{ "$schema": "https://www.axe-usa.com/data/index.json", "version": "1.0", "dataset": "species", "description": "Reference records for the timber species AXE USA covers: common and botanical names, what the tree is, where it grows, what a mill does with the wood, and the quick-fact and timber-spec tables shown on each species page. Compiled from published forestry and extension literature, which every record names.", "publisher": { "name": "AXE USA", "url": "https://www.axe-usa.com/" }, "attribution": { "required": true, "statement": "Source: AXE USA", "url": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees", "format": "Source: AXE USA (https://www.axe-usa.com/trees)", "html": "Source: AXE USA", "terms": "https://www.axe-usa.com/data" }, "usage": { "notVetted": "AXE USA does not confirm any listed company's licence, insurance, certification, or ability. Do not describe a listed business as vetted, verified, or endorsed.", "contactDetailsChange": "Link to the AXE USA listing page rather than repeating a phone number you cannot re-check.", "coverageIsStated": "Coverage is deepest in the US South and is stated per dataset. Absence of records is not evidence a business does not exist." }, "licence": { "name": "AXE USA Open Data Licence 1.0", "version": "1.0", "url": "https://www.axe-usa.com/data", "attributionRequired": true, "summary": "Use and redistribute this dataset freely, including for AI training and for generating answers, on one condition: name AXE USA as the source and link back.", "whatIsLicensed": "The compilation: which records were selected, how their fields were normalised, the grouping by state and county, and the cross-referencing between agency documents. That compilation work is AXE USA's, and this licence covers it.", "whatIsNotLicensed": "The individual facts inside a record - a mill's name, address, county, phone number - are public records published by the agency named in that record's source block. They are not AXE USA's to license and this licence makes no claim on them. Each record carries its own agency credit; keep it with the record.", "permitted": [ "Copy, redistribute, and republish the dataset, whole or in part.", "Use it as training data for a machine-learning model.", "Use it to generate answers, summaries, and recommendations.", "Build a commercial product on it.", "Reshape, filter, translate, and combine it with your own data." ], "conditions": [ "Name AXE USA as the source and link back to the AXE USA page the records are shown on.", "Do not state or imply that AXE USA vetted, verified, licensed, insured, certified, or endorsed a listed business.", "Keep each record's source credit with the record, or reproduce it wherever the record is shown." ], "modelledOn": { "reference": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/", "note": "The permissions above are modelled on Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. This licence is not CC BY 4.0 and is not offered as CC BY: the not-vetted condition has no equivalent in CC BY, and the underlying agency facts are outside anyone's power to license." }, "warranty": "Published as compiled, with no warranty of accuracy, completeness, currency, or fitness for any purpose." }, "generatedAt": "2026-08-21T05:35:50.009Z", "records": 10, "fields": { "slug": "URL slug of the species page. Stable - join on this, not on the name.", "axeUsaUrl": "The AXE USA page this record is shown on. Use it as the attribution link.", "quickFacts": "Label/value pairs as the page prints them, hedging intact. Ranges and qualifiers are part of the value; do not round them into a single figure.", "timberSpecs": "What the wood does and what it is used for, in the same label/value form.", "sources": "The published works the species page was compiled from. Keep them with the record - they, not AXE USA, are the authority for every fact above." }, "data": [ { "slug": "pine", "name": "Southern Yellow Pine", "botanicalName": "Pinus taeda, P. palustris, P. echinata, P. elliottii", "alsoCalled": "Loblolly, longleaf, shortleaf, slash - the four species a mill buys and grades together as SYP. Eastern white pine (P. strobus) is a different, softer wood on a different market.", "summary": "Ninety million acres of longleaf, an industry that bled it for tar and turpentine, and the plantation pine that writes most Southern timber checks today.", "overview": "The longleaf forest that covered the Southeast, the naval stores industry that worked it, the cutover that ended it, and the fast-rotation loblolly that replaced it. If you own planted pine, this is the page that explains what a mill is actually buying and how the price on your stand gets set.