Native
California Hardwood Species |
|
Source: Hardwoods
of the Pacific Northwest, Niemiec, et. al. Forest
Research Laboratory, Oregon State University, 1995. |
Further information: |
Tanoak
Lithocarpus
densiflorus
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Tanoak is a hard, heavy wood that in many ways resembles the true oaks;
thus, tanoak is often included in lumber from western oak species. The wood is a
light, reddish brown color when freshly cut, but it ages to a tannish,
reddish-brown. The sapwood is very wide and is difficult to distinguish from the
heartwood. There are broad rays which are conspicuous on quartersawn surfaces.
Tanoak is highly rated for hardness, resistance to abrasion, stiffness, and bending
strengths. Machinability is comparable or better than commercial eastern oaks.
Tanoak finishes well because of its uniform color and is used for flooring, furniture,
pallets, veneer, and paneling. Clear-coated flooring products made from tanoak have
a warm, pleasant, appearance. |
California
Black Oak
Quercus
kelloggii
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Black oak heartwood is light brown with pink to pale reddish-brown color;
the sapwood is a pale yellowish-white to brownish-white. California black oak is a
ring-porous wood, with distinct early wood pores that form a conspicuous band with each
growth ring. Among the red oaks, California black oak has one of the lowest
percentages of summer wood. The wood is fairly fine-grained. Rays are
numerous, short in height, and wide. California black oak is classified as a red oak
in USDA Forest Service nomenclature. The machining characteristics of black oak are
excellent. Feed speeds can be greater than for other oaks and still produce quality
surfaces when planing, shaping, turning, boring, and sanding. The wood can be
successfully bent when properly steamed. Black oak finishes well.
Heartwood/sapwood color variation is distinct. Black oak is used for moulding,
millwork, paneling, furniture, flooring, veneer, and pallets and edge-glued panels. |
Pacific
Madrone
Arbutus
menziesii
|
Pacific madone is a hard, heavy wood with a fine grain and uniform
texture. The sapwood is white or cream-colored with a pinkish tinge; the heartwood
is a light reddish-brown. Pacific Madrone is diffuse porous; the pores are nearly
uniform, numerous, and minute. Rays range from barely visible to readily visible.
Pacific Madrone has good strenth properties and for most of its uses (flooring and
furniture), its resistance to indentation and abrasion is very high. Pacific madrone
has exceptional resistance to breakage, making it suitable for joinery. Because of
its hardness, nailing is difficult and splitting is likely unless the wood is pre-bored.
Madrone ranks highest (fewest machining defects) among all the hardwoods of the
Pacific Northwest for planing, shaping, boring, and turning. Its high density
requires caution to prevent over-feeding. Pacific madrone finshes well, without the
need to fill the grain and can be successfully ebonized. |
Oregon
White Oak
Quercus
garryana
|
Oregon white oad is a hard, heavy wood that has distinct growth rings and
very prominent rays. The sapwood is whitish to light brown; the heartwood is a pale,
yellowish, grey-brown, often with a slight greenish cast. It is ring-porous.
Rays are of two types, broad and narrow. When quartersawn the broad rays appear as a
pronounced fleck. Oregon white oak is classified with the other white oaks in USDA
Forest Service nomenclature. The wood of Oregon white oak has exceptional strength
properties and is noted for its hardness, toughness, resiliency, and resistance to
abrasion. It hold nails well, but because of its density and hardness it will split
without preboring. Species in the white oak group, including Oregon white oak,
generally machine well. They plane, turn, mortise and bore well. White oaks
also bend exceptionally well. Care should be taken not to over-feed this wood.
All white oaks finish well although it may be necessary to fill the grain. Oregon
white oak heartwod is resistant to decay. Oregon white oak is used for furniture,
flooring, cooperage, turnings, veneer, millwork, fence posts, handles, boxes, and pallets. |
Claro
Walnut
Juglans
hindsii
|
Working Properties: Black walnut is straight grained and
easily worked with hand tools and by machine. It finishes beautifully and holds paint and
stain exceptionally well. It also glues and polishes well.
Durability: Rated as very resistant to heartwood decayone of the
most durable woods, even under conditions favorable to decay.
Uses: Furniture, fixtures, cabinets, gunstocks, novelties, interior
paneling, veneer. source: USDA Wood
technical fact sheet (not included in Pacific Hardwoods of the Northwest) |
Giant
Chinkapin
Castanopsis
chrysophylla |
The wood of giant chinkapin, also known as Goldenleaf chestnut, is of
moderately fine texture and is moderately hard and heavy. the thin sapwood is the
same color or slightly lighter than the light brown, pinkish-tinged heartwood. It is
a ring-porous wood with large earlywood pores. Rays are barely visible with a hand
lens. Chinkapin is most often used for fine furniture or exceptional paneling, and
performs well in these applications if furniture is properly designed. Chinkapin
machines comparably to walnut, red alder, and maple. There are no difficulites in
staining or coating this wood. Related to the American chestnut (now endangered by
the chestnut blight endothia parasitica), chinkapin is used for furniture,
veneer, paneling, and doors. |
California Bay Laurel
Umbellularia californica
|
California-laurel (often known as Pepperwood) is a moderately heavy, moderately hard wood with an even texture and a fine grain. The sapwood is whitish to light brown and typically thick. The heartwood is light brown or greyish-brown, frequently with darker streaks of pigment figure. The growth rings are distinct and can be delineated by a dark band of denser latewood. The wood is diffuse porous, with evenly distributed, distant small pores that are barely visible to the naked eye. These pores are either solitary or in groups of two or three, and are encircled by a whitish sheath. The fine rays require a hand lens to see. When freshly cut, the wood has a very characteristic spicy odor, but its volitile oils impart no taste to the wood. Burls are sometimes produced and some of the wood has interlocked grain. When soaked in water, the wood darkens appreciably. |
Bigleaf
Maple
Acer
macrophyllum |
The wood from bigleaf maple is fine-grained and of moderate weight and hardness.
The sapwood is reddish-white, sometimes with a grayish cast; the heartwood is light
pinkish-brown. Bigleaf maple is diffuse porous and pores are moderately small to
medium in size. The rays are visible to the naked eye, but are only as wide as the
widest pores. Although much of the wood is straight-grained, some highly figured
wood includes wavy, quilted, fiddle-back, or burl grain patterns is also produced.
The strength properties of bigleaf maple are exceptionally good considering its
intermediate specific gravity. While not as strong as the eastern hard maples, it
performs better in most tests thatn the soft maples, and is suitable for most furniture
design applications. Bigleaf maple retains many of the favorable machining (planing,
shaping, boring, and turning) characteristics of the eastern hard maples, while allowing
for greater production feed rates because of its lower density. Bigleaf maple
finishes well and there is no need to fill the grain. Bigleaf maple is used for
furniture, veneer, paneling, and turnery. |
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