Cory (family down the road) had a bunch of trees taken down. Most were dead ash, but one accidental victim was a beautiful large cherry. After a brief mourning and a wake with coffee and donuts, we cut up and hauled away the portion of the tree we could get to and manage. We left the large trunk and the whole top half of the tree, that was hanging over a deep ravine.
The white is the glue I painted on to seal the ends to keep the wood from drying too fast and cracking, but you can see that cracking has already begun.
I tackled one log the very next day. I split the log along a pre-existing crack. But cherry cracks easily, and as you can see here, another crack formed while I was turning. You can also see by the darker color at each ring how wet the wood is.
I didn’t give up on it. I just made it a much shorter bowl. Wet cherry cuts so beautifully. And smells amazing! Cherry Coke was one description — fruity and vanilla.
Not wasting anything! I’m turning these flitches into small green wood bowls that will warp as they dry. It’s also good practice at getting things thin.
More rough turned cherry. Over the last few weeks, I’ve put about 10 of these in the loft to dry.
This one was a bit of a challenge. The left semicircle made a fine bowl. The middle slab made a great platter. But the right semicircle ….
…had some rot that went all the way through. So I pulled out some old dental tools I use for stripping furniture, and scraped out all the rot.
And I filled the void with epoxy. If the bowl survives drying and final turning, its going to have a small, clear “window”. The right hand bowl is the semicircle that didn’t have problems.
This is a small green wood dish I made from the maple that fell in July. I gave it to my jeweler friend, Lainey, to use as display for her recent show.
And another visit to the (still large) fresh maple pile gave me three more rough turns.
More maple yesterday morning. The maple is starting to crack, so I’m going to have to up my game.
You can see some of the hairline cracks here. If this keeps happening, I will try to break down the logs into other blanks (like for pepper mills and boxes). I think by removing the pith, I might reduce this cracking.
But for now, I’ll keep making rough bowls. After all, I only have about 60 — oak, beech, maple, cherry — in the loft drying.