Region (see...you just learned something even though you didn't wanna....Duluth, Minnesota is in the Arrowhead Region of Minnesota). A Funny unrelated story about Duluth. About 10 or 15 years ago, a semi truck driver from California was driving all over Duluth and could not find the address for his delivery. So he stopped a policeman for directions and found out that he was supposed to be in Duluth, Georgia. Heeeee, heeeeeeeeeeee.

For all you Texan's and such, frozen ground is that ground which you need a hammer and chisel to plant something.

Now, excuse me while I go look for a pine seed for the contest.