JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL WOOD COLLECTORS SOCIETYA Dedicated Group of Wood Collectors and Crafters

Volume 69, Number 3 May/June 2016

World of Wood

2016 — The Year of Encouraging Membership

Contents President’s Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3Pink Flame Wood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4Gary Green - Elected President Elect . . . . . . . . . . . .6IWCS 2016 Annual Meeting Minutes . . . . . . . . . 62016 — The Year of Encouraging Membership . . . . 9Elected IWCS Secretary/Treasurer . . . . . . . . 9Shrubwoods of the World . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Sixteen Year Wood Identification Project . . . . 12Australian Woods 83-84 . . . . . . . . . . . . 14Elected IWCS US North East Trustee . . . . . . . . 16Wood Meets. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16,20,30New Honorary Life Members . . . . . . . . . . . 17Regis-Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17Book Reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18,25DNA for Testing Legality of Wood . . . . . . . . . . . . 19Appointed Corporate Membership Coordinator . . 20Honor Flight of West Central Florida . . . . . . 212016 Winter Woodfest Report . . . . . . 22Member Listings and Requests . . . . . . . . . . . 31Obituaries . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Editor Mihaly Czako PhD E-mail: wow.editor@woodcollectors.org Associate Editors Ken Bassett — Washington, USA Richard Crow — Cornwall, England Alan Curtis — Oregon, USA Fred Holder — Washington, USA Willem Hurkmans — Crete, Greece Barry & Danielle James — KZN, S. Africa Morris Lake — Queensland, Australia David Mouat PhD — California, USA Nelis Mourik — South Holland, Netherlands Chuck Ray PhD — Pennsylvania, USA Webmaster: webmaster@woodcollectors.org

Worldwide web : http://www.woodcollectors.org

The World of Wood is published bimonthly by the International Wood Collectors Society (IWCS). IWCS is devoted to distributing information on collecting wood, correctly identifying and naming wood specimens, and using wood in creative crafts. Contributions for publication may be educational, scientific, technical or of general interest to members and relevant to the purposes of the Society. Papers may be refereed by an Editorial Board of technically trained members. The phrases ‘World of Wood’, ‘IWCS Wood Data Sheet’ and all materials contained herein are © Copyright protected by the International Wood Collectors Society. Address requests to reprint material to the Editor.The World of Wood is published as a benefit to members of the IWCS, a non-profit organization of botanists, dendrologists, and other scientists, technologists, wood collectors, hobbyists and crafts people for mutual assistance and reciprocation. Applications are available from the Secretary-Treasurer or from the IWCS website. Dues and address changes also should be directed to the Secretary-Treasurer. We encourage your membership in our unique international organization.All Countries “On-Line Only”: (Couples) US $35/yr; 3 yrs/$90; 5 yrs/$125; or Life membership/$500;USA Hardcopy Journal: (Couples) US $40/yr; 3 yrs/$105; 5 yrs/$150; or Life membership/$575;Australia Hardcopy Journal: (Couples) US $45/yr; 3 yrs/$120; 5 yrs/$175; or Life membership/$650;Other countries Hardcopy Journal: (Couples) US $55/yr; 3 yrs/$150; 5 yrs/$225; or Life membership/$750;Corporate “On-Line Only”: US $125/yr; 3 yrs/$325; or 5 yrs/$450; all countriesCorporate Hardcopy Journal: US $150/yr; 3 yrs/$375; or 5 yrs/$525; all countriesStudent Member: US $15 per year; all countries.

2 World of Wood May/June 2016

Cover photographs Center: Jupiter (in Peru pink flame wood) and sand dunes of Namibia at sunrise with camel thorn trees - story by Vince Manna on page 4. Background: Macassar ebony (Diospyros celebica) end grain (by Eric Meier #9701).

