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ONE OF A KIND / OOAK
AO / ARTIST ORIGINAL
BURL WOODEN BOX
AO / ARTIST ORIGINAL
BURL WOODEN BOX
STASH
INSERTS AND HIDDEN COMPARTMENTS
CACHE MEASURES ABOUT
CACHE MEASURES ABOUT
8in TALL X 3in WIDE X 8in LONG
WOOD IS UNDETERMINED
FYI
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Some of the finest extant examples of early wood carving are from the Middle Ages in Italy and France, where the typical themes of that era were Christian iconography. In England many complete examples remain from the 16th and 17th century, where oak was the preferred medium in this case
Figural carving seems to have been widespread. The carving to represent one's god in a tangible form finds expression in numberless ways. The early carver, and, for that matter, the native of the present day, has found a difficulty in giving expression to the eye, and at times has evaded it by inlaying this feature with colored material.
The nature of the wood being carved limits the scope of the carver in that wood is not equally strong in all directions: it is an anisotropic material. The direction in which wood is strongest is called "grain" (grain may be straight, interlocked, wavy or fiddleback, etc.). It is smart to arrange the more delicate parts of a design along the grain instead of across it, and the more slender stalks or leaf-points should not be too much separated from their adjacent surroundings. The failure to appreciate these primary rules may constantly be seen in damaged work, when it will be noticed that, whereas tendrils, tips of birds beaks, etc., arranged across the grain have been broken away, similar details designed more in harmony with the growth of the wood and not too deeply undercut remain intact. Probably the two most common woods used for carving are Basswood (aka Tilia or Lime) and Tupelo, both are hardwoods that are relatively easy to work with. Chestnut, Butternut, Oak, American walnut, mahogany and teak are also very good woods; while for fine work Italian walnut, sycamore maple, apple, pear, box or plum, are usually chosen. Decoration that is to be painted and of not too delicate a nature is as a rule carved in pine.
Woodturning is a form of woodworking that is used to create wooden objects on a lathe (see: also antique wooden polelathe). Woodturning differs from most other forms of woodworking in that the wood is moving while a stationary tool is used to cut and shape it. Many intricate shapes and designs can be made by turning wood.
There are two distinct methods of turning wood: spindle turning and faceplate turning. In spindle turning, the wood is fixed between 2 points. The spur center digs in to the wood and is powered by a motor. The other, a hard center or a live center may be a point or set of points in the tailstock. In face plate turning, the wood is secured with screws to a faceplate or in a chuck or jig. the tail stock and a center may also be used for added support on large pieces with a faceplate. Most bowls, platters and many vessels are face plate turned, while, Pens, furniture legs, spindles, and some vessels are spindle turned. The method used may differ depending on the shape of the blank and the technique of the turner, and both methods may be used on the same piece.
When wood is cut in such a way that the fiber being cut is not supported by the fiber below it, it tends to separate and tear. This "tearout" exhibits a rough, highly damaged looking surface texture and greatly reduces the value of any product exhibiting it. The direction of cut is different in spindle turning and faceplate turning because cutting in the wrong direction can cause tearout. Spindle turning cuts are made from high points toward the axis on the outside of the piece, and from the axis toward the outside when hollowing. When faceplate turning, the opposite applies.
The origin of woodturning dates to around 1300BC when the Egyptians first developed a two-person lathe. One person would turn the wood with a rope while the other used a sharp tool to cut shapes in the wood. The Romans improved the Egyptian design with the addition of a turning bow. Early bow lathes were also developed and used in Germany, France and Britain. In the Middle Ages a pedal replaced hand-operated turning, freeing both the craftsman's hands to hold the woodturning tools. The pedal was usually connected to a pole, often a straight-grained sapling. The system today is called the "spring pole" lathe (see Polelathe). Spring pole lathes were in common use into the early 20th Century. A two-person lathe, called a "great lathe", allowed a piece to turn continuously (like today's power lathes). A master would cut the wood while an apprentice turned the crank.
The term "bodger" stems from pole lathe turners who used to make the chair legs and spindles. A bodger would typically purchase all the trees on a plot of land, set up camp on the plot, and then fell the trees and turn the wood. The spindles and legs that were produced were sold in bulk, for pence per dozen. The bodger's job was considered unfinished because he only made component parts. The term now describes a person who leaves a job unfinished, or does it badly.
