American Chestnut

[David Keller NC]

Since american chestnut is, by definition, a wood only used in older furniture (it went virtually extinct in the early 20th century), I thought I might post this in the Neander forum. Klingspor's Woodworking shop in Raleigh, NC, has something for sale that is extremely rare - American Chestnut from freshly felled, non-blight trees. Recovered "wormy" chestnut isn't too hard to come by, but getting boards from undamaged, living trees is not an opportunity that will be repeated in your grandchildren's lifetime, much less ours.

These boards apparently came from a grove planted in Wisconsin in the 1910's, which escaped the blight. Some of the boards are clear, some have a few knots, all are 4/4. Widths vary between a low of 3.5 inches to a high of 8 inches, with most in the 5-6 inch range. Looks like there's about 300 bf left. Price is $9.95 a b.f.

Disclaimer - Other than being a regular customer, I've no connection with this business.

[Pat Zabrocki]

Very cool, I am going to check that out. On a side note, my company's headquarters is in Newtown Square, PA (Philly). We recently built a new building next to the existing one, both of which were very large. The building was to be very energy efficient, green, and generally environmentally friendly. During this process they examined the trees that were cleared to make room for the building and you guessed it, they found a stand of glight free chestnut. The chestnut logs wer processed and used in many of the wooden pieces in the building such as stair rails etc...

cheers
Pat

[Chris Griggs]

Would chestnut make good saw handles?

[Dan Carroll]

You have to be carefull about saying chestnut is blight free. One of the problems if fighting the blight has been the trait that American chestnut has of growing back from the root knot. The blight attacks the trees above the ground and girddle the tree. You come across stands of chestnut all the time that look like they escaped the blight only to discover that they have gron back from the roots of blight killed trees. The new growth has not been exposed to the blight yet. This problem had made breeding a blight resistent american chestnut difficult. One other issues is the the 'blight' has itself developed a virus that attacks the blight fungus. It was the natural development of the blight virus that saved much of the italian chestnuts in the 1950's when the blight hit europe.
The work today in saving the american chestnut involves breeding in resistence to the blight and in introducing the blight virus into the 'wild' population to make the blight fungus less likely to kill the trees. More info http://www.acf.org/

[Michael Dedon]

I'll second what Dan says. And ACF is attempting to bring stands of chestnut back. If you've got some land check with them and see if you can help restore healthy timber.

I built my workbench base from reclaimed chestnut beams. It's got some spike holes but very few worm holes. It's beautiful wood, maybe splinters a little, but left natural or with a clear finish has a light brown honey look. At least to my eye. Seems to work a little easier than oak or ash.

[Peter J Lee]

Interesting stuff Dan.

[Jason Coen]

I was in there this week and purchased a couple of the boards. Really pretty stuff. I'm using some of the wood for the till of a small toolchest that I hope my son will one day use as well.

[David Keller NC]

Assuming the attribution is correct (from Wisconsin), these trees were apparently planted from nuts, and due to their geographic isolation, propogated to about 90 acres. The site below has a sentence or two about this stand - it was apparently blight-free unitl just a few years ago, but now shows signs of the disease. Scientists are attempting to save the grove by inoculating it with a hypo-virulent strain of the fungus (sort of like using an attenuated virus strain to make a mammalian vaccine - you get infected, which produces immunity, but the strain doesn't produce disease symptoms):

http://www2.volstate.edu/jschibig/resurrectingthechestnut.htm

The lumber at the shop, however, doesn't appear to have been cut from a dead tree - there are no signs of insect damage or spalting.

[Randy Briggs]

In case anybody's interested in reclaimed American Chestnut - here's an ad I've been watching in NC CL (no connection to sellers).

http://winstonsalem.craigslist.org/mat/2745083502.html

[Jim Matthews]

I thought the primary appeal of American chestnut was for the worm tracks.

Is it particularly interesting, without the blight?

[Dan Carroll]

I thought the primary appeal of American chestnut was for the worm tracks.

Is it particularly interesting, without the blight?

Yes, american chestnut is a pretty honey color with a grain a bit like white oak. It grows faster is almost as hard as oak. The worm tracks really do not add much to the wood. The nuts are also very good and have a real impact on wildlife. It is a tree well worth the effort to bring back.

[David Keller NC]

I thought the primary appeal of American chestnut was for the worm tracks.

Is it particularly interesting, without the blight?

From a period furniture maker's perspective, getting one's hands on non-recovered (and hence, non-wormy and not "baked" for a humdred years in the rafters of an old barn) is very interesting. Much of the output from John Townsend's and John Goddard's shops used chestnut almost exclusively as a secondary wood.

[Ken Higginbotham]

I found some chestnut and was wondering what a good price would be - ? Not sure about the type but the grain is as described in earlier posts. Not sure if it has the 'worm hole' stuff as I didn't see a big enough sample. Sounds like it is more desirable because of the extra character it adds - ?

[Jim Davis]

Here's some information from the Forest Products Laboratories:

"
The Tree

American Chestnut grew to heights of 120 feet, with a diameter of 7 feet. Its ability to sprout from the cut or dead stump has kept this species in existence, temporarily, although the blight eventually kills the sprouts.

The Wood

General

The narrow sapwood of Chestnut is near white, while the heartwood is grayish brown to brown and darkens with age. The wood is coarse, intermediate in strength, light in weight, low in shock resistance, of average hardness and moderate shrinkage. It can be kiln dried or air seasoned with minimal problems."

The light weight, medium hardness, and availability in clear, wide boards made it the choice for such things as cabinets, boxes, and paneling. I have a 1910ish tool box whose marketers said it was made of chestnut. In restoring the box, I did some planing of a surface and found it a joy to work.

[Ken Higginbotham]

Thanks for the info Jim - Do you have a picture of the tool box?

[John K Jordan]

Would chestnut make good saw handles?

American Chestnut should make good handles for anything. Although fairly coarse, it machines and turns beautifully and finishes easily. I have a stock of wormy chestnut from 4/4 up to some beams maybe 5" thick. I guard it carefully and use it sparingly!

326118
JKJ

[Ken Higginbotham]

Nice - !

Looking forward to making something with it :)

[Allan Speers]

I have a decent stash of reclaimed Chestnut, but I could never think of anything to make with it. Its light weight, which is nice, but not very strong, and I find it's appearance to be sort of "Red Oak's ugly cousin."


It's certainly not horrible, but $10 / bf? I dunno ......