Wood that will make you drool!

[James Williams 007]

I went by my local wood supplier (Peach State Lumber) this week to grab a little cherry and walnut and when I walked in the door my jaw hit the floor! In front of me was a slab about 16'x7' of the most beautiful and perfect bubinga I have ever seen! then as Turned in an intoxicated state I started noticing all of the other specimens they had just received. I don't know if your local supplier has this kind of selection or if this is just normal because I am new at this but to me this was unbelievable! the fact that I live a few miles down the road makes me feel like the luckiest woodworker in the world! I thought some of you would get a kick out of seeing some of the pics I took when I went back this Sat.

[richard poitras]

James, you state "16'x7' of the most beautiful and perfect bubinga" Just wondering what the the price was?..:)

[Bob Ross]

Nah...too much sap wood :D:D

[Bill Huber]

All I can do is dream about having all that wood at my supplier.

That is some really beautiful wood, I would love to be able to make a table out of some of those slabs.

[James Williams 007]

10,000$ and the guy who bought them already picked the other one up!!!!!!!!!!!!! He's making a table for some office in ATL!

[James Williams 007]

One day she'll let me!

[Maurice Ungaro]

James,
Peach State Lumber is my favorite wood source! The crew there is the nicest bunch of folks. I used to live on the south side, but worked in downtown Atlanta. One of my assigned counties was Cobb, soooooo....every now and then, I would HAVE to make a trip to Kennesaw. Needless to say, it would have been hard to explain all the lumber sticking out the back of my car, so I usually went in the afternoon, and then beat it back home to unload my goodies!

[James Williams 007]

You couldn't ask for a nicer group of guys they are always willing to help and educate some one on their selection.

[Peter Quinn]

Yea, my local Borg has nearly the same things. Not. Nice to live nearby that supplier.

[tim rowledge]

We've had some bubinga slabs like that in my local Windsor Plywood stores; my favourite one was something like 18ft by 5ft and a good 2" thick on offer for C$7500 last summer. I was soooo tempted.

[scott spencer]

Wow...that's incredible stuff! Reminds me of West Penn Hardwoods in Olean, NY.

[John Eaton]

Peachstate is also one of my faves.

-- John

[Alex Shanku]

How do they clean a piece of wood up thats that big?

After its rough cut, do they run it through some kind of large drum sander?

[Porter Bassett]

An army of slaves with hand planes?

[John Eaton]

Illegals with sanding sponges...

[David Keller NC]

There's a great deal of that lumber in the US right now. Almost every specialty wood supplier whose sites I've perused over the last few months has at least a slab or two of it (even Rockler of all places). It's pretty clear that a large forest tract in Africa that had a lot of these huge bubinga trees was cut down. I kind of wonder whether it was a legal cut or not, and something tells me that this isn't going to last.

Seems that African wood is predominating the market in the last few years after much tighter restrictions on exports were placed on South American wood.

[Justin Leiwig]

Even the woodcraft near me has a couple sections of those slabs for sale. like 5 grand each though.

[James Williams 007]

A big router set up

[Ron Barnes]

I have always had a great experience when shopping there. Great folks to deal with. Lots of great lumber to choose from.

[Vic Castello]

Want to drool and become frustrated at the same time??? I don't live too far from the furniture making compound of the late George Nakashima, a very influential furniture maker.

http://www.nakashimawoodworker.com/

The man collected HUGE amounts of rare woods from all over the world, so much that his family member's carrying on his work had to build a warehouse for it! Every Saturday, they open up the compound to the public. The tour includes the warehouse where you can see all of his fantastic ancient wood. BUT.....they save all of it for themselves! If you want some of it, you have to order a piece of their furniture to get it. No raw wood sales to the public!

:mad:

[John Willoughby]

I would love to have a wood supplier like that. On second thought, maybe it's a good thing I don't...

[Mike Robbins]

Another huge thumbs up for Peach State Lumber. Good prices, great people. Love that place.

[Chris Padilla]

Beautiful rare large slabs of wood like Bubinga should be veneered up but I can understand the draw of solid slabs. Do a search on "Todd Burch" and "bubinga" and you see another nice large slab turned into a table.