During the industrial revolution the lathe was motorized, allowing turned items to be created in less time. The motor also produced a greater rotational speed for the wood, making it easier to quickly produce high quality work. Today most commercial woodturning is done by computer-operated machinery allowing for mass-production that can be created with precision and without the cost of employing craftsmen. Despite this, there is still a demand for hand-turned products. Woodturning is also a hobby enjoyed by many people.
Modern professional woodturners are typically either "production" turners producing large quantities of functional pieces, or artistic turners producing smaller numbers of pieces, often enhanced after turning by carving, piercing, coloring, applying pyrography, gilding, or a number of other techniques to produce objects for the art market.
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Spalting is any form of wood coloration caused by fungi. Although primarily found in dead trees, spalting can also occur in living trees under stress. Although spalting can cause weight loss and strength loss in the wood, the unique coloration and patterns of spalted wood are sought by woodworkers.
Types
Spalting is divided into three main types: pigmentation, white rot, and zone lines. Spalted wood may exhibit one or all of these types in varying degrees. Both hardwoods (deciduous) and softwoods (coniferous) can spalt, but zone lines and white rot are more commonly found on hardwoods due to enzymatic differences in white rotting fungi. Brown rots are more common to conifers, although one brown rot, Fistulina hepatica (beefsteak fungus), is known to cause spalting among deciduous trees.
Pigmentation
Pigmentation is caused when fungi produce extracellular pigments inside wood. Bluestain is also a form of pigmentation; however, bluestain pigments are generally bound within the hyphae cell walls. A visible color change can be seen if enough hyphae are concentrated in an area. Pigmenting fungi classified as spalting fungi do decay wood, they simply do so at a slower rate (soft rotting) than white rotting fungi. The most common groups of pigmentation fungi are the imperfect fungi and the ascomycetes. Mold fungi, such as Trichoderma spp., are not considered to be spalting fungi, as their hyphae do not colonize the wood internally and they do not produce the enzymes necessary to digest the wood cell wall components.
White rot
The mottled white pockets and bleaching effect seen in spalted wood is due to white rot fungi. Primarily found on hardwoods, these fungi "bleach" by consuming lignin, which is the slightly pigmented area of a wood cell wall. Some white rotting can also be caused by an effect similar to pigmentation, in which the white hyphae of a fungus, such as Trametes versicolor (Fr.) Pil., is so concentrated in an area that a visual effect is created.
Both strength and weight loss occur with white rot decay, causing the "punky" area often referred to by woodworkers. Brown rots, the "unpleasing" type of spalting, do not degrade lignin, thus creating a crumbly, cracked surface which cannot be stabilized. Both types of rot, if uncontrolled, will render wood useless.
Zone lines
Dark dotting, winding lines and thin streaks of red, brown and black are known as zone lines. This type of spalting does not occur due to any specific type of fungus, but is instead an interaction zone in which different fungi have erected barriers to protect their resources. They can also be caused by a single fungus delineating itself. The lines are often clumps of hard, dark mycelium, referred to as pseudosclerotial plate formation.
Zone lines themselves do not damage the wood. However, the fungi responsible for creating them often do. Spalted wood is also sometimes known as web wood.
Conditions
Conditions required for spalting are the same as the conditions required for fungal growth: fixed nitrogen, micronutrients, water, warm temperatures and oxygen.
Water: Wood must be saturated to a 20% moisture content or higher for fungal colonization to occur. Wood placed underwater lacks sufficient oxygen, and colonization cannot occur.
Temperature: The majority of fungi prefer warm temperatures between 10 and 40 °C, with rapid growth occurring between 20 and 32 °C.
Oxygen: Fungi do not require much oxygen, but conditions such as waterlogging will inhibit growth.
Time: Different fungi require different amounts of time to colonize wood. Research conducted on some common spalting fungi found that Trametes versicolor, when paired with Bjerkandera adusta, took eight weeks to spalt 1.5 inch (38 mm) cubes of Acer saccharum. Colonization continued to progress after this time period, but the structural integrity of the wood was compromised. The same study also found that Polyporus brumalis, when paired with Trametes versicolor, required 10 weeks to spalt the same size cubes.
