Help identify this orange wood

[Labman]

My book shows Osage orange starting at about Iowa and south to the gulf and east to the coast.

 

[mizzou]

Bark looks wrong for hedge, it may be mullberry. Close relative of hedge and fairly close in btu output.

 

[banshee67]

looks like hickory

osage orange is bright yellowish/green when cut open, theres some on the left, that pic doesnt do it justice, fresh cut, outside in the sun its BRIGHT

they also drop these things, we used to call em monkey brains

 

[Dalmatian90]

Dutch, or American Elm.

The trees are American.

The disease they get is Dutch.

 

[wackydeejay]

Well so far it seems the best guesses are mulberry, some sort of hickory or possibly some type of elm. I am hoping that once the splits sit out in the sun they'll change enough to give a few more clues.

 

[mga]

i just cut up some wood exactly like that. very dense and it had a strange odor to it when cutting...kinda peppery like.

unsure what it is tho.

i might go back for more today.

 

[r&r]

Looks like elm to me
If it gets really light after it dries out its probably slippery elm.

 

[wackydeejay]

Looks like elm to me
If it gets really light after it dries out its probably slippery elm.

See, I think it looks a lot like red elm also. Only thing is this is very orange instead of red inside. The smell is very different also, so I don't know.

 

[CountryBoy19]

What about pignut hickory?

The bark seems close and you said it was dense stuff. Color seems similar, except most hickories have a greater percentage of sapwood.

Just fishing to help.

Thats what I was thinking. The grain looks a lot like hickory. Pignut Hickory is my vote.

Definitely not hedge from what I can tell. The bark is too flat. Hedge is a more furrowed bark.

 

[r&r]

take a look at the end grain
elm will have wavy lines of early wood (maybe late wood don't remember) either way the white part of the growth ring.

Hickory will have little white dots.

IMO the bark rules out hickory maybe wrong though.

 

[4seasons]

Looks like hickory to me

I can tell hickory by the smell and how it splits. Any straight grained hickory I have ever split pops open with the first good swing of my maul then requires all the stringy fibers cut with an ax or two strong men fight it apart for the next 5 minutes. I don't cut much elm but I have heard of splitting elm to be similar to this as well. So the pleasant smell of hickory would be the deciding factor. One word little bit of advice if it is hickory, burn it around a year after it was cut and split. Bugs love hickory and you will have lots of dust in a pile of hickory from the bugs eating it and burring up in your firewood. They also pop a lot when you throw them in the fire:msp_wink:

 

[Hedgerow]

This is out of right field, but you folks don't have any Kentucky coffee trees growing around there do you? There would have been some pods around if it were... Not sure if they grow that far east...

 

[wackydeejay]

I can tell hickory by the smell and how it splits. Any straight grained hickory I have ever split pops open with the first good swing of my maul then requires all the stringy fibers cut with an ax or two strong men fight it apart for the next 5 minutes. I don't cut much elm but I have heard of splitting elm to be similar to this as well. So the pleasant smell of hickory would be the deciding factor. One word little bit of advice if it is hickory, burn it around a year after it was cut and split. Bugs love hickory and you will have lots of dust in a pile of hickory from the bugs eating it and burring up in your firewood. They also pop a lot when you throw them in the fire:msp_wink:

It didn't have quite the same crack that shagbark hickory has when you split it with a maul. It split about the same as the red elm, and it seemed to have a stringy fiber just like the elm. As for the smell, it does smell a little like hickory. There is a WORLD of difference between the smell of this stuff and the smell of the red elm!

 

[wackydeejay]

This is out of right field, but you folks don't have any Kentucky coffee trees growing around there do you? There would have been some pods around if it were... Not sure if they grow that far east...

No, I don't think I've ever seen one of those around here, hedge.

 

[Hedgerow]

No, I don't think I've ever seen one of those around here, hedge.

Then my guess is Eastern hop hornbeam. "Ostrya virginiana" The bark is right. This wood is second in BTU to the Hedge...
And let me guess, it wasn't a very big tree, extremely heavy, relatively straight grain, but still don't split easy?:msp_wink:
AKA.. Ironwood...

 

[wackydeejay]

Then my guess is Eastern hop hornbeam. "Ostrya virginiana" The bark is right. This wood is second in BTU to the Hedge...
And let me guess, it wasn't a very big tree, extremely heavy, relatively straight grain, but still don't split easy?:msp_wink:
AKA.. Ironwood...

Yeah, I've run into a bit of ironwood. That stuff is really dense. The trunk looks like muscles on that, though, doesn't it?

 

[Hedgerow]

Yeah, I've run into a bit of ironwood. That stuff is really dense. The trunk looks like muscles on that, though, doesn't it?

Nope. I've found that certain characteristics of trees differ upon growing conditions and locations.

This is an Eastern Hop hornbeam tree.

 

[wackydeejay]

Nope. I've found that certain characteristics of trees differ upon growing conditions and locations.

This is an Eastern Hop hornbeam tree.

You may very well have answered my question, Hedge!

I ran across the first post on this page of the Wood ID Reference thread: http://www.arboristsite.com/firewood-heating-wood-burning-equipment/96057-3.htm.

The other hornbeam was the american hornbeam I was thinking of. It's the muscle-looking wood. Yep. We might be looking at some Eastern Hophornbeam here.

 

[Woobie]

+1 on the hickory...could be Pignut. Either way good score! :msp_thumbup:

 

[wackydeejay]

I will say that regardless of what it is, my gut feeling is that this is going to be good wood.