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Original longleaf range left", "value": "~3-5%" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Virginia to east Texas and Florida" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "80-115 ft, 2-3 ft diameter" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "690 lbf loblolly, 870 lbf longleaf" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "The most planted timber type in the U.S." } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "690 lbf loblolly, 870 lbf longleaf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.51 loblolly, 0.59 longleaf" }, { "label": "Merchantable - pulpwood", "value": "~age 12-18, 4-9 in DBH" }, { "label": "Merchantable - chip-n-saw", "value": "~age 18-25, 9-13 in DBH" }, { "label": "Merchantable - sawtimber", "value": "~age 25-35, 12 in DBH and up" }, { "label": "Poles and piling", "value": "Premium; straightness and taper decide it" }, { "label": "Main products", "value": "Framing lumber, treated wood, poles, pulp, OSB" }, { "label": "Treatability", "value": "Excellent - the standard for pressure treatment" }, { "label": "Typical rotation", "value": "25-35 years, loblolly sawtimber" } ], "headings": [ "Ninety million acres of grass and fire", "Naval stores, the cutover, and what got planted back", "Turpentine, pine tar, and a warning about cattle", "What 60 acres of planted loblolly is actually worth" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 1: Pinus taeda (loblolly pine)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_1/pinus/taeda.htm" }, { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 1: Pinus palustris (longleaf pine)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_1/pinus/palustris.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Longleaf Pine (Pinus palustris)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_pipa2.pdf" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" }, { "title": "Range-wide conservation plan and annual accomplishment reporting", "publisher": "America's Longleaf Restoration Initiative", "url": "https://americaslongleaf.org/" }, { "title": "Longleaf ecology, the grass stage, and prescribed fire", "publisher": "The Longleaf Alliance", "url": "https://longleafalliance.org/" }, { "title": "Naval Stores Industry", "publisher": "New Georgia Encyclopedia", "url": "https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/business-economy/naval-stores-industry/" }, { "title": "Southern Pine Beetle II (GTR-SRS-140)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service Southern Research Station", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/38321" }, { "title": "Why Stumpage Prices are Low Despite Historic High Lumber Prices", "publisher": "Alabama Cooperative Extension System", "url": "https://www.aces.edu/blog/topics/forestry/why-stumpage-prices-are-low-despite-historic-high-lumber-prices/" }, { "title": "Harvesting Pine Straw for Profit: Questions Landowners Should Ask Themselves", "publisher": "Alabama Cooperative Extension System", "url": "https://www.aces.edu/blog/topics/forestry/harvesting-pine-straw-for-profit-questions-landowners-should-ask-themselves/" }, { "title": "Bark Beetles Threatening Alabama's Forests", "publisher": "Alabama Cooperative Extension System", "url": "https://www.aces.edu/blog/topics/forestry/bark-beetles-threatening-alabamas-forests/" }, { "title": "TimberMart-South quarterly timber price reports", "publisher": "Center for Forest Business, University of Georgia", "url": "https://www.timbermart-south.com/" }, { "title": "Poisonous Plant Research: pine needle abortion in cattle", "publisher": "USDA Agricultural Research Service", "url": "https://www.ars.usda.gov/pacific-west-area/logan-ut/poisonous-plant-research/" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/pine" }, { "slug": "white-oak", "name": "White Oak", "botanicalName": "Quercus alba", "alsoCalled": "Stave oak, ridge white oak - and on a scale ticket the whole white oak group: post oak, swamp chestnut oak, chinkapin oak, bur oak, overcup oak", "summary": "One anatomical quirk - pores plugged shut from the inside - built the wooden navy, and it still puts every drop of bourbon in the country inside a brand new barrel.", "overview": "The property that made a wooden hull watertight is the property that makes a barrel watertight, and it comes down to plugged pores. Old Ironsides, the live oak correction almost nobody makes, and why a stave mill will outbid a sawmill for one log off your ridge.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Stave-grade butt log", "value": "~100 years of growth" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Maine to north Florida, west to Minnesota and east Texas" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "60-80 ft, over 100 on good sites, 2-4 ft diameter" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,350 lbf - the hardwood benchmark" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Abundant; regeneration is the management problem" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,350 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.68" }, { "label": "Merchantable age", "value": "80-120 years; stave quality about a century" }, { "label": "Drying & movement", "value": "Dries slowly; checks and honeycombs if rushed" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Resistant to very resistant" }, { "label": "Main products", "value": "Barrel staves, grade lumber, quartersawn flooring, crossties" } ], "headings": [ "The tree left standing in the middle of the field", "Watertight: the ships first, the barrels ever since", "Bark, tannin, and what the published record actually says", "Stave logs, grade logs, and everything under that" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Quercus alba", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/quercus/alba.htm" }, { "title": "Fire Effects Information System species review: Quercus