What species of wood is this?

Welcome to the forum, Matt! Add your first name to your profile to clear the N/a in the side panel. Add your location, as well.

At first glance I thought Madrone burl but the more I look at it this could be Redwood burl. The coloring is wrong for Buckeye burl. Of course, I could be off the mark completely but those were my first thoughts.

David

Hi Matt and welcome. Knowing where you are might help too.

Thank you for your help with putting in my location. Helps to know where I'm From..lol I never would have guessed Redwood. I will have to look it up. I'm not sure if I want to keep it whole, or slab it for pen making. Any ideas if it is valuable whole?

Hi Matt, I would like to see your burl in the flesh before nominating which tree it came from,however Redwood is the logical species. At first glance I thought it was a lump of conglomerate rock. Welcome to the Router Forums & keep us posted when the mystery is solved please. Jamesjj777746

Continent is better Matt but east coast/west coast and north or south, etc is even better. The density of the wood will help identify it too. Redwood is a very light weight wood so the burl should be too if that's what it is. Redwood is also soft. You should be able to scratch the surface with a thumbnail.

As far as uses there are a few. It's hard to tell just how big it is but it could be pretty valuable made into a small table. A high end furniture maker might be interested in turning it into veneer. I've made a number of clocks out of burls. That's just a start on possible uses.

Cherryville Chuck said:

Continent is better Matt but east coast/west coast and north or south, etc is even better.

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His profile says Bemidji, Minnesota, Chuck. I wish Location would show in the side panel instead of the Country.

David

My location is Northern Minnesota, a little over a hundred miles south of Canada. It asked for my city, and that's what I entered. All responses are gratefully welcome as I don't know the original birthplace of this type of wood/burl.

It is light for a burl. I just cut up a Western Ironwood and this is a feather in comparison. It is about 15" long by 8" tall and 4" thick.

That shiny coat on it is what makes me curious. Makes me wonder.

JOAT said:

That shiny coat on it is what makes me curious. Makes me wonder.

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urethane...
it was used as stabilizer...

Welcome to the forum Matt. Not sure your location will assist in the determining of that burl as it could be from anywhere in the world. But I certainly agree that it appears to be redwood. From what I can see it looks to be slightly over a foot wide maybe, say 16"x12" and maybe 3-4" thick? Of course that's just based on the background as a scale.....

Never mind the guess I didn't see that post....

Welcome to the forum Matt

Whoever had this burl before put resin on it and thick. I am going to try and sand it off and cut it for pen making

Matt if you were somewhere around the west coast then the chances of it being redwood go up. But that didn't come from a tree local to your area unless it came from some exotic tree in someone's yard which is still unlikely based on where you are so precise location isn't going to help. According to the wood database it should weigh in the neighborhood of 26 lbs/ cubic foot. Burl wood might be a little heavier than that. If you can do a rough calculation for volume and it corresponds to a weight like that then redwood takes the lead in possibilities as almost every other wood it could be is heavier (denser) than that. https://www.wood-database.com/redwood/

Matt_Olson said:

Whoever had this burl before put resin on it and thick. I am going to try and sand it off and cut it for pen making

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Welcome to the Forum, Matt...

I wouldn't sand it but rather scrape it. Sanding will heat up the finish and wood and may bring up oils that could be undesirable. Scraping is a much better way to go...it will allow you to get right down into the pores.

Good luck with it...BTW...I wouldn't cut it up for pens...find a use for it whole...it looks big enough for a couple of end tables...if both sides are poly-raz-matazed, even better...(get it resawed in half)

The whole burl is 11"×7"×2 1/4" thick. It weighs 2 - 1/2lbs