If you were traveling

[John Walls]

Eventually, from 2 weeks to 2 months, I will be traveling from Washington back to my Norf Dakoota home. I'm not controlling the time frame but when we do travel back, It could be straight across through Moontana, or we have toyed with the idea of dropping a little south of 90/94, maybe go towards northern Oregon, across and through Wyoming, etc. Envision these routes and think about what kind of local wood you would pick up to take with you for lathe fun this coming winter when the snow is higher than a dragon's .... nose... LOL I do understand with each state pinging about invasive insects, etc so it would need to be from a woodturning supplier of local woods that are sealing the wood (waxing?) so it can travel. Mostly thinking of bowl turning blanks but spindle blocks would not be out of the question. My experience is rookie so expensive cuts of wood need not apply. I get *fancy* exotic woods from a supplier in Moorehead, MN when I visit the Fargo VA so import wood need not apply either. Oh, and any Seattle area turners, preferably north seattle area, what's a store/lumber yard you would suggest?

The wood I have at home is Red Oak, Piss Elm, Ash, Box Elder, limited Maple and some cotton-wood. Different wood would be a nice change.

Would love to hear wood/area suggestions.

 

[robo hippy]

Oregon is known for the Big Leaf Maple, Myrtle wood which is actually a California Bay Laurel, and the Pacific Madrone. I am in short supply of all 3. don't turn much of the maple, and called my log guy to get some madrone and myrtle, and all the loggers were gone from the coast to harvest the trees in the burn areas. Eugene is 120 miles south of Portland if you get down this way... Gilmers and Goby Walnut are 'interesting' places to go, and of course, expensive. Cook Woods is in Klamath Falls, south of where I am, and they have lots of exotics.

robo hippy

 

[Dean Center]

John, there really aren't any woods native to the Northern Rockies that are especially great for turning. Aspen is pretty and so easy to turn it can spoil you. Finding it in big sizes is hard. It's not good for detail work and oil finishes tend to look smudgy in my experience.

Otherwise, it's either urban wood, or Pacific Northwest woods, such as Reed mentions. There used to be a couple of urban tree 'recyclers' in the Seattle area. They could have just about anything.

Dean

 

[Roger Wiegand]

Unless you have the means to ensure you aren't transporting undesirable bugs I wouldn't transport green wood any distance at all. Driving from Boston down to central PA last week I was amazed and appalled at the devastation of the forests by the Emerald Ash Borer and ongoing Dutch Elm disease. Kiln dried wood should, of course, be no problem. Myrtle and big leaf maple would top my list.

 

[Brian Gustin]

Unless you have the means to ensure you aren't transporting undesirable bugs I wouldn't transport green wood any distance at all. Driving from Boston down to central PA last week I was amazed and appalled at the devastation of the forests by the Emerald Ash Borer and ongoing Dutch Elm disease. Kiln dried wood should, of course, be no problem. Myrtle and big leaf maple would top my list.

Yup. I happen to have a whole grove of Ash trees out back, which I have been getting many chunks of Ash wood for turnings - many of them are quite dead and due to also be cut down, even the live ones are rather sickly, at least once a week, large branches fall off... and some of the wood I have turned, I find bore holes from the ash borer going into the wood, so I would not recommend any green wood being transported much further than the local region you are already in, or you have capabilities to ensure your logs do not contain parasites that might be spread to areas that don't have them... which you'd probably need to haul a whole tractor trailer full of equipment to manage that feat..

 

[John Walls]

My ash trees are doing the same. I've lost a bunch a little at a time. I turn the ones big enough to use by rough turning then throwing in my shop microwave to make sure anything alive is nuked. I then finish turn them and seal the heck out of them. I won't move these items out of the area but the ash trees out on the farm 2 hours away all have the same problem. On a side note, I love the bowls I get full of worm/bug holes, every one of them has their own character. Dayum shame they are being destroyed. I don't have many elm trees left either, they are also being killed off in this area. Haven't found any bug damage to the maple wood I have, other than it being very green and covers my shop/tools in water. I'm letting it dry as much as possible.