Green Walnut

[John Stone]

This is kind of a meaningless post. But I think it’s interesting...maybe someone else with think so too.

I was rooting around in my off-cut bins looking for some walnut as part of my project to modify the bare walnut sole that is fitted in the space under the cockpit behind the engine. Anyway, I ran across this piece of walnut from when I installed the sole in the saloon way back about 2014/15. This particular piece of walnut came from a tree grown in NC near Winston Salem. Look at the color. It’s green. And it’s green on both sides. I can’t remember if it was that color when I milled it. It was an end piece off a live edge plank. I jointed it and planed it then cut off this end because it was split and knotted. None of the rest of the walnut is green. Kind of weird.

It’s actually more green than in the photo. I put my hand in the photo as well as the yellow in the chop saw for some sense of the color. All the other walnut I have to include every piece installed in the boat is chocolate brown.

Wood is so interesting.

[Jim Walsh]

The color looks like some poplar I’ve seen but the grain is certainly not the same. Could have been mineral deposits which frequently have an effect on color. It would be interesting to run it through the planer just to be certain the color is not just on the surface.

[tjr818]

The grain looks like walnut, the color is more like poplar. What does it smell like? It is hard to mistake the smell of walnut. I think that it is probably no less durable than black walnut, but the color will not match any other work.

[John Stone]

Would not use it even if it wasn't split and knoted. I'll have to cut it to smell it as I detect no smell now in this piece of wood. It's been sitting in a bin for maybe 6-7 years. I will cut a hole through it tomorrow. I have milled hundreds of board feet of popular. Poplar is light in weight. None of the popular I have milled had quite that much green in it. This wood is more dense. I have milled maybe 800 linear feet of walnut. So I am reasonably familiar with it. The cabin sole and all my bulkhead trim is bare black walnut. It's a great wood. Dense. Hard. Relatively stable. Much under rated.

Could it be something else? Sure. I'll report back. Wood is fun though. So much much to learn...how it works. How it glues. How it moves. So much to learn. So little time.

P.S. This afternoon I epoxied in a small piece of manufactured fiberglass strip into the walnut sole I mentioned earlier. I have to cut a 8-10" diameter hole through it on one side to accommodate the waterlock muffler. There is not going to be a lot of wood in one small area that has to span between to supports. My intent is to reinforce the wood underneath with the fiberglass strip I epoxied into a dado I cut today on the table saw.

[Steve Laume]

Take a look at the growth rings on the end of the board. It looks like a board that was cut from very close to the sap wood of the log and is picking up that color.

I once trimmer out an entire house with poplar. I kept the pieces with the most green for the most prominent areas. Once it is finished and ages it all turned brown but still added some interest to an otherwise, somewhat bland wood.

I still have some walnut from the farm where I grew up in south eastern, Pa. The soil there is a very red clay. The walnut is very dark and has a bit of purple tinge to it when it is freshly cut. Any walnut I have seen from here in CT cannot compare as is is not nearly as dark.

I have incorporated pieces of that tree in all sorts of projects I have done over the years. I like to think about how my father and grandfather walked under that tree and that to spent time beneath it as a child, Steve.

[Bill Goldsmith]

Interesting. A search turned up this discussion: https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=49607.0

[John Stone]

Very cool story Steve. Thanks for sharing.

This morning I cut a slice off the mystery wood and a slice off some scrap walnut. I thought well it is poplar. But it’s heavy and dense.

I built 22 drawer boxes in my house. So I went around comparing the mystery wood to different drawer boxes. Found one that sort of looked similar. Interestingly the mystery wood is still very green after all these years. It might be 8 years since last milled?

Not 100 percent sure. But if I had to choose, was forced to chose, I would call it poplar. Very interesting.

I suppose j could do a a specific gravity test....

[Bill Goldsmith]

I built 22 drawer boxes in my house.

Nice dovetails!

[John Stone]

I built 22 drawer boxes in my house.

Nice dovetails!

Thanks Bill. Nothing to it.

[tartansailor]

I would be interested in knowing the pH of the soil, and also the sulphate content.
Dick

[sloopjohnl]

John, in the process of elimination is there any possibility it could be a butternut sometimes referred to as a white walnut depending who you are talking to in what part of the country. just sayin!

[John Stone]

John, in the process of elimination is there any possibility it could be a butternut sometimes referred to as a white walnut depending who you are talking to in what part of the country. just sayin!

Not very likely I think. I don’t have any more of it. It’s an off-cut and I have never used white walnut or butternut. The only wood I have is Burmese teak, a small amount of Plantation Teak (not great wood), mahogany, sapele, ash, maple. Iroko, black walnut, white oak. Southern yellow pine. Juniper (love that wood) and some cypress. most of what’s left is in small amounts. i have about 40 BF of Iroko on the rack waiting to get milled for the rub rail. I have a little stash of what i refer to as super secret wood (grin) a friend gave me. I used all the poplar building drawers for the house.

I think it’s poplar. I’m a little chagrined I got hoodwinked like that. You know what they say about assumptions, LOL. It’s a neat little piece of wood. I might just nail it to the shop wall so I can see it everyday. Kinda make friends with it.

i don’t know anything about butternut. But I have always loved the name. Sounds like a great name for a small wood sloop.

Thanks for the suggestion. Kind of a fun thread.

[Jim Walsh]

Butternut was often used in the Herreshoff yard. Their classic interiors consisted of light woods or painted woods and dark trim. I've seen mention of it in several of my books.
Here's one example [url]https://johan_roodt.tripod.com/doris1905herreshoffcopy/id10.html[/url]

[John Stone]

Butternut was often used in the Herreshoff yard. Their classic interiors consisted of light woods or painted woods and dark trim. I've seen mention of it in several of my books.
Here's one example [url]https://johan_roodt.tripod.com/doris1905herreshoffcopy/id10.html[/url]

Line drawings are so much fun to look at...I could spend hours looking at them. Graceful and beautiful. A perfect amalgamation of art and science.

I looked at some pictures of butternut on-line. Almost like a cross between white oak and chestnut. Lovely. I’ll keep an eye out for it. I need to read up on it’s properties.

In my classic yacht photo books I have seen quite a few Herreshoff interiors. Sometimes they have too much white for my taste. Or the white is just too bright a white. I have seen a couple though I though very nice. A guy named Phinias Sprague rebuilt an Alden schooner naked Lion’s Whelp Around 2003 I think. It was featured in Cruising World in 2009 before that once noble magazine became just a catalogue for advertisers....I digress. Anyway, it was a lovely boat, beautifully finished with a more offwhite almost vanilla color in the interior along with varnished hardwoods and it was great. That’s the boat where I got the idea for the heel fitting I incorporated on the Far Reach’s bowsprit.

Here is a link to the magazine article. I couldn’t not get it to fully load on my tablet.

https://www.cruisingworld.com/sailboats ... ly-roving/

I attached a photo, not great quality, of Lion’s Whelp and you can see the Alden influence on Alberg. I think Carl Alberg worked for Alden when he was young. That hull sure looks similar to a CD to me.

[mgphl52]

Great photo, John! Thanks for posting!