World of WoodVol. 69, No. 3 ISSN 1068-7300 May/June 2016

The International Wood Collectors Society, founded in 1947, is a non-profit society advancing information on wood.Officers and TrusteesPresident: Elaine Hunt, Florida, USA Phone: E-mail: president@woodcollectors.orgPresident Elect: Gary Green, Indiana, USA Phone: E-mail: president.elect@woodcollectors.org Vice President: Bob Chastain, Indiana,USA Phone: E-mail: vp@woodcollectors.org Secretary-Treasurer: Patti Dickherber, 12 August Alp Ct. Phone: E-mail: treasurer@woodcollectors.orgPublications Chairman: Duane Keck, South Carolina, USA Phone: E-mail: pubchair@woodcollectors.orgFirst Past President: Garry R oux, Illinois, USA Phone: E-mail: newmember@woodcollectors.org Second Past President: Art Lee, Maryland, USA Phone: E-mail: webchair@woodcollectors.org Endowment Fund Chairman: Greg Reed, Calgary, Alberta, Canada Phone: E-mail: Archivist: Dennis Wilson, Alpena, Michigan, USA Phone: E-mail: archivist@woodcollectors.org Regional Trustees AustralAsia (2013-2016): Harry Dennis, Victoria, Australia Canada (Interim): Robert Ritchie, Ontario, Canada EuroAfrica (2010-2016): Willem Hurkmans, Crete, Greece UK (2013-2016): Ramsey Pattison, Essex, United Kingdom USA Central (2014-2018): Wes Kolkmeier, Missouri,USA USA Great Lakes (2011-2017): John Burris, Indiana, USA USA NE (2016-2018) Mark Peet, Pennsylvania, USA USA NW (2010-2016): Alan Curtis, Oregon, USA USA SE (2013-2016): Jean Sumner, Virginia, USA USA SW (2011-2017): Dave Mouat, California, USA Committee Chairs and Service Providers All-Mail Auction: Duane Keck, South Carolina, USA Membership Committee: Bob Chastain, Indiana,USA. New-member Correspondent: Garry Roux, Illinois, USA Nominations Committee: Garry Roux, Illinois, USA Corporate Membership: Eric Krum, Maryland, USA Student Membership: Open Membership Directory: Erlene Tarleton & Jim Ciesla, Florida, USA Website Committee: Art Lee, Maryland, USA Webmaster: Erlene Tarleton, California, USA Wood Import Permits: Alan Curtis, Oregon, USA Wood Specimen Kits: Gary Green, Indiana, USA

A note to contributorsPlease submit articles as you complete them. I can then place them into future editions so each edition will present a

balance of topics. Last minute changes before June 25 for the July/August 2016 issue.

May/June 2016 World of Wood 3

The President’s Message - Searches and Thanks by Elaine Hunt #8174

The first thing I want to do is thank Garry Roux for writing the President’s Message for the last issue of WoW. I came home from the Southeast Regional Meeting, USA, in February and started running a fever. Needless to say, being sick for the next couple weeks, I was in no shape to write much of anything. I don’t think even Wonder Woman could have written a message that would make much sense during that time. Then along came Garry to save the day.

The Southeast Regional Meeting at Lake Yale, Florida, USA, was a huge success. We all had a great time and are looking forward to next year’s meeting, February 8 – 12, 2017. It is so hard to describe what all goes on at this meeting. There is something happening all the time. One of the most important parts of the meeting is the making of new friends and getting together with the friends you have made in the past. I tell people who have never been, come and see what it is all about and you will want to come again. There is an article with photos in this issue on page 22. Enjoy them and picture yourself there next year. We would love to have you join us.

I would like to ask every member to check their information in the new 2016 Membership Directory. If it is not correct, please let Duane Keck (pubchair@woodcollectors.org) know. He and Mihaly Czako are compiling a corrections page that will be in a later issue of WoW. The information will also be sent to our Secretary/Treasurer so she can update the IWCS records. This is very important and in most cases, only you can tell us if your information is not correct.

Have you checked out the IWCS Facebook page? It is found at https://www.facebook.com/WoodCollectors. There is always something new and different to see: from what is happening in IWCS today, woodworking, to wood technology and much, much more. Take a look and you will be pleasantly surprised. Don’t forget to “Like” us while you are there.

