Photos "Deck of cards" chips.

FortyTwoBlades

FortyTwoBlades

Baryonyx walkeri
Dealer / Materials Provider
Joined
Mar 8, 2008
Messages
25,952
An approach to use with thin bits.

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With these sorts of chips, vs. "dinner plates" you take deep cuts with the blows placed close to one another so they still pop cleanly despite the reduced chip-popping ability of thin bits. Because they bite deeper but don't pop as well, you cut a linear notch to start and then pare off one side of the notch and walk blows across it until you fully traverse that "layer". If you have to widen the mouth as you progress you do so with another paring blow at the start of a new "layer" of the notch.
 
Good example of why Ash is not optimal material for handles of striking tools; 'delaminates' readily.
 
That delamination is typical when cutting green NW conifers. Plates show that delamination on them.
 
It should be expected to see that sort of behavior in ash when subjected to what is basically end-grain pressure on short sections. But yes, I'm not usually much of a stickler for grain orientation on hickory or beech, but on ash handles I'm always more particular.
 
Growth rings look irregular and it appears there might be borer holes through the bark.
 
Yup. Inner rings were HUGE with almost no porous structure. Then the outer rings were super tight.
 
It came from a local summer camp that had some trees cleared. According to state sources we don't have the EAB in Maine yet.
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
It came from a local summer camp that had some trees cleared. According to state sources we don't have the EAB in Maine yet.
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It's traumatic when it does come through. First evidence of these bugs occurred in east Ottawa Ontario in 2008. Now it's 2017 and you'll be hard-pressed to find a mature Ash alive anywhere within 100 miles. The dead and dying stumps continually send up new shoots so the bugs are never going to peter out. USDA and Agriculture Canada have been introducing EAB parasitic wasps from China to combat this introduced alien but their impact is not yet known. I am a licensed pesticide applicator and have managed (via injection under the bark) to keep a few hundred trees alive and healthy but it's not a cheap proposition, especially when it's a magnificent specimen 4 feet (120 cm) across. Back when American Chestnut was succumbing to blight American gov't encouraged industry to make use of the trees but in the case of ash it's become nothing but a Provincial and Municipal gov't expenditure in having to treat and process the wood as if it were toxic waste.
 
As I understand it, the EAB only attacks mature trees, so lots of places where it's starting to encroach have been cutting trees ahead of infestation and replanting saplings in their place in an attempt at creating an effective barrier to their proliferation.
 
We mainly just have ornamental ash planted in the towns and cities. Green ash has escaped and naturalized along some streams and rivers. The economic impact when it finally reaches here will be mostly to the home owners that have them trees.
 
300Six said:
Back when American Chestnut was succumbing to blight American gov't encouraged industry to make use of the trees but in the case of ash it's become nothing but a Provincial and Municipal gov't expenditure in having to treat and process the wood as if it were toxic waste.
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That turned out to be a disastrous policy for the American Chestnut. Whole forests were wiped out by logging before the more resistant trees could be found and cultivated. It made it much harder for the ongoing effort to re-introduce resistant chestnuts back into the wild. But progress is being made and the American Chestnut is going to return. Interestingly, we still have many ornamental American Chestnut trees out here on the west coast. The blight never made it across the Rocky Mtns. I know of several trees in my community and I have harvested the chestnuts (gotta fight the squirrels for them).

American Chestnut Foundation
https://www.acf.org/
 
Square_peg said:
That turned out to be a disastrous policy for the American Chestnut. Whole forests were wiped out by logging before the more resistant trees could be found and cultivated. It made it much harder for the ongoing effort to re-introduce resistant chestnuts back into the wild. But progress is being made and the American Chestnut is going to return. Interestingly, we still have many ornamental American Chestnut trees out here on the west coast. The blight never made it across the Rocky Mtns. I know of several trees in my community and I have harvested the chestnuts (gotta fight the squirrels for them).

American Chestnut Foundation
https://www.acf.org/
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I unfortunately have a large horse chestnut in my yard. The squirrels love it but not much good for me other than as shade. I have probably seen the American chestnut out here and just didn't pay attention but Horse chestnuts are common.
 
Horse Chestnuts are common here too and are considered an invasive species. The nuts are inedible for humans.
 
FortyTwoBlades said:
As I understand it, the EAB only attacks mature trees, so lots of places where it's starting to encroach have been cutting trees ahead of infestation and replanting saplings in their place in an attempt at creating an effective barrier to their proliferation.
Click to expand...
The larval stage is a white segmented worm about an inch long. They have a tough time tunnelling under the bark of stems or branches that are under 1 1/2 inch in diameter and that's their only real constraint. No ash tree is safe. A fellow whose medium-sized ash I injected last week called me yesterday to say a small beach towel he'd accidentally left out under the tree overnight was littered with EAB beetle carcasses. He wasn't kidding; I gathered up a couple of hundred! What this does tell me is that a large mature tree can easily harbor a few hundred thousand of these GD critters before the tree is mortally wounded.
Specialists claim that EAB adults are weak fliers and not expected to travel very far. I've never put much faith in that. A good storm will carry small insects hundreds if not thousands of miles. My first customer from 6 years ago was a farm property with an ash-lined laneway which was minimum 1 mile away from the next nearest ash trees. His trees were already badly infested and I've never been able to wipe those critters out despite managing to keep the trees alive.
 
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