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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been reading an old book on Trees of America, published by the American Forestry Society a long time ago. I enjoy the descriptions of trees, the information about uses of the wood and how much a cubic foot weighs air-dried (live oak, our heaviest wood, is nearly double the weight of spruce and basswood and others). Another thing I enjoy about the book is that the photos seem to have been taken from the '30s to perhaps the '50s - the trees are the focal point but it's interesting to see fences and buildings and farm fields and wide open spaces....and no cell phone towers or wind turbines or McDonalds (stuff like that was present, but not like today).

Another thing I've enjoyed is refreshing my memory about the botanical (scientific) names of trees. So many of them are beautiful: Thuja occidentalis (northern white cedar); Chamaecyparis thyoides (Atlantic white cedar), Diospyros virginiana (persimmon), Liquidambar styraciflua (sweetgum), Lireodendron tulipifera (yellow poplar) and a host of others. There's poetry in the botanical names of trees.


The genus name of the apple is Malus, as Lokasenna is referring to. Apples, pear, plum, rose, hawthorne, prune, blackberry and a zillion other fruiting plants are in the Roseacea (rose) plant family.

I enjoy knowing that, so sitting around reading an old book by the American Forestry Society is time well spent.

Especially when there aren't any Braves games on the radio!

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been reading an old book on Trees of America, published by the American Forestry Society a long time ago. I enjoy the descriptions of trees, the information about uses of the wood and how much a cubic foot weighs air-dried (live oak, our heaviest wood, is nearly double the weight of spruce and basswood and others). Another thing I enjoy about the book is that the photos seem to have been taken from the '30s to perhaps the '50s - the trees are the focal point but it's interesting to see fences and buildings and farm fields and wide open spaces....and no cell phone towers or wind turbines or McDonalds (stuff like that was present, but not like today).

Another thing I've enjoyed is refreshing my memory about the botanical (scientific) names of trees. So many of them are beautiful: Thuja occidentalis (northern white cedar); Chamaecyparis thyoides (Atlantic white cedar), Diospyros virginiana (persimmon), Liquidambar styraciflua (sweetgum), Lireodendron tulipifera (yellow poplar) and a host of others. There's poetry in the botanical names of trees.


The genus name of the apple is Malus, as Lokasenna is referring to. Apples, pear, plum, rose, hawthorne, prune, blackberry and a zillion other fruiting plants are in the Roseacea (rose) plant family.

I enjoy knowing that, so sitting around reading an old book by the American Forestry Society is time well spent.

Especially when there aren't any Braves games on the radio!

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been reading an old book on Trees of America, published by the American Forestry Society a long time ago. I enjoy the descriptions of trees, the information about uses of the wood and how much a cubic foot weighs air-dried (live oak, our heaviest wood, is nearly double the weight of spruce and basswood and others). Another thing I enjoy about the book is that the photos seem to have been taken from the '30s to perhaps the '50s - the trees are the focal point but it's interesting to see fences and buildings and farm fields and wide open spaces....and no cell phone towers or wind turbines or McDonalds (stuff like that was present, but not like today).

Another thing I've enjoyed is refreshing my memory about the botanical (scientific) names of trees. So many of them are beautiful: Thuja occidentalis (northern white cedar); Chamaecyparis thyoides (Atlantic white cedar), Diospyros virginiana (persimmon), Liquidambar styraciflua (sweetgum), Lireodendron tulipifera (yellow poplar) and a host of others. There's poetry in the botanical names of trees.


The genus name of the apple is Malus, as Lokasenna is referring to. Apples, pear, plum, rose, hawthorne, prune, blackberry and a zillion other fruiting plants are in the Roseacea (rose) plant family.

I enjoy knowing that, so sitting around reading an old book by the American Forestry Society is time well spent.

Especially when there aren't any Braves games on the radio!

I read the excellent "Six Frigates" last year. One thing I did not know was that the first American frigates were framed with live oak and this is what gave them their amazing resistance to damage-not the white oak planking. So Old Ironsides should have been called Old Ironframe. However, that just does not sound too good. [;)] The British has no access to wood like the live Oak. It really gave the American ships a huge tactical edge.

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been reading an old book on Trees of America, published by the American Forestry Society a long time ago. I enjoy the descriptions of trees, the information about uses of the wood and how much a cubic foot weighs air-dried (live oak, our heaviest wood, is nearly double the weight of spruce and basswood and others). Another thing I enjoy about the book is that the photos seem to have been taken from the '30s to perhaps the '50s - the trees are the focal point but it's interesting to see fences and buildings and farm fields and wide open spaces....and no cell phone towers or wind turbines or McDonalds (stuff like that was present, but not like today).

Another thing I've enjoyed is refreshing my memory about the botanical (scientific) names of trees. So many of them are beautiful: Thuja occidentalis (northern white cedar); Chamaecyparis thyoides (Atlantic white cedar), Diospyros virginiana (persimmon), Liquidambar styraciflua (sweetgum), Lireodendron tulipifera (yellow poplar) and a host of others. There's poetry in the botanical names of trees.


The genus name of the apple is Malus, as Lokasenna is referring to. Apples, pear, plum, rose, hawthorne, prune, blackberry and a zillion other fruiting plants are in the Roseacea (rose) plant family.

I enjoy knowing that, so sitting around reading an old book by the American Forestry Society is time well spent.

Especially when there aren't any Braves games on the radio!

I read the excellent "Six Frigates" last year. One thing I did not know was that the first American frigates were framed with live oak and this is what gave them their amazing resistance to damage-not the white oak planking. So Old Ironsides should have been called Old Ironframe. However, that just does not sound too good. [;)] The British has no access to wood like the live Oak. It really gave the American ships a huge tactical edge.

Weren't the hulls also double walled with an airspace? Seem to recall that description from Master and Commander as the French frigate he was fighting had been purchased from the US and one of his deck hands had seen one the type under construction.


yea, yea....I recognize the danger of relying on movie quotes for historical accuracy....

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

The joints in some wooden warships were also made from live oak. The joints were cut whole from the massive "knees" where roots joined trunk, so the angles were "real" rather than "cut." The joints were thus much stronger.

Recognizing the importance of live oak to the Navy, the US government first bought about 300 acres of live oak stands in the southeast in the late 1790s. I think alot more acreage was added later.

On a related note, when I worked in the timber industry in the early 1980s, some of the old timers were still telling stories of government purchasing agents meeting with farmers to buy black walnut timber, used in airplane propellers. Even at the time, I thought that was a remarkable step into the past. Now it seems like lore from some vanished civilization.