I am trying to locate all of the IWCS banners. I know where some of them are but would like to know where they all are. That way, if someone needs to use a banner for a meeting, a tool show or a woodworking/craft show, we can get one to them. If you are in possession of an IWCS banner (3’ X 4’, ~ 90 cm x 120 cm), please contact me at manleyelaine@aol.com or call my phone number that is in the directory. Thanks for your help.

Kris Troyer our Secretary/Treasurer is stepping down effective June 1, 2016. She has done an outstanding job for IWCS these last four years. I have worked closely with Kris and know of the long hours she has devoted to our organization. I want to wish Kris happy days ahead and all the down time she so deserves. Thank you Kris for all you have done.

Welcome to Patti Dickherber, our new IWCS Secretary/Treasurer beginning June 1, 2016. At the Southeast Regional Woodfest last February, 2016, Patti was elected during the business meeting. IWCS is fortunate to have her and I am looking forward to working with Patti in the future. There is a photo and a short bio of Patti in this issue.

Sometime ago, I was on an assignment of several expeditions into many remote areas of the Peruvian rainforest to photograph pygmy marmosets, tamarins, jaguars and the rarely seen indigenous tribes deep in the interior of Manú National Park in the south of Peru. The expedition was made so much more rewarding by having seen a group of rare species such as Goeldi’s monkey (Callimico goeldii) within the Manú Biosphere Reserve. Via various means of transport I traveled on to Santa Rosa, a distant town on an island in Amazonian Peru near the triple shared border (Tres Fronteras) with Brazil (Tabatinga township) and Colombia (Leticia township). There I put together another small team. As we were returning to the jungle capital, the city of Iquitos late one evening upstream along the Amazon River (Rio Amazonas) the real adventure was about to begin.Following a spectacular sunset moments earlier, the weather had suddenly turned for the worse. With increasing winds and large swells of the river, our tiny motorized aluminum boat was being tossed as if it were a cork top, bobbing up and down violently. In the far distance we could hear the thundering roars accompanying lightning vigorously striking in every direction with tremendous commotion and destruction as it drew near. Some of the flashes were hovering directly overhead but most were reaching either side of the riverbanks.These electric bolts were so loud and fierce they had sent the terrified skipper ducking for cover under the tiny stern of the boat. I wasn’t about to follow him as I would be so lucky to have a front row seat to witness one of nature’s impressive furies at work. I brushed off the repeated warnings made to me by my guide of the risks the lightning posed. Since there was no point setting up a tripod on a rocking boat, I continued pointing the drenched metal camera randomly firing away at these flashes of light in the hope of capturing on film such a spectacle. They were so intense they constantly lit up the night sky turning it into hues of blue.

Pink Flame Wood by Vince Manna #4713

4 World of Wood May/June 2016Rare dark phase of Goeldi’s monkey

Rarely seen Machiguenga tribal lady in traditional wear deep within Manú Biosphere Reserve (beyond Boca Manú)

Lightning strikes Barrio Florido. It wasn’t until the film was developed the sheer scale of that single bolt of lightning was revealed.

One lightning strike dwarfed the forest canopy; its intensity had lasted a couple of seconds enabling me to capture it on film as a testimony of its monstrous size but “striking” beauty! A roaring thunder followed with the sounds of crackling explosions of wood and crashing trees. We were all shaken as the shattering vibrations traveled through us onto the other side of the river and back. I realized that something in the forest had been severely hit. The guide assured me it was a tree and I was keen to see the end result!

After arriving in Iquitos, we studied the local map aided by the notes we made to accurately pinpoint the location. The next day we stocked up on food and gear to allow for a long journey back to explore the forest. I allowed a few days for the unexpected! We arrived within the vicinity of Barrio Florido where nature’s “fireworks” put on a show only nights before. We explored the area for more species of primates before camping out overnight.

Early the next morning we set off again and after an 8-hour frantic search crossing streams and tributaries beneath the canopy a glowing red tree trunk appeared in the distance as if to be demanding our attention (maybe not the attention of a wood collector such as I). We inspected the damage and the inside of what previously was a tall tree.

It had been blown apart into numerous fragments as if caused by dynamite. The explosion sent the splintered debris of various shapes and sizes with tremendous force at great distances in every direction. Some of the fragmented spears were even embedded into the nearby foliage. The tree had been struck due to being partially rotted and holding much moisture in spongy wood and large amounts of free water trapped in cracks and wedge-shaped gouges, an easy target for lightning strikes.