Commonly spalted woods
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources found that pale hardwoods had the best ability to spalt. Some common trees in this category include maple (Acer spp.), birch (Betula spp.) and beech (Fagus spp.). However, recent research suggests that sugar maple (Acer saccharum) and aspen (Populus sp.) are preferred by both white rot and pigment fungi.
Common spalting fungi
One of the trickier aspects to spalting is that some fungi cannot colonize wood alone; they require other fungi to have preceded them to create favorable conditions. Fungi progress in waves of primary and secondary colonizers,[4] where primary colonizers initially capture and control resources, change the pH of the wood and its structure, and then must defend against secondary colonizers that then have the ability to colonize the substrate.
Ceratocystis spp. (Ascomycetes) contains the most common blue stain fungi. Other pigmenting fungi include Chlorociboria aeruginascens, Chlorociboria aeruginosa, Scytalidium cuboideum, and Scytalidium ganodermophthorum. Trametes versicolor, (Basidiomycetes) is found all over the world and is a quick and efficient white rot of hardwoods. Xylaria polymorpha (Pers. ex Mer.) Grev. (Ascomycetes) has been known to bleach wood, but is unique in that it is one of the few fungi that will erect zone lines without any antagonism from other fungi.
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A burl (American English) or burr (British English) is a tree growth in which the grain has grown in a deformed manner. It is commonly found in the form of a rounded outgrowth on a tree trunk or branch that is filled with small knots from dormant buds. Burl formation is typically a result of some form of stress such as an injury or a viral or fungal infection.
Burls yield a very peculiar and highly figured wood sought after in woodworking, and some items may reach high prices on the wood market. Poaching of burl specimens and damaging the trees in the process poses a problem in some areas.
Description
Large burl on a spruce tree at Denali State Park, Alaska
A burl results from a tree undergoing some form of stress. It may be caused by an injury, virus or fungus. Most burls grow beneath the ground, attached to the roots as a type of malignancy that is generally not discovered until the tree dies or falls over. Such burls sometimes appear as groups of bulbous protrusions connected by a system of rope-like roots. Almost all burl wood is covered by bark, even if it is underground. Insect infestation and certain types of mold infestation are the most common causes of this condition.
In some tree species, burls can grow to great size. The largest, at 26 ft (8 m), occur in coast redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens) and can engirdle the entire trunk; when moisture is present, these burls can grow new redwood trees. The world's second-largest burls can be found in Port McNeill, British Columbia. One of the largest burls known was found around 1984 in the small town of Tamworth, New South Wales. It stands 6.4 ft (2.0 m) tall, with an odd shape resembling a trombone. In January 2009, this burl was controversially removed from its original location, and relocated to a public school in the central New South Wales city of Dubbo.
Use
Burls yield a very peculiar and highly figured wood, prized for its beauty and rarity. It is sought after by furniture makers, artists, and wood sculptors. There are a number of well-known types of burls (each from a particular species); these are highly valued and sliced into veneers for furniture, inlay in doors, picture frames, household objects, automobile interior paneling and trim, musical instruments, and woodturning. It is also used for car dashboards.
Working the Wood
The prized "burr maple" is not a species of a maple, but wood from a maple's burl (burr). The famous birdseye maple of the sugar maple (Acer saccharum) superficially resembles burr maple, but it is something else entirely. Burl wood is very hard to work with hand tools or on a lathe, because its grain is twisted and interlocked, causing it to chip and shatter unpredictably. This "wild grain" makes burl wood extremely dense and resistant to splitting, which made it valued for bowls, mallets, mauls and "beetles" or "beadles" for hammering chisels and driving wooden pegs.
Poaching
Because of the value of burls, ancient redwoods in national parks in the Western United States have recently been poached by thieves for their burls, including at Redwood National and State Parks. Poachers often cut off the burls from the sides of the trunks using chainsaws, which exposes the tree to infection and disease, or fell the entire tree to steal burls higher up. Because of the risk of poaching, Jeff Denny, the state park's redwood coast sector supervisor, encourages those buying burl to inquire where it came from and to ensure it was obtained legally. Legal acquisition methods for burl include trees from private land cleared for new development and from lumber companies with salvage permits.
(VIDEO & PICTURES 21, 22 FOR DISPLAY ONLY)
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