BLEMISHES IN CYPEESS AND RED CEDAR. 



65 



open checks. Some of these form a narrow open knot an inch long. 

 Distorted grain is very abundant and ranges from ornamental bird's- 

 eye to abundant bunches of gnarls (fig. 13), which ruin the appear- 

 ance and workability of the wood. 



At Cottonport, La., the writer had an opportunity to learn what 

 proportion of the wood of cypresses abundantly punctured by sap- 

 suckers is defective. Out of 189 palings split from one cypress, 29, 

 or nearly 16 per cent, bore enough black stains to ruin the wood for 

 any ornamental purpose. In a lot of 322 palings, 111, or nearly 39 

 per cent, showed much gnarled grain accompanied by a few black 

 spots. The gnarly wood and open knots are most objectionable in 

 cypress, which is much used for purposes requiring easy working 

 qualities and 

 strength in slender 

 pieces — for instance 

 in greenhouse con- 

 struction. 



Northern red 

 cedar (Juniperus 

 ■i cvginiana). — Some- 

 times open fissures 

 extend from checks 

 toward the bark, 

 surrounded by stain 

 and gnarly wood. 

 Even more objec- 

 tionable are cases 

 where the grain of 

 the wood about the 

 healed punctures is 

 very wavy and each 

 scar has one or more outwardly projecting tubercles (fig. 14, and PI. XI, 

 fig. 3), varying up to an inch in length, and requiring at least two 

 complete annual rings of wood to bury them. These tubercles, 

 together with the gnarled grain and extensive resin deposit, produce 

 a hard, knotty, brittle layer of wood. The wounds have small 

 cavities and light but continuous stains. Wood thus disfigured is 

 unsightly and unworkable. The greater part of the output of red 

 cedar is used for pencil wood, for which the requirements are very exact- 

 ing. A soft wood, even and straight grained, free from defects, is 

 essential. 1 Trees of this species are very commonly worked on by 

 sapsuckers, and often they are covered with rings of pecks. The 

 writer found 19 out of 40 trees punctured on a small area on Plum- 



-Eflects of sapsucker work on wood of bald cypress ( Taxodiurn 

 distichum). Gnarly grain. 



' White, L. L., Circular 102, Forest Service, p. 5, 1907. 

 99068°— Bull 39—11 5 



