Birdseye heaven

Just got back from a trip to the mill to get a trailer load of green stock. I had asked for some 12/4 birdseye and flame birch for bed post material. I know this is super scarce. Drying takes forever and finding big logs is never easy. Plus you are going against the veneer companies to purchase those. Well, I hit the motherload. My son in law picked me up and we stated out about 6:30 am. It was a wonderful drive. Sunny and pleasant. We made good time and even stopped for breakfast. When I got to the mill, it was real quite. They work 4 10 hour days and Friday was an off day. The loader guy was working thankfully. I was told I didn't have much to pickup. I was told wrong....

The loader guy was picking up bundles and bringing them to the truck. He came with 3 bundles and told us there were more. Not on this load...The wood was all frozen together. Took some pounding with sledge hammers to get it apart. I was speechless. There were planks, 3" and 17" wide. Beautiful white birdseye. The whole trailer got filled quick. We had to hand load some to get the most on without being overloaded. We had almost 6000# on the trailer. The roads were a bit lumpy to say the least, so we strapped it down and headed out.

Unloading was no fun. Had to beat it more with sledges. Stacking and stickering was a chore. Heavy wet and icy. Some of the big planks weighed several hundred pounds. Made for some exciting stacking to say the least. No smashed fingers thankfully. Wet cold hands, but those are fixable. Hope you enjoy the pics. It was a great day to say the least. Hope to be going back in the next month for some flame birch. I hope to have this dried and ready to sell by the end of this year. Thick stock is always a slow process. This will make some great turning stock, bedposts or tables. I have never in my life seen this thick and wide of birdseye. All great figure too.

Boxes, lots O' boxes

Doing a run of dovetailed candle boxes. I pull bits of boards aside over time and then just try and use them for small work. This is mostly maple with some flame beech ones also. I had too many and never did get any curly cherry or flame birch ones started. I have 25 going right now with a couple of new sized ones in the works. I get some real different maple at times. It doesn't fit any figure I have seen before. Its all hard maple, but I don't know what to even call the figure. I do have birdseye and curly tiger maple in this bunch, but also some other.

 this is some bark inclusion

 This stuff looks exactly like the bark on a white birch tree. Never saw anything like it.

 Another shot

 spalted hard maple

birdseye maple.

Hope to get these done in the next couple weeks. I am working on a bigger size for a jewelry box with a tray inside. Same sliding lid. Just wider. They will be dovetailed also. None of these have finish on yet. I will do another blog when I get these done. Some will be dyed, some clear finished. They do take a lot of work. I made these with Charles Neil and they are available in a dvd set. I was fatter then. If you see me in that dvd set, I am about 70# less now.
Thanks for reading.