I collected some of the larger sections of wood along with foliage, botanical data and notes to identify the species. Back in Iquitos, I took the wood to local crafts people who may have been familiar with the species. Some locals were familiar with it as it was sparsely used as a craft-timber, but I needed its botanical name, so I was referred

to Jim King of Amazon Reserve and Resort. Jim identified it as “canilla de vieja” but the scientific name was not known at the time. As this wood only recently entered commerce and lacked a trade name, he and his associates invented (admittedly also inspired by rum) a flashy name for it: ‘pink flame wood’, which was back translated to Spanish as ‘llama rosada’. ...continued on page 8.

Crossing one of the tributaries in search of the shattered tree

May/June 2016 World of Wood 5

The shattered victim - canilla de vieja or pink flame tree(Rinorea paniculata)

Frog caught in a spiderweb? - Upper Amazon treefrog (Dendropsophus bifurcus)

in Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve

I was born in Goshen, IN, USA in 1953 and have resided in Syracuse, IN since 1976. I have a BA degree from Ball State University. I taught middle school Industrial Education for 7 years, was a general contractor with as many as 8 employees for 18 years, and have been in the retail lumber/woodworking business for the past 15 years. I produce kiln dried hardwood and softwood lumber mainly from lawn trees on a Wood-Mizer, and produce architectural wood products as well as cabinets and furniture.Assuming I had a unique hobby, I had been assembling a wood specimen collection for a few years when a wood supplier suggested that I should join the International Wood Collectors Society. Amazed that there was an organization of this nature, I joined as a life member in 1996. The benefits of membership exceeded my expectations and continue to do so.• I have attended several Annual General Meetings, several Winterfest meets and many regional meets.• I helped organize the Northern Indiana meeting held in 2014, which was well attended and very successful.• I am currently the chairman of the Wood Specimen Kits program and have built up a good reserve of Inventory.• I plan to continue in this capacity as I feel the bulk of the work is now behind me.• I value the friendships I have made in the IWCS and have enjoyed all of the meetings that I have attended.• I anxiously await every issue of World of Wood and read it from cover to cover.• I would love to see more collectors, as a collector myself, but appreciate our member wood crafters.• I certainly don’t advocate an overhaul of our organization but do see the need to keep us up to speed with the rapid changes in society.• I always give all of my pursuits my best efforts and will do the same for the IWCS.

Gary Green #6654L - Elected President Elect, February 13, 2016

6 World of Wood May/June 2016

May/June 2016 World of Wood 7

...continued from page 5.

I had previously encountered this wood many years before whilst travelling from the Bolivian highlands down to the Amazon basin where it was also used by craftspeople of the interior. Not surprisingly, I still recall it as impressive with wild grain and color patterns. After considerable difficulty and efforts of transporting the Peru wood halfway round the world, it finally reached my

workshop.

The wood was immediately cut to the required sizes for proper seasoning. Pink flame wood is extremely difficult to season, as it is prone to severe warping, checking and splitting. I found old deserted holes and canals, caused by wood boring insect larvae, radiating towards the center of the tree. I took full advantage of these interesting colors and grains with its many combinations of impressive “hook-like” features appearing within. I continued cutting the 150 mm X 75 mm (6” X 3”) square dressed boards into 1.5-mm thick (1/16”) “end grain” veneers.

The seasoning process was difficult. The 1.5 mm thin “end-grain” veneers were very brittle and constantly wanting to buckle and fall apart. Naturally, the veneer leaves inherited numerous hair line cracks. Finally, I adhered them to a solid substrate using 2-PAC glue. Their faces were hand-finished to a glass smooth finish ready for scanning. ...continued on page 18.

