Evergreen root ball

[Bill Jobe]

There's been an evergreen in front of the house that was there when we bought the place 29 years ago. The wife decided she wanted it gone so she could plant flowers there.
So I grabbed the chain saw and stripped it of its limbs and cut the trunk off above ground. She thought she was stuck with the stump, but I had other plans for it. I dug down and cut the tap root and that gave me a very nice piece of wood to turn.
But, oh how I wish I had passed it along to a seasoned turner. I did some roughing tonight, then bagged it in plastic to keep it wet.
I ended up cutting away some of the pretty, looking for more spalt. Then the idiot hollowed the large end. How I wish I'd left it alone.
Added a shot with the Oneway to help you see how big it is. It's bagged and I forgot to measure it.

[Nick Amandus]

Thats a nice looking piece of wood Bill. Wouldn't worry to much about any mistakes. The biggest mistake would have been leaving it in the ground.

[Bill Jobe]

Thanks for responding, Nick.
What finish would you use?
For the majority of my pieces ( and all for the last couple of years) I've used tung oil finish, if for no other reason than to try to eliminate one variable.

[Dick Strauss]

Bill,
That is a yew of some sort (possibly a japanese yew that is common in landscaping). There is some talk of yews being toxic to horses and dogs, etc. I've never had any issues turning or trimming them myself but please be careful to limit your exposure just in case.

[Stan Calow]

If it looks and smells like eastern red cedar, its likely juniper. The purple and cream colors are what I see when digging out juniper shrubs.

[Bill Jobe]

Thank you for the headsup, Stan.

I read recently that cedar is not indigenous to the U.S., that what we but and use from lumber yards is one of a number of junipers. Can't find varification on that.
I recently purchased a pickup load of "cedar" from a Comercial hardwood sawmill and some of the pieces were up to 16-18" wide. Not a single board had any sap wood and it is very heavy.

[Stan Calow]

Bill, as I understand it, Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana) is different species than Western Red Cedar (Thuja plicata). Its the ERC that is actually a juniper. This is something I remember from 5th grade shop class teacher. I don't know about being imported, but ERC is considered an invasive species around here. In fact the conservation department was trying to encourage people using wild ones as substitute for Christmas trees, to help get rid of them.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Like Dick above mentioned, this is a piece of Yew, NOT Juniper aka Eastern Red Cedar.

And yes all parts of the Yew are poisonous, except the soft meat of the fruit on the female plant, so do not eat the wood ;), wood dust is not healthy of any wood, so wear a mask.

I have turned a bunch of Yew,and have pictures of it, but can’t find one of the freshly turned wood, the colors are really different from Juniper aka Easter Red Cedar when fresh.

Juniper is a vivid purplish red color that will become a dull brown, I will add the picture of a piece fresh and as it is now, the Yew is a more orange color when fresh and turns a dark color as you can see in the picture of these pieces.

361397 361398

Yew pieces
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The Yew I polished and finished with Carnauba wax.

[Bill Boehme]

I also vote for juniper of some sort. There is no mistaking the cedar/juniper smell. The white balance is off which complicates ID ... that's obvious by looking at the color cast of the chuck. After I adjusted the white balance, the color of the wood looks even more like juniper. There are several native juniper species. However, I wouldn't know yew from Adam (bad pun) so I think you can let your nose tell you whether it is yew or juniper assuming that yew doesn't have the same smell.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

I also vote for juniper of some sort. There is no mistaking the cedar/juniper smell. The white balance is off which complicates ID ... that's obvious by looking at the color cast of the chuck. After I adjusted the white balance, the color of the wood looks even more like juniper. There are several native juniper species. However, I wouldn't know yew from Adam (bad pun) so I think you can let your nose tell you whether it is yew or juniper assuming that yew doesn't have the same smell.

Care to show the picture with the balanced white Bill ??

I tried if changing the colors it got anywhere close to the common Juniper tree, but could not.

Looking at this picture seeing the white sapwood, the purplish colors of the root area and the more orange color of the rest of the wood, I still say it is Yew and not Juniper, compare the two.

361411 361412

[Bill Jobe]

Leo, as usual, some incredible pieces.
There was no dust when I rough it out, it was so full of water I was soaked in no time.
Bill, are you referring to a sheep? I've never met Adan, but pretty sure I could pick him out with the 2 side by side.
Stan, is that where they got the term "yewl tide"

It's Bill's fault. He got me started.:p

[Bill Jobe]

Using an editing program called Be funky, this is the result of hitting "Beautify" and "Smart Sharp".

Bill, how did you correct the white balance?

[Bill Boehme]

I still think that the "scratch and sniff" test will answer the question. If it smells like Granny's blanket chest then it must be cedar or juniper unless it is a yew chest.

Per Leo's request, here is my attempt at color correcting the image. I looked for something close to white or gray and made a guess that the headstock might be a Jet which is sort of white. So I used the eyedropper in Photoshop Camera Raw and did some sampling and came up with the results shown below. I did a before and after to compare my results with the original. Maybe this looks exactly like yew ought to look, but I wouldn't know yew if one fell on me. But, it sorta looks like Texas Juniper. What do yew think?

