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Weeping Willow

Started by Sarah Duval, April 07, 2012, 10:13:55 PM

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Sarah Duval

Has anyone cut weeping willow? We had a 12' long log about 34" in diameter given to us, I asked my father but he said he has never used it for anything nor heard of anyone using it. What would be the best way to cut it, I was thinking about quatersawing it? The one thing I do know is the grain in weeping willow is all over the place making it a royal pain to split.

POSTON WIDEHEAD

I've never heard of anyone sawing it. So I'll be watching the replies so we both can learn something.
The older I get I wish my body could Re-Gen.

Sarah Duval

I am going to dig into it tomorrow so I figured I would ask. Putting the finishing touches on the Husky now so it will be ready and will make sure I take some pics to post here as well.

Ironwood

never done it, I did cut a tree of heaven (Alianthis, spelling?) miserable. It was stringy and clogged the gullets even after rotating out of the cut, kinda stringy (best adjective I can think of). I bet willow if not stringy, will be not so good, split, reactive (warping) low quality.


Ironwood
There is no scarcity of opportunity to make a living at what you love to do, there is only scarcity of resolve to make it happen.- Wayne Dyer

taw6243

I cut some for a customer in Ravenna, Michigan. I was told by the owner of the logs that he had planted the tree 34 years before. Here's the kicker it was 34 inches diameter at the small end of the first 8' log. Thats one inch per year growth rings. The wood was beautiful when he brought it back to me to be planed. a very light weight wood, golden yellow and lustrously shiney. this warped very little.
I also cut willow burls for a different couple. It was fantastic looking stuff, Sort of teardrop shapes in it.

Tim
4500 hours on my 2004 LT40HDG28, CBN sharpener and auto setter, 25" woodmaster planer with 9'auto leveling bed and trac vac chip handling system, 1998 L3010 kubota, 2010 L3200 kubota Festool TS75 rail saw with 42", 75" and 106" rails.

Okrafarmer

I'd like to see how it turns out.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Psalm 91:1

Operating a 2020 Woodmizer LT35 hydraulic for Upcountry Sawmill, Dacusville, SC

Now selling Logrite tools!

Writing fiction and nonfiction! Check my website.

WildDog

Willow makes good cricket bats, I presume its Weeping Willow.
If you start feeling "Blue" ...breath    JD 5510 86hp 4WD loader Lucas 827, Pair of Husky's 372xp, 261 & Stihl 029

Chuck White

It would be interesting to saw the Weeping Willow.

We have quite a few Black Willow trees in this area, and one of these days I hope to saw one of them.

Unfortunately, there are none on my property, and most of them are huge.
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Bandmill Bandit

I have sawed Laurel Leaf willow (soft, warps/twists a lot, pretty grain) Weeping willow (bit harder and nice grain but twists some) Diamond willow ( very hard, very stable, very pretty, very hard to find a piece big enough to saw)
Skilled Master Sawyer. "Skilled labour don't come cheap. Cheap labour dont come skilled!
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Al_Smith

About all I know about is it will throw roots about a mile it seems and clog up every drain line you have .About the only way to kill it is either dynamite or a D9 Cat then you best get every root else it will come back .

Okrafarmer

I know WW is very easy to clone. Just cut chutes off a WW tree and stick them in the ground, keep them wet, and generally they will grow into new trees.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Psalm 91:1

Operating a 2020 Woodmizer LT35 hydraulic for Upcountry Sawmill, Dacusville, SC

Now selling Logrite tools!

Writing fiction and nonfiction! Check my website.

Ironwood

The favorable grain pattern described is most likely the Diamond willow.
Ironwood
There is no scarcity of opportunity to make a living at what you love to do, there is only scarcity of resolve to make it happen.- Wayne Dyer

Al_Smith

This might sound hard to believe but I saw a weeping willow that started from a discarded piece of a limb.That stuff has the tenacity of a star fish.Tear off a star fish arm it grows another plus the arm grows another star fish.

Ha on my way to work somebody topped out a big fat weeping willow.The thing has to be every bit of 6 feet across so they probabley didn't have a big enough saw to finish the job .

So for about 3 years it sprouted new limbs and looked like a woman with a bad hair day .Sure enough there it sits now droopy limbs every where like they never even touched it .

Ianab

Traditional use for Willow wood is Cricket Bats.. It's soft and stringy nature means it doesn't break on those big "6" hits.

As Cricket is not big in the US, the market may be limited.

Ian
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

Al_Smith

Yeah but baseball is and we are fast loosing all the ash to make bats from . :(  Unfortunately I somehow doubt if willow would be a good substitute .I suppose they could use hickory or oak but the ball players would have to have arms like Superman to swing them .

Ianab

Yeah,. cricket is not the same as baseball.

Both involve bats and balls, but it ends about there.

Cricket is as incomprehensible to Americans as Baseball is to us... Cricket needs the ability to stay awake for a game that lasts 3 days, then ends in a draw.   :D

Ian
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

Al_Smith

Oh my goodness .If it were baseball they'd have ran out of hot dogs and draft beer long before the game was over .

JohnM

Quote from: Ianab on April 09, 2012, 09:23:04 AM

Cricket is as incomprehensible to Americans as Baseball is to us... Cricket needs the ability to stay awake for a game that lasts 3 days, then ends in a draw.   :D


And I thought the 4hr+ Redsox/Yankee's games were bad. :o  Add cricket to the list of sports I don't get. ???  Soccer is and will always be #1 on that list. ;D :D
Lucas 830 w/ slabber; Kubota L3710; Wallenstein logging winch; Split-fire splitter; Stihl 036; Jonsered 2150

Al_Smith

Soccer is about the same as a physical game of chess .It takes not only great endurance to play the game but a mind sharp as a tack to be good at it .

It just hasn't been popular in the US for long enough for the players to become really as good at is as in other countries .Give it some time though . ;D

SwampDonkey

I would think willow would saw out much like aspen, both closely related.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Al_Smith

Well now that brings up an interesting question of which I'm not entirely certain of .Aspen as we know it seems to be able to propigate from the roots .The quakies in Colorado for example .

Willow seems to propigate by just about any means .It seems rather fond of a lot of water where mountain aspen really doesn't get that much .Both light weight wood though .

I'd imagine both would have the ability to be steam bent for whatever you wanted to make out them .Willows we have .The only aspen locally is the big tooth variety which starts about 20 miles to the west and north to about lake Erie .None really in close proximity .

Those things have wood that reminds me of cotton wood although a tad harder plus they can get rather large .Fact I dropped a 3 footer that was next to a barn foundation a few years back .Ruined a chain the process too . >:(

SwampDonkey

Aspen isn't that hard to cut, must've been a worn out chain. :D We've cut some here that some mills couldn't process and the one mill that would buy the big stuff gave out a type of oversize ticket to control the quotas.

Now balsam poplar, which is another aspen we have, you could stick a branch to mark a culvert along the ditch and next spring you have a new tree taking root. Aspen of any variety here grows in swamps with cedar to dry stony ridge tops with hardwood or softwood.  It's a pioneer so for it to grow in cedar or hardwoods there has to be a disturbance. Eventually it dies out and your left with near pure cedar or tolerant hardwoods. 8) I've seen ground cut that might have an aspen or two an acre and no undergrowth, but clear cut the place and it's 80% aspen suckers and usually red maple stump suckers is the rest. Now of course that's just from the species mix in there and whats regenerating. But thick cedar and softwood often is pretty dark in under so nothing grows. Also know of a few places the undergrowth was 30 year old fir about 3 feet tall. It was cut with an aspen overstory and the over mature fir. Well now you have 25 year old aspen and small 55 year old suppressed junk fir under the aspen because it suckered about 5 feet the year after it was cut. I can't tell you how much of that old suppressed small half rotten fir I had to thin. Better off burning that suppressed junk. If that old junk is what a mill is depending on in 50 years to run they will be broke.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Al_Smith

 :D Dull chain my behind .It cut okay even after I skinned the concrete .Just not razor sharp like most of my chains ;)With the help of a file and 20 minutes I saved it though .32" loop I still have it .

Now this balsam poplar is often what they   refer black cottonwood as .Fact they tell me that often times what they sell as poplar trim is in fact cottonwood .If they called it cottonwood nobody would buy it .I didn't however know the stuff would root from a stick in the ground .

On the other hand residing in a swamp as you do I'd imagine any tree that likes water like willow or cottonwood would just about take over if you let it .Just maybe if all the ash dies and willow would work for ball bats you might be in like Flynn . Instead of calling them Louisville sluggers they'd have to change the name to New Brunswick swatters .Might work,you never know . ;)

SwampDonkey

Quote from: Al_Smith on April 09, 2012, 07:59:07 PM

Now this balsam poplar is often what they   refer black cottonwood as .

They are different trees but I bet you can't tell the difference. Black cottonwoods I seen in BC are 3 times as big as balsam poplar. Huge dang things along the Skeena river. They look pretty much the same, leaves, flower and gummy stinky buds and all. :D

Swamps, we have lots of them. But we got lots of dry hardwood ground to. ;D Don't cornfuse the rest  of New Brunswick for the forest around them southern NB cities everyone has to go on tourism to. Most of them are only about 3 steps from bogs and river bottom. :D
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Okrafarmer

Quote from: SwampDonkey on April 09, 2012, 09:19:52 PMBlack cottonwoods I seen in BC are 3 times as big as balsam poplar.

Must be pretty big ones. The balsam poplar at my cousin's house in Waterville, Maine was 6 ft ABH and well over 100 ft. tall. The city took it down--  one of my cousins from the other side of my family helped take it down, but he didn't realize he was at my other cousin's house!  :D
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Psalm 91:1

Operating a 2020 Woodmizer LT35 hydraulic for Upcountry Sawmill, Dacusville, SC

Now selling Logrite tools!

Writing fiction and nonfiction! Check my website.

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