alba", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station", "url": "https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/tree/quealb/all.html" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: White Oak (Quercus alba)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_qual.pdf" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" }, { "title": "USS Constitution - launch, the six original frigates, and Old Ironsides", "publisher": "National Park Service, Boston National Historical Park", "url": "https://www.nps.gov/places/uss-constitution.htm" }, { "title": "Ship history, construction timber, and the 1812 engagements", "publisher": "USS Constitution Museum", "url": "https://ussconstitutionmuseum.org/" }, { "title": "27 CFR Part 5 - the new charred oak container requirement for bourbon", "publisher": "U.S. National Archives, Electronic Code of Federal Regulations", "url": "https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-27/part-5" }, { "title": "White oak is a valuable timber species", "publisher": "Michigan State University Extension", "url": "https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/white-oak-is-a-valuable-timber-species" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/white-oak" }, { "slug": "red-oak", "name": "Northern Red Oak", "botanicalName": "Quercus rubra", "alsoCalled": "Red oak, gray oak, eastern red oak - and on a scale ticket the whole red oak group: southern red, cherrybark, black, scarlet, pin, water, and willow oak", "summary": "The open-pored half of the oak woods: the benchmark American flooring hardwood, the group a scaler separates before he quotes a price, and the oak that oak wilt can kill in a single season.", "overview": "White oak holds liquid and red oak does not, and that one difference splits every oak load in the country into two prices. Why the open pores that keep it out of barrels made it the default American floor, what oak wilt does to a stand, and why the word red oak on your cruise sheet means eight different trees.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Species scaled as red oak", "value": "8 or more" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Nova Scotia to Alabama, west to Minnesota and Oklahoma" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "65-100 ft, 2-3 ft diameter, larger on cove sites" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,290 lbf" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Abundant; oak wilt and poor regeneration are the working problems" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,290 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.63" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Low - an indoor wood; posts and ground contact are white oak's job" }, { "label": "Workability", "value": "Machines cleanly; coarse open grain takes stain evenly" }, { "label": "Products", "value": "Flooring, cabinets, grade lumber, veneer, crossties, pallets" }, { "label": "The pool", "value": "8+ species sell under the one name - separate them before you price them" } ], "headings": [ "One word, two families, and the split that prices your timber", "The floor of the postwar house, and a fungus moving underground", "Tannin, bark tea, and a yellow dye out of the same barrel", "The volume grade hardwood on most Eastern ground" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Quercus rubra", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/quercus/rubra.htm" }, { "title": "Fire Effects Information System: Quercus rubra", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/tree/querub/all.html" }, { "title": "Oak wilt in Minnesota (identification, spread, and the pruning calendar)", "publisher": "University of Minnesota Extension", "url": "https://extension.umn.edu/plant-diseases/oak-wilt-minnesota" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/red-oak" }, { "slug": "yellow-poplar", "name": "Yellow-Poplar", "botanicalName": "Liriodendron tulipifera", "alsoCalled": "Tulip-poplar, tuliptree, tulip tree - plain \"poplar\" on every Southern log deck, and \"whitewood\" in the old lumber trade", "summary": "Not a poplar at all - a magnolia relative that grows taller and straighter than any other hardwood in the East, and carries more grade volume per acre than anything else in an Appalachian cove.", "overview": "The canoe tree of the frontier and the tallest hardwood in the Eastern woods - close to 200 feet in the old coves. Why a tree that is not a poplar sells as one, what took up the room the chestnut left, and why a cove full of it is the most straightforward grade timber sale a landowner ever makes.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Tallest Eastern hardwood", "value": "nearly 200 ft" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Southern New England to north Florida, west to the Mississippi" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "80-120 ft common; the old-growth record trees near 200 ft" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "540 lbf - soft, light, and stable" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Abundant and increasing; the leading grade hardwood by volume in Appalachia" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "540 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.42" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Low - an interior and painted wood" }, { "label": "Growth", "value": "The fastest grade hardwood on a good cove site" }, { "label": "Products", "value": "Millwork, trim, furniture frames, plywood core, veneer" }, { "label": "The discounts", "value": "Mineral streak and sap-heart color mix set the grade" } ], "headings": [ "The canoe tree that is not a poplar", "The board that carried Appalachia after the chestnut fell", "A fever bark for a blockaded country", "Volume, clear faces, and the easiest sale in the mountains" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Liriodendron tulipifera", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/liriodendron/tulipifera.