361431

[Leo Van Der Loo]

I still think that the "scratch and sniff" test will answer the question. If it smells like Granny's blanket chest then it must be cedar or juniper unless it is a yew chest.

Per Leo's request, here is my attempt at color correcting the image. I looked for something close to white or gray and made a guess that the headstock might be a Jet which is sort of white. So I used the eyedropper in Photoshop and did some sampling and came up with the results shown below. I did a before and after to compare my results with the original. Maybe this looks exactly like yew ought to look, but I wouldn't know yew if one fell on me. But, it sorta looks like Texas Juniper. What do yew think?

361431

Looks exactly like Yew Bill, thank you,

I found two pictures from Yew pieces turned that are more representative of the fresh color, though there are not wet like the OP ones.

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and the Juniper one.
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[Bill Boehme]

I guess that yew would know. I have some pieces of Texas Juniper which folks around here call cedar, but it is a number of years old so it is sort of drab looking now. Texas juniper is hard and heavy unlike eastern red cedar and years ago it was commonly used for fence posts. Some of the posts that are around a century old are still there, but steel posts are now used for barbed wire fences.

Does the color in the edited version seem right to you?

[Bill Jobe]

Bringing this thread back up with an unusual update.
About a week ago I decided I was done roughing and I took the piece out of plastic and wrapped it in many layers of newspaper.
Tonight I noticed the paper was very damp so I unwrapped it to re-re-wrap it with dry. To my astonishment......this.
What do you make of it?
Other than crop the pics are not edited. They were taken with my phone, but I'm thinking about unwrapping it again and shooting it with my SLR.

[John K Jordan]

Bringing this thread back up with an unusual update.
About a week ago I decided I was done roughing and I took the piece out of plastic and wrapped it in many layers of newspaper.
Tonight I noticed the paper was very damp so I unwrapped it to re-re-wrap it with dry. To my astonishment......this.
What do you make of it?
Other than crop the pics are not edited. They were taken with my phone, but I'm thinking about unwrapping it again and shooting it with my SLR.

I see no photos. Perhaps they are just slow to make it to the thread.

JKJ

[Bill Jobe]

And the pics....

[Bill Jobe]

And down inside...

[Bill Jobe]

The color change all took place over the last week or so.

[Bill Jobe]

One more....

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Your wood is rotting away (fungus on and in it) wrapping wet wood using plastic is a bad idea, as you keep the moisture in and on the surface, layers of newspaper wrapped around it do pretty much the same.

Using a brown paper bag as I have been recommending for years and years, does not do this, it lets the wood dry slowly, but not prevent it like Plastic or multiple layers of newspaper or even packed in wood shavings.

[Bill Jobe]

What do you recommend at this point?
Cold weather is here with below,freezing temps. I could put it outside. Would that stop the fungus?

[Leo Van Der Loo]

What do you recommend at this point? Cold weather is here with below,freezing temps. I could put it outside. Would that stop the fungus?Drying will kill the fungus, freezing will stop it till the temp goes up again.

[Bill Jobe]

Ok, so I now have it in a paper sack, but it's one of Home Depot's lawn bags, triple layered and I wrapped the end down into a fairly loose wad and put a clip on it.
How often should I replace the bag, if at all?
What if I was to put the piece outside while still in the bag. Wouldn't that provide me with the best of both suggestions?

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Ok, so I now have it in a paper sack, but it's one of Home Depot's lawn bags, triple layered and I wrapped the end down into a fairly loose wad and put a clip on it. How often should I replace the bag, if at all? What if I was to put the piece outside while still in the bag. Wouldn't that provide me with the best of both suggestions?You want the wood to dry fairly fast at this point, stopping or slowing the drying down now with all the fungus growth on it, will give the fungus more time to grow and further rot the wood.A single layer of craft paper would be better than the leaf bag, maybe you can rip one layer from that bag and use that, but even doing all this, you might well be to late to save that wood.Try it, if you can get the moisture level below 20 % , the fungus will die and you can then let the wood dry with no further degrading of the wood.

[Bill Jobe]

Thank you, Leo.

[Bill Jobe]

Leo, it's down right at 20% or less at most spots, so maybe I can salvage it.
Hope so. I think with the right finish it will be a pretty piece. I'd hate to lose it since it grew right here on my place.

By the way, my pinned General MMD4E meter calibrated at exactly 18.3.

[daryl moses]

Bill, in my experience most if not all of the mold [fungus] will be turned away when it is returned to the lathe and finish turned. Of course it will depend on how thick it was before and how thin it will finish out to.
Several months ago I roughed out some pretty large Box Elder bowls 13"+. I anchor sealed them and left them on my basement floor, most of them formed a thick layer or green mold but they all finished out nicely.
I hope that will be your experience as well.