Help Needed Re:Wood Species

[campy]

Does anyone know what species of wood this is?
I am totally stumped.

When planing, it seems to be extremely hard.

Three photos below:







Thanks for any help you may offer.

[McCormack]

Ash maybe?

[ladylake]

I'd guess ash also. Put a pic of the bark up.   Steve

[campy]

There is no bark left.
When I first saw the log I thought it was Black Cherry.
That is judging from the bark.

The streaks are a dark maroon color.

I cut a lot of Ash here and it looks quite different than Ash.
Perhaps another sub species of Ash?

[redbeard]

 





I was stumped on these slabs that i planned that i found under a old bld. no bark on them and one fellow told me it was blk cherry these look similar to yours. Hope it helps

[Woodwalker]

I'm sure not an expert, but from the pictures I would also guess it to be Hickory.

[junkhound]

The coloration around the knots make me think hickory also.

Junkhound

[WDH]

Hickory or pecan, but pecan is a hickory, so hickory  ;D.

[bull]

cherry.........

[ely]

persimmon on the first ones.

[campy]

Persimmon !

I think you are right.

It is super hard.

I will burn some of it tomorrow and check the smell.

[WDH]

The bark is wrong for persimmon.  The inner bark of persimmon has a yellowish cast.  99.9% probability that is hickory, but sometimes probability gets it wrong too  ;D.

[Don K]

I would place my poker chips on hickory or pecan, leaning heavily on pecan. When I first saw the pics I said, "That looks like pecan I sawed a couple of yrs ago." Hard as all get out.

Don

[Okrafarmer]

Persimmon !

I think you are right.

It is super hard.

I will burn some of it tomorrow and check the smell.

I was thinking that since the living tree was mistaken for cherry. Easy to do for those who aren't real sure.

[LeeB]

My money is on pecan.

[SwampDonkey]

First pictures look like a hickory from here. If it planes hard than it's likely hickory. I see a little edge bark that is typical of hickory/walnuts. If it were fresh cut than the inner bark is yellow, then turns brown on exposure.

Persimmon yellows or grays on exposure and tiny dark heart wood often with streak stains in the heart. Growth rings not as pronounced as in that picture.

Redbeard, yours looks like pecan. It has reddish brown hues and dark streaks.

Cherry bark up here in the north is different than in the south. Ours is very scaly and dark gray. Come off in small strips, maybe up to 12" long (mostly 2" to 4") and 2" or 3" wide. White spots sparsely dotted over the trunk.





Same tree

[customsawyer]

My vote is hickory.

[Okrafarmer]

SD, you are right, our cherries around here look different. The pictures you posted-- if I saw that tree down here (either picture) I would first think it was a river birch (our only native birch down here). The cherries here have kind of a tight scaley bark, charcoal gray in color, but there is a considerable amount of variation in texture. Under some circumstances the bark of cherries down here can be confused with that of our shortleaf pine, for instance, in winter, when the leaves are off, and if the tree is covered in vines and you only see glimpses of the bark, it looks something like a dead SLP.

[WDH]

Cherry also has pronounced lenticels on the bark, which are small horizontal streaks or dashes.  These structures are thought to function in respiration.  They are never pronounced in hickory or pecan or persimmon.

[Okrafarmer]

Cherry also has pronounced lenticels on the bark, which are small horizontal streaks or dashes.  These structures are thought to function in respiration.  They are never pronounced in hickory or pecan or persimmon.

If this is what i think it is, we see the same thing on birch trees (very pronounced) especially white and gray birch in the north. In winter time I can tell a cherry from other trees around here by the small branches and twigs, and I can see these horizontal marks on them. I don't recognize them on the lower, rougher bark of most cherries around here. Sometimes the river birches look a little bit like cherries, but I can tell the difference. The river birches planted in landscaping look different from the ones you find in the wild around here.

The bark is different on persimmon from cherry, but some cherries are more like persimmon than others. There seems to be quite a bit of genetic variation in the cherry bark around here. I've also seen some variation on the persimmons, too, but they usually have that deep mosaic texture to them. The cherry bark is almost never as deeply fisured as the persimmon.

[WDH]

Okra, you are right.  The birches display prominent lenticels, most pronounced in paper birch that the native americans used to make canoes.

Old persimmons have knobby, alligator hide like bark.  It is distinctive.

[Okrafarmer]

I'll have to look back and see if there is a pic heavy thread anywhere about bark variations within species-- it would be neat to see.

[WDH]

I have studied bark for 30 years and, to me, it is a very reliable and distinctive ID method.  Being able to ID species without the leaves is a huge advantage.

[LeeB]

Also looks somewhat like cedar elm.

[SwampDonkey]

Gray birch are very warty and glandular on the fine branches, from which resin exudes.

Bark is very reliable for your region or state. Our sugar maple bark is much smoother here in farming country than it is out in the Igneous-Sediment soils in Deersdale. Sometimes challenging to separate from red maple.