Pink flame wood, locally called “wasicuchu”, photographed in

Rurrenabaque, Bolivia8 World of Wood May/June 2016

Spectacular sunrise on the Rio Amazonas from one of few river vessels used after leaving Santa Rosa

Leaping red uakari or English Monkey (Cacajao calvus ucayalii) along the shattered tree’s trail

May/June 2016 World of Wood 9

Patti Dickherber #8719Elected IWCS Secretary/Treasurer, June 1, 2016 -

Patti Dickherber attended Maryville University, St. Louis, MO and acquired a BS in Business Administration. She is retired from MEMC (formerly Monsanto Electronic Materials Corp.). She was the Corporate Financial Analyst for the Technology & Research Division. She has extensive experience in banking as she worked in banks and savings and loans for many years. She lives with her husband, Bob. She has two children, five step-children, 13 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. She is currently the Registrar for the Saint Charles Chapter, National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She also volunteers at the non-profit local recycle and resource center that helps disabled children. She has been the registration person for a number of IWCS annual and regional meetings. She enjoys genealogy, crafting, sewing and traveling. Now she is looking forward to working for the IWCS because she loves the people of this organization!

The botanical name of the common spicebush is Lindera benzoin (L.) Blume and it is one of three eastern North American species, from extremely southern Canada down into northern Florida. Lindera is a genus of about a 100 spicy aromatic trees and shrubs, almost all native to tropical to temperate Asia, while one is native to Australia. The other two North American Lindera species are southern spicebush or Jove’s fruit, L. melissaefolium (Walt.) Blume (extremely rare) and bog spicebush, L. subcoriacea Wofford (rare, endangered), both from the very southeastern United States. The genus is in the Lauraceae family. Other common names for common spicebush are northern spicebush, wild allspice, fever bush and Benjamin bush; the latter is clearly a corruption of the word benzoin. A synonym is Benzoin aestivale Nees. Linnaeus named it Laurus benzoin L., now another synonym that clearly shows that Lindera is closely allied to the genus Laurus. The genus Lindera is named after the Swedish botanist and physician Johann Linder (1678 - 1723). The specific epithet benzoin is of Arabic or Semitic origin meaning a resinous gum or perfume. The specific epithet aestivale means ‘summer flowering’.Common spicebush is a shrub with a

rounded habit, 2 - 5 m (7 - 17 ft.) high and just as wide, and the stems bearing an aromatic bark. Leaves are alternate, obovate in shape, and 8 - 15 cm (3 - 6 in.) long. They turn to clear yellow in autumn. When crushed, the leaf emits a sharp spicy odor, almost too strong to be pleasant. Flowers are unisexual (male and female on different individuals), yellow, sweetly fragrant, appearing before the leaves in a Forsythia-like flowering habit. Fruits are red, oblong, juicy, spicy berries. Spicebush is an understory shrub of wet woodlands.The wood of common spicebush is very light brown. There is no heartwood, or possibly only in stems of older specimens. Stems are seldom over 5 cm (2 in.) in diameter and will hardly ever exceed 10 cm (4 in.). Growth rings are sometimes visible, sometimes not, depending on growth conditions. The wood is diffuse porous. Vessels are small, less than 100 µm in diameter, equal in diameter all over the growth ring, solitary and in radial groups of 2 and 3. Perforation plates are simple, although sometimes scalariform perforation plates occur. Parenchyma is paratracheal in irregular and incomplete rings around the vessels. Rays are (1 -) 2 (- 3) seriate. Oil cells in xylem, so characteristic in this family, are quite uncommon. Ground tissue consists of libriform fibres.The wood of common spicebush is very hard, quite heavy (density 700 - 850 kg/m3 or 45 - 55 lb/cu. ft. airdry), fine textured and straight grained. The wood dries with little risk of cracking if cut along the pith and end-sealed before drying. When using sharp tools, machining is easy, although the small dimensions make machining dangerous. It glues well and can be sanded to a smooth surface. It is of a moderate to low durability and is easily affected by fungi.As far as known, the wood is not used, but it must be suitable for fine carving and turning. The shrub is planted as an ornamental for its early, quite rich

yellow flowering, for its handsome aromatic foliage with deep yellow autumn colors, and for its red berries. Formerly, leaves of this shrub were used as a tea and the fruits as a substitute for allspice. (Allspice, or Jamaica pepper, is the dried unripe fruit of Pimenta dioica from Central America and the West Indies, an important ingredient in the Caribbean cuisine with a rich peppery bouquet of flavours.) Leaves, bark and fruits were used medicinally.

