Osage Lumber Gloat...

[Chris Jackson]

Never posted a gloat before...not sure if this qualifies but I think so. I just purchased 10 slabs of Osage Orange lumber. I've never seen Osage in this thickness or width before, called some friends in the lumber business here in Maryland and they claimed they had once or twice over the last 15-20years, but claimed what I brought home was very, very rare....

Take a look at the photos...4 of these slabs are around 15" widths, the rest are all near 8", and they are all 10/4 and 12/4 thick, and all are around 6' long!!! Some live edges, a few inclusions and checks, but for the most part clear and straight...moisture was measured at around 3.5%. The seller claimed he milled this back in 2004 on his portable mill, from an old growth tree that was approximately 8' in diameter...



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[Mike Cruz]

Very nice, Chris. What are you planning on doing with it all? Did you get a good price on it?

[Chris Jackson]

Ooops forgot the gloat part...$240 for the whole lot. I've got a krenov cabinet stand and the legs/stretchers for a trestle table in mind...

Chris

[Mike Cruz]

So, about 120 bf? For $240? So, about $2 a bf. I don't know what Osage Orange goes for, but sounds like a great price to me! Nice haul.

[Chip Lindley]

Osage Orange (hedge apple) makes great hot-burning firewood. The old-timers said you could burn a stove down with the stuff, so they mixed it with other wood. Good luck milling it for a project. It is harder than hickory, so, have your carbide really sharp!

[Kent A Bathurst]

When my sod-buster antecedents travelled the Santa Fe Trail to central eastern Kansas, they planted osage orange along their property/pasture lines. It took a few years, but it grew into a fence line that was impenetrable by cattle. They've [including current owner 5th generation nephew] spent the many years since thinning it out, but it's still there, and it still works as advertised. I never saw any in the Flint Hills that was anywhere near that big, though. Maybe it doesn't grow that big there, or maybe just they've never let it grow that big?

Knda jealous, actually, Chris............

[Joe Angrisani]

So, about 120 bf? For $240? So, about $2 a bf. I don't know what Osage Orange goes for, but sounds like a great price to me! Nice haul.

And it's all 10/4 and 12/4! Not "cheap ol' 4/4".

Chris....YOU SUCK!!!

[Ryan Hellmer]

That is a good whack o' lumber. We do have lots of osage orange out here in KS but it is rare to find a tree big enough to yield that kind of lumber. I've seen it sell for $6-11 a bd/ft so I'm thinking you got a pretty good deal.

[Paul Johnstone]

That's a great deal.. In all seriousness. If you want to sell a flat rate box of cutoffs after you finish your project, let me know.. I could use some small pieces.

[Leo Vogel]

I've worked with it quite a bit. It is hard, but wow, you can really get a nice finish. What I don't like are the hidden flaws. You can have a piece that looks perfect, but rip it and find that it has voids that you could not see. I seem to waste a lot of osage orange when I'm building things. Fun wood to play with though. I always wanted to build a woodworking bench out of osage orange.

[Russell Sansom]

I grew up on a farm in Kentucky that was surrounded by Osage Orange. Called Mock Orange where I came from. Ours were 80 of years old or so. There was nothing vaguely that large. Perhaps they limit one another when used for a fence.
I used them for a very large set of backgammon pieces and they are beautiful, beautiful. They turned a very dark brown pretty quickly. The end grain is gorgeous. I was afraid they would go oval as they got older, but they've stayed round.

[Chris Jackson]

Believe it or not, there are very, very few inclusions in these. I took the selects from what was available and I've done a resaw (not too bad with a Lennox 1/2" carbide blade) on one of the smaller pieces and no inclusions so far.

I'm going to be starting on that trestle table this spring...and I'm headed back to the source this weekend to pick up some 14/4 chunks for plane building.

I'd certainly entertain selling a slab to cover my costs on this if anyone in the Maryland area has an interest.

[Cody Colston]

That's a nice gloat. I had some OO (Bodark, Bois d' Arc) milled to 8/4 and kiln dried for a Hal Taylor rocking chair a couple of years ago. I paid around $11 per bf for it so you got a smoking deal. I also sold the rocker for a very attractive price. ;)

Bois d' Arc is hard but it's not too difficult to work. I bought new blades for my jointer before working it, thinking I would dull the ones already installed but that didn't happen. It does want to splinter a bit and tear out when routing. I had to climb cut most everything.

I think it's a stunning wood, especially after it darkens to that golden brown color.

[russell lusthaus]

Osage is also the premier bow making wood - if you are inclined to fling an arrow or two.

[Danny Hamsley]

I sold all that I cut and air dried for $4.00/BF, but it is all gone now. I wish that I had some more. You did not get a smoking good deal, you got a smoking smoking smoking good deal!

[Cyrus Brewster 7]

Believe it or not, there are very, very few inclusions in these. I took the selects from what was available and I've done a resaw (not too bad with a Lennox 1/2" carbide blade) on one of the smaller pieces and no inclusions so far.

I'm going to be starting on that trestle table this spring...and I'm headed back to the source this weekend to pick up some 14/4 chunks for plane building.

I'd certainly entertain selling a slab to cover my costs on this if anyone in the Maryland area has an interest.


I am just north of Baltimore and would definitely be interested. Let me know when you will be getting rid of extras.

[ken gibbs]

Cody.

What are you talking about? What is this "bodark" & Bois de Arc". Are you making up a name to impress folks? Are you talking about moch orange trees?

[glenn bradley]

Bootiful stuff. You're gonna enjoy that.

[Matt Schuman]

Ken,

Where I grew up in Ks, we called osage orange; hedge, or hedge apple. When I moved to TX, I was introduced to a new name, Bois d'arc or Bodark. Bois d'arc is French for bow wood. All the same tree.

[Dave MacArthur]

Apparently this is the wood that was used for English long bows, it drives an arrow faster than anything else they had available, and is what made armor obsolete as it could shoot an arrow through armor.

We used to have it in Delaware growing up in hedges, quite large trees I remember climbing, and we called it osage orange, mock orange, and "monkeyball trees".

[Charlie Barnes]

We had a couple of old fence rows of "hedge" as we called it on the farm I grew up on in central Illinois. It's so hard that when you cut it with a chain saw, you can actually see sparks. We had pigs and when one of them would die unexpectedly, we would burn it on a fire made from hedge. It burned so hot that it would burn the bones and all. My dad used to tell me that during the depression they liked it for firewood because you got warm twice. Once when you cut it and again when you burned it! All of the trees we had were so twisty and gnarly that I can't imagine boards like your's coming from the same species. Anyway, it looks like you've got some beautiful wood there and I'm curious to see your finished work.

[Jeff Bartley]

Chris,
Is there enough of the 14/4 for a couple others to get into this? I've been looking for some thick osage for a mallet....
Jeff