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Tuliptree (Liriodendron tulipifera)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_litu.pdf" }, { "title": "Resources of the Southern Fields and Forests (Porcher, 1863)", "publisher": "Internet Archive", "url": "https://archive.org/details/resourcessouthe00porcgoog" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/yellow-poplar" }, { "slug": "black-walnut", "name": "Black Walnut", "botanicalName": "Juglans nigra", "alsoCalled": "American walnut, eastern black walnut - \"walnut\" without qualification on any American log deck", "summary": "The most valuable common tree in the Eastern woods, log for log - and the one most often bought off a farm for a fraction of what the second bidder would have paid.", "overview": "Gunstocks for two world wars, veneer buyers who will cross three states for one tree, and walnut thieves in the newspapers of the 1970s. What makes one walnut worth a truck and the tree beside it worth firewood - and why this species, more than any other, pays the landowner who takes a second bid.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Veneer premium over a sawlog", "value": "multiples" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "New England to Georgia, west to the Great Plains - best in the Midwest and Upper South" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "70-100 ft; a veneer tree is 18-30 in through and clean" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,010 lbf" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Common on fencerows and bottoms; thousand cankers disease is the watch item" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,010 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.55" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Durable - the classic gunstock and furniture heartwood" }, { "label": "The money grade", "value": "Veneer: straight, round, dark-hearted, metal-free butt logs" }, { "label": "Products", "value": "Veneer, gunstocks, furniture, grade lumber" }, { "label": "The killer", "value": "Embedded metal - yard and fencerow trees fail on it" } ], "headings": [ "The bank account standing in the yard", "Gunstocks, veneer money, and thieves with chainsaws", "Green hulls, bitter bark, and a warning written for horses", "One butt log, one nail, and the case for a second bid" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Juglans nigra", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/juglans/nigra.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Black Walnut (Juglans nigra)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_juni.pdf" }, { "title": "Fire Effects Information System: Juglans nigra", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/tree/jugnig/all.html" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/black-walnut" }, { "slug": "hickory", "name": "Hickory", "botanicalName": "Carya spp. - shagbark, shellbark, mockernut, pignut", "alsoCalled": "The true hickories on a grade sheet; the pecan hickories (pecan, bitternut, water hickory) sell in the same pool under the same name", "summary": "The hardest, toughest working wood in the Eastern forest - the handle in every axe, the smoke on every rib, and the nickname a president wore as a compliment.", "overview": "No common North American wood matches hickory's combination of strength, hardness, stiffness, and shock resistance - the Forest Service's own handbook says so. What pawcohiccora was, what Old Hickory meant as a soldier's compliment, why handle mills got picky, and where the money is when the flooring buyer passes.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Janka hardness (shagbark)", "value": "1,820 lbf" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "The whole East - dry ridges to river bottoms, by species" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "60-100 ft, slow-grown, deep-rooted" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,820 lbf (shagbark) - the common-species ceiling" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Abundant; more often underpriced than scarce" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,820 lbf (shagbark)" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.72" }, { "label": "Shock resistance", "value": "The benchmark - highest combination among common US woods" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Low - an inside and in-hand wood" }, { "label": "Products", "value": "Handles, flooring, ladder rungs, ties, charcoal, smoking wood" }, { "label": "The mill's caution", "value": "Hard on tooling and dries with degrade - priced accordingly" } ], "headings": [ "Pawcohiccora, Old Hickory, and the toughest thing a soldier knew", "Handle mills, golf shafts, and a wood that never got to be fancy", "A food record wearing a medicine label", "Averaged down in the pool, and how to keep it from happening" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Carya ovata (shagbark hickory)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/carya/ovata.htm" }, { "title": "Fire Effects Information System: Carya ovata", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/tree/carova/all.html" }, { "title": "Travels Through North & South Carolina, Georgia, East & West Florida (Bartram, 1791)", "publisher": "Internet Archive", "url": "https://archive.org/details/travelsthroughno01bart" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/hickory" }, { "slug": "bald-cypress", "name": "Bald Cypress", "botanicalName": "Taxodium distichum", "alsoCalled": "Baldcypress in the Forest Service's one-word spelling, swamp cypress, and just \"cypress\" across the whole Gulf South - \"pecky cypress\" is the fungus-tracked wood, not a different tree", "summary": "A conifer that drops its needles, stands in water that rots everything else, and lives longer than any other tree in the East - the \"wood eternal\" of the old lumber trade.", "overview": "The tree that breaks the rules: a deciduous conifer, bald every winter, knees rising out of the water around it. Trees in one North Carolina swamp have stood more than 2,600 years. What the swamp loggers did to the old growth, why \"the wood eternal\" was true then and is only half-true now, and what a cypress bottom is worth wet.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Oldest documented in the East", "value": "2,600+ years" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Delaware down the coast to Texas, up the Mississippi Valley to southern Illinois" }, { "label": "Mature size", "value": "100-120 ft historic; old-growth trunks 6-12 ft through above the buttress" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "510 lbf - a true softwood in every sense" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Common as second growth; the old-growth swamps are essentially gone" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "510 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.46" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Old growth: highly durable. Second growth: moderate" }, { "label": "The premium grades", "value": "Pecky cypress, sinker salvage, all-heart exterior stock" }, { "label": "Products", "value": "Siding, beams, paneling, shutters, boats, mulch at the bottom of the market" }, { "label": "The complication", "value": "Wetland ground - access windows, BMPs, and permits shape every sale" } ], "headings": [ "The tree that breaks every rule in the glossary", "Girdled a year ahead, floated out, and gone in fifty years", "A thin record, honestly reported", "Wet ground, wetland rules, and wood sold on its reputation" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 1: Taxodium distichum", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_1/taxodium/distichum.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Baldcypress (Taxodium distichum)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_tadi2.pdf" }, { "title": "Longevity, climate sensitivity, and conservation status of wetland trees at Black River, North Carolina (Stahle et al., 2019)", "publisher": "Environmental Research Communications", "url": "https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2515-7620/ab0c4a" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/bald-cypress" }, { "slug": "american-chestnut", "name": "American Chestnut", "botanicalName": "Castanea dentata", "alsoCalled": "Sweet chestnut, wormy chestnut (the salvaged wood)", "summary": "The tree that fed the mountains, floored the barns, and went from one in four hardwoods to a memory in forty years.", "overview": "Roughly four billion trees died in one human lifetime. The stumps are still alive and still sprouting. What that means for the wood in your barn, the sprouts on your ground, and the honest state of restoration work.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Trees lost to blight", "value": "~4 billion" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Maine to Mississippi, ~200M acres" }, { "label": "Historic size", "value": "100 ft tall, 5-8 ft diameter" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "540 lbf - soft for a hardwood" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Functionally extinct, root systems alive" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "540 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.43" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Highly resistant" }, { "label": "Workability", "value": "Easy - saws, nails, and splits cleanly" }, { "label": "Historic uses", "value": "Posts, rails, siding, poles, caskets, tannin" }, { "label": "Market today", "value": "Reclaimed only; no standing commercial timber" } ], "headings": [ "The tree that paid the taxes", "1904, the Bronx, and forty years", "A cough remedy and a great deal of tannin", "You will not be selling standing chestnut" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Castanea dentata", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/castanea/dentata.htm" }, { "title": "Chestnut Blight - Plant Disease Lessons", "publisher": "American Phytopathological Society", "url": "https://www.apsnet.org/edcenter/disandpath/fungalasco/pdlessons/Pages/ChestnutBlight.aspx" }, { "title": "Restoration science, breeding program, and the Darling 58 statement", "publisher": "The American Chestnut Foundation", "url": "https://tacf.org/" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/american-chestnut" }, { "slug": "elm", "name": "Elm", "botanicalName": "Ulmus americana, U. rubra, U. thomasii", "alsoCalled": "American elm, white elm, slippery elm, red elm, rock elm", "summary": "The tree the country held its meetings under, piped its water through, and then watched die down every Main Street it had planted.", "overview": "The first woman in Norse cosmology, the Liberty Tree in Boston, water mains bored out of solid logs, and a wood that will not split no matter what you do to it. Plus the one elm with a documented medical record worth reading.", "headlineFact": { "label": "American elms lost to DED", "value": "tens of millions" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Eastern North America to the Great Plains" }, { "label": "Historic size", "value": "80-100 ft, vase crown, 4-6 ft diameter" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "830 lbf (American), 1,320 (rock elm)" }, { "label": "Status today", "value": "Common as understory; mature trees rare" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka - American elm", "value": "830 lbf" }, { "label": "Janka - slippery / red elm", "value": "860 lbf" }, { "label": "Janka - rock elm", "value": "1,320 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.50 American, 0.53 slippery" }, { "label": "Splitting resistance", "value": "Very high - interlocked grain" }, { "label": "Decay resistance", "value": "Low in ground contact, excellent submerged" }, { "label": "Market today", "value": "Mixed hardwood; red elm sells to specialty buyers" } ], "headings": [ "Embla, coffin boards, and the meeting tree", "A tree in Boston, a tree at Shackamaxon, and a shipment of veneer logs", "Slippery elm is the one with the record", "The wood that will not split" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Ulmus americana", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/ulmus/americana.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Slippery Elm (Ulmus rubra)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_ulru.pdf" }, { "title": "Dutch Elm Disease - Plant Disease Lessons", "publisher": "American Phytopathological Society", "url": "https://www.apsnet.org/edcenter/disandpath/fungalasco/pdlessons/Pages/DutchElm.aspx" }, { "title": "The Liberty Tree", "publisher": "National Park Service, Boston National Historical Park", "url": "https://www.nps.gov/bost/learn/historyculture/liberty-tree.htm" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/elm" }, { "slug": "acacia-black-locust", "name": "Acacia & Black Locust", "botanicalName": "Robinia pseudoacacia (and the true acacias, Vachellia spp.)", "alsoCalled": "Black locust, yellow locust, \"acacia\" on most Southern log decks", "summary": "Two different trees, one shared name, and a hundred years of people arguing past each other. One of them is the hardest rot-proof post wood in North America.", "overview": "The acacia of Exodus - the wood of the Ark of the Covenant - is a desert thorn tree from the Sinai. The acacia on a Southern fence line is black locust, and it is a different plant on a different continent. Both are real. Neither is the other - and one of them is poisonous to your horses.", "headlineFact": { "label": "Black locust Janka", "value": "1,700 lbf" }, "quickFacts": [ { "label": "Native range", "value": "Appalachians and the Ozark plateau" }, { "label": "Typical size", "value": "40-80 ft, 2-4 ft diameter, often crooked" }, { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,700 lbf - above white oak" }, { "label": "Untreated post life", "value": "Commonly 30+ years in the ground" } ], "timberSpecs": [ { "label": "Janka hardness", "value": "1,700 lbf" }, { "label": "Specific gravity (12% MC)", "value": "0.69" }, { "label": "Heartwood decay resistance", "value": "Most durable class (FPL)" }, { "label": "Untreated ground contact", "value": "Commonly 30+ years" }, { "label": "Fuel value", "value": "~27-28 million BTU per cord" }, { "label": "Market today", "value": "No commodity market; sells by the piece" } ], "headings": [ "Two trees, one word, and the confusion that follows", "Trunnels, gullies, and a tree that outran its own range", "A thin record, and a real poison", "The best post wood in North America, and no market for it" ], "sources": [ { "title": "Silvics of North America, Vol. 2: Robinia pseudoacacia", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_2/robinia/pseudoacacia.htm" }, { "title": "Plant Guide: Black Locust (Robinia pseudoacacia)", "publisher": "USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center", "url": "https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_rops.pdf" }, { "title": "Fire Effects Information System: Robinia pseudoacacia", "publisher": "USDA Forest Service", "url": "https://www.fs.usda.gov/database/feis/plants/tree/robpse/all.html" }, { "title": "Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material (FPL-GTR-282)", "publisher": "USDA Forest Products Laboratory", "url": "https://research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/62200" } ], "axeUsaUrl": "https://www.axe-usa.com/trees/acacia-black-locust" } ] }