found a couple tons of burl

[tedmich]

its at my local cemetery in its waste pile, from a tree I used to walk my dog past every day. It had a burled base maybe 15 ft across, not sure what species. They cut it into >10x ~200lb pieces with a 36" chainsaw.The busy surface is actually 220 grit flat, it might make a neat guitar once resawn. Wood is light but hard with a real ring when tapped, it was dead for 2 years before felled so already quite dry.

[Jason Rodgers]

Whaaaaaaaa? That's cool! PM...

[John_H]

A little creepy, but very cool!

[Usable Thought]

A couple TONS?!

Maybe if you post a closeup grain pic someone here can identify?

[tedmich]

The burl itself is pretty chaotic and unidentifiable but the straight, tall trunk nearby looks quite curly and interesting too, I thought it was Western Maple but another woodworker who walks in the area said he thought it was American Chestnut, which I thought was extinct. A bit of a mystery, we could PCR it like the Fed does with suspected Brazilian Rosewood I suppose...

Its definitely NOT Brazilian Rosewood, hard to photograph as well. As long as its not made into bowls with 90% as shavings on the floor I'll be happy with any use!

[Usable Thought]

When I was a newspaper reporter about 20 years ago I did a feature on a scientist, a botanist, researching splices & transplants she hoped would cure chestnut blight. At the time I wrote the story, American chestnuts only grew to the size of saplings before the blight killed every single one of them. And all the mature trees were long since dead as you say. So if your tree was old and big enough to have a 1-ton burl, it seems very unlikely it was an American chestnut - esp. since even if there has been a scientific breakthrough since I wrote that story, 20 years ago that tree must have already been well past the sapling stage.