What Kind Of Tree Is This?

[TBigLug]

Well, after I got out of work, me, “Big Orange” and “The Little Poulan That Could” set out to the woods to turn some big pieces of wood into smaller pieces. After a good three hours or so of splitting wood I decided to stop and cut up a tree that had blown down a couple years ago. Figuring it was just an old rotten tree I took to sawing it into 16″ sections to set by the road for sale. After I got three starters on it I noticed something. The inside of this tree wasn’t spitting out in rotten chunks like I figured it would. I cut the base off square above the section where it twisted and fell and there is a small hole where ants or termites had built a nest but it’s small so I think there’s not much more nest there. So now, I’m curious.

What kind of tree is it? I’m ID ignorant when it comes to trees but I was guessing either Cherry or White Oak.

What would it be worth if I were to sell it to someone who wanted to have it made into lumber?

Dimensions are ~8′ 10″ long, 19″ across at the base, 5′ 3″ in circumference near the thin end.

How much would a sawmill typically charge to make it into 1x or 2x’s?

Just trying to get some ideas. If it could be worth something I’d hate to just cut it up into firewood.

[Carl Russell]

I think you’ll have to give us more to go on, like a picture, color of the heart-wood, bark characteristics,etc… Then I’d be glad to take a guess, Carl

[TBigLug]

Yup, sorry. My high speed connection turned into a NO speed connection as I was working on it.

[TBigLug]

[Patrick]

Looks like choke cherry to me.

[Traveling Woodsman]

Black Cherry. Sorry to say probably not worth much because of the heart rot. If it were in a pile of cherry logs there would be some buyers out there who might reject it. There are some who would buy it, though, and it would have a board foot reduction or price reduction, depending on your buyer. However if you wanted some cherry lumber for your own use, you would probably get some nice character boards from it. There’s approximately 120 bd. ft. in this log, and a depending on local markets you might get it sawed for $0.25/bd.ft. Although some sawyers might have a minimum order or hourly charge.

[TBigLug]

Thanks for the info. I figured it was a Cherry of some sort. Looks like it’ll be firewood.

[lancek]

Hey big lug from what I see thats a large black locauts of the real kind!
If what you say is true and its been down a few years that wood would be more decayed than that and if your post was corect that splitting it was hard, then that to leads me to my conclusion! Old groth black locast has a tendinsy to look like cheery. this log would make good farm or wagon lumber lance k

[Plowboy]

I’ve got a large locust grove on my farm but that tree in the photo’s is a Cherry.

[Rod]

Would make a nice blank or blanks for some ox yokes.

[lancek]

After looking at the limbs it may be cherry but the bark looks like the old groth black locast we have around here you look at the wood gain and it looks a lot tighter than cherry the sap wood is also small an open grown cherry tree like that would have a large sap line! and as I stated before if it was splitting hard cherry wouldnt do that! hey jason what do you say lancek

[Scott G]

Even from the Rockies it looks like cherry to me…

[Carl Russell]

Most definitely Black Cherry. In most mature cherry trees the sap wood is only an inch or so. It is the heart wood that is sought for lumber. My experience with cherry is that the heart rot pictured here would certainly preclude use for ox-yoke blanks, and it would probably only yield about 1/3 of the volume in good usable boards. Also, cherry does often split very easily, but there can be trees that break the rule. I say burn it.

Carl
p.s. Black Locust has more distinct early/late wood cells within each growth ring, and the wood is much more black/grey/brown than the red in this tree.

[Phil]

Yes that’s definitely a cherry log. Could be some nice boards for interior projects, I did my bathroom in cherry from logs like that. If not, it will be some nice easy to split firewood. 🙂

[Vicki]

Looks cherry to me, having had dendrology oh so many years ago, and living in hardwood lumber country, and being a firewood cutter. Old cherry will often have that distinct aroma that I love when you chainsaw it. Good firewood. Look like ants ruined the good heartwood.

[Author]

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