Common spicebush by Nelis Mourik #7460LThis is a spicy aromatic shrub, the hardiest species in its genus. Its wood is hard and fine, without special features.

Transverse surface of an about 3-cm disc of Lindera benzoin

Lens view of Lindera benzoin wood end grain

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Longitudinal surface of a glued up Lindera benzoin wood specimen

The full botanical name of this shrub is Enkianthus campanulatus (Miq.) G. Nicholson. The genus Enkianthus comprises a total of 13 species, native to Asia from the eastern Himalayas eastwards into Japan. E. campanulatus is endemic to Japan (southern Hokkaido, Honshu and Shikoku Islands). The Japanese name is furin-tsutsuji. Not often used other names are pagoda bush and showy lantern. The Dutch name is Pronkklokje. The German name Prachtglocke, something like beauty bell in English, but that name is only fictional. Enkianthus is in the Ericaceae family.

Redvein enkianthus is an erect-branched shrub usually attaining 2.5 - 3 m (8 - 10 ft.), but it can grow higher, up to 9 m (30 ft.). Branches are often in whorls. Leaves are produced in clusters at the ends of the twigs, or are alternate on vigorous shoots, obovate to elliptic and finely toothed, 2.5 - 6 cm (1 - 2½ in.) long, and about half that wide. Flowers are bell-shaped, about 1 cm (⅜ in.) long, in pendulous clusters, varying from whitish-pink to white with pink striping and edges. Fruits are egg-shaped, also about 1 cm (⅜ in.) long. The leaves lend it a great beauty in autumn by turning to various shades between yellow and red.

The genus name Enkianthus is Latinized after the Greek words ‘enkûos’ = ‘pregnant’ and ‘anthos’ = ‘flower’. One explanation is that it is in reference to the pouched corollas found in the flowers of some species

(not in E. campanulatus). Another explanation is that the cluster of flowers is initially enclosed by a corolla-like coloured involucre. When this opens, it appears it was ’pregnant of flowers’. The specific epithet campanulatus is after the Latin word ‘campana’ (bell) and means ‘bell-shaped’.

The wood of redvein enkianthus is creamy to light brown. Stems of cultivated specimens are usually not over 5 cm (2 in.) across, although diameters of mature stems can easily reach 10 cm (4 in.) across. Growth ring boundaries are distinct due to one or few wider spaced rings of larger earlywood vessels formed after narrower spaced rings of smaller vessels in the latewood of the previous year. The wood is semi-ring porous. All vessels are lined up in narrow tangential bands, the farther in the growth ring the narrower the bands and the spacing are, and the smaller the vessels are. Sometimes there is a quite an abrupt transition. This makes the transverse wood structure look very characteristically ordered. Largest vessels are about 40 µm; smallest about 20 µm. Perforation plates are scalariform with 20 - 40 bars. Parenchyma is scanty paratracheal. Rays are 1 - 6 (- 8) - seriate. The uniseriate rays consist of square to upright cells only. The multiseriate rays have bodies with procumbent cells and uniseriate tails of square to upright cells. Ray height is up to 0.6 - 0.8 mm. Ground tissue between the vessel bands consists of fibre tracheids.

Redvein enkianthus wood is medium hard and medium heavy (density about 600 - 650 kg/m3 or 37.5 – 40.5 lb/cu. ft., airdry). Texture is fine; grain is straight. The wood seasons well, without any difficulty and with only little tendency to crack. It works easily with all kinds of tools, although the small dimensions make it dangerous. It is easy to glue and can be finished by sanding to a very smooth surface. The wood is not durable and is easily affected by fungi.

The species is used for Bonsai cultivation and as a cut flower. Nothing is known about use of the wood in Japan, perhaps because of the small dimensions this wood might not be used. In view of its properties, however, it must be very well suitable for small, fine carvings and turnings.

Lens view of Enkianthus campanulatus wood end grain

Transverse section of an about 4 x 5 cm wide stem of Enkianthus campanulatