How much is Sinker Pine worth?
Commercial retail prices range from two to five dollars per board foot. By the time high-quality sinker cypress wood reaches a California show room, it can range from eight to fourteen dollars per board foot.
What is Sinker Pine?
Sinker Pine, just as sinker cypress, is a river recovered old growth wood that has been sunken in the river bottoms and has been retrieved for use in historic restorations, timber frame homes, and new construction.
How hard is sinker cypress?
Sinker Cypress is a highly desired lumber product. Because it’s a reclaimed lumber, the supply is limited. As old-growth wood, this lumber is harder, denser, and more stable than newer-growth Cypress, and its 150-year underwater preservation process makes it one of the most rot- and insect-resistant woods in the world.
What is heart pine wood?
Heart Pine refers to the heartwood of the pine tree, which is the non-living center of the tree trunk, while the sapwood is the outer living layer which transports nutrients.
Why are sunken logs valuable?
The logs can command thousands of dollars for their intricately beautiful grains and long, straight cuts. Across the coast of the Southeastern U.S., pine and cypress were harvested into the late 1800s. Most logs were lashed together with metal “spike dogs” and floated or towed downstream to mills.
Why is sinker cypress so expensive?
Cool water perfectly preserves what are known as sinker logs, which lay on river bottoms for hundreds of years. These magnificent sinker cypress and sinker pine logs are considered to be buried treasure, because once recovered, they yield the richest patina of any wood.
Why is Cypress so valuable?
Cypress trees were harvested for use in boat hulls and boat decking because of their length and density. Longleaf pines were in such demand for their long, straight trunks that they often were designated “king’s trees” during the colonial era and reserved for making ship masts, Barr said.
Why are cypress trees so expensive?
Today, old growth Cypress is very difficult to find, and it is almost always wood that has been Reclaimed. It is also expensive due to the local demand for antique Cypress millwork in fine homes across the Gulf Coast.
Why is heart pine so expensive?
Because it is a scarce antique, heart pine installed and finished will cost you more per square foot than the standard oak floor. Several manufacturers are making a three-quarter-inch-thick laminated flooring that has a thick-wear layer of heart pine over other hardwood cores.
Does heart pine still exist?
What remains of the once vast virgin forest are protected meaning Old Growth Heart Pine is no longer commercially available as a timber crop. Fortunately, old-growth heart pine still exists as high quality timbers are reclaimed from turn-of-the century mill buildings, warehouses, and factories.
What is deadhead logging?
Claytor refers to him as the “computer guru.” Deadhead logging isn’t about pulling fallen trees out of a swamp or river. And for clarification, these loggers aren’t going after trees that just fell in the water but, rather, sunken logs and timber that have already been cut, most of them over 100 years ago.