[John Twesten IV]

Elmo,

I have also had the privilege of touring George Nakashima's shop etc. Some of their wood comes from the following.

http://www.hearnehardwoods.com/

You are about 1.5 hours from Hearne where you can buy

Bring your check book and a rag to clean up your drool -

[Jim King]

I het to meet a lot of Government types in charge of the illegal lumber trade in the States and have been told that probably 99% of the exotic lumber there is illegal for one reason or another and all the people impoting will be having problems as they cannot prove the Chain of Custody from stump to store. It looks like when the govt gets its self back in order the exotic wood business will be much different.

Updated Lacey Act becomes world’s first ban on illegal logging

Heath E. Combs -- Furniture Today, 6/24/2008 1:26:00 AM

Focus on supply chain could affect importers
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Importers of wood products may want to keep an eye on newly passed regulations in last month’s farm bill. New amendments added to the Lacey Act (http://www.animallaw.info/articles/ovuslaceyact.htm) aim to cut down on illegal logging.
Depending on how strongly the new provisions are enforced, the law could have implications for the furniture industry’s supply chain.

© Environmental Investigation Agency
The timber depot in Suifenhe, China, on a standard day. Officials with the watchdog Environmental Investigation Agency said the area is one of heightened concern for illegal logging.

The legislation creates a requirement for importers to declare the species and country of origin of any plant or plant product, including wood.
Penalties range from $250 to in excess of $500,000 with a possibility of jail sentence for knowingly sourcing, or failing to exercise due care when sourcing, products that contain illegal timber or plants.
Illegally logged wood is often defined as wood that is sold below market price or wood cut in violation of treaties, laws and regulations.
The amendments added by this year’s farm bill to the Lacey Act are intended to protect forests worldwide from deforestation and illegal wood products from entering the United States.
The Lacey Act, originally signed into law in 1900, is a conservation law that focuses on illegal commercial transportation of wildlife and non-native species.
The new farm bill extended provisions to amendments added to the act in 1981 to address global illegal logging and trade.
“The key to the Lacey Act amendment is to provide a level playing field for U.S. forest products manufacturers,” said Tom Inman, president of the Appalachian Hardwood Manufacturers Assn.
“There have been companies in recent years trading in illegal forest products, and estimates are that $460 million was lost last year in U.S. export sales because of illegally harvested wood.”
Just what percentage of logging is done illegally remains unknown, but estimates peg the level at 10% or higher.
Typically, illegal logs and lumber are purchased by factories for one-half the cost of legally harvested and documented wood products.
Officials with the Environmental Investigation Agency, a non-profit Washington- and United Kingdom-based environmental watchdog group, said that failure to adhere to the provisions would increase risk of seizure and forfeiture of products made with illegally sourced wood.
Import requirements haven’t been issued yet but are likely to come out in the next six months, said David Groves, a spokesperson for EIA.
The bill will be jointly enforced by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Animal Plant Health Inspection Service.
The process of creating an interagency task force to help facilitate information flow and appropriations is still being worked on, Groves said.
Once the law is finalized, the U.S. Department of Justice is likely to look at importers and choose to try the cases they are most likely to win.
Groves said the law doesn’t state requirements for how importers should show that wood is legally harvested, so no third-party certification is required.
That will leave importers with the responsibility of deciding if their products come from reputable wood sources.
For retailers and importers, the law has a flexible “due care” concept, which could cause larger importers to be held to a higher standard than smaller independent purchasers. Countries with a higher record of illegal logging could also be more closely targeted by the enforcement community than countries with stricter logging laws, Groves said.
For example, big-box retailers could be expected to send groups to talk to long-term suppliers in source counties to make sure their wood is sourced responsibly, rather than relying strictly on paperwork.
“A mom-and-pop shop isn’t going to be expected to go overseas,” Groves said. “The main purpose of the declarations is to provide the most basic information to the enforcement community. If teak is coming from China, there was good chance it was cut in Burma and is illegally funding the junta.”
With the passing of the law, the U.S. became the first country in the world to prohibit the import, sale or trade of illegally harvested wood and wood products.
Groves added that the new law is more stringent that the European Union’s voluntary Action Plan for Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade, which targets countries that contain nearly 60% of the world’s forests, namely Central Africa, Russia, Tropical South America and Southeast Asia.
“The U.S. has leapfrogged and taken the most significant steps toward addressing illegal logging,” Groves said.
The EIA is most concerned about wood sourced from the following regions:

The Russian Far East, primarily the Primorky Region, which hangs over Far Eastern China and extends through Suifenhe City in the Heilongjiang province.
Russian timber moving through Manzhouli in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China.
Exotic species from Indonesia, specifically grown in areas such as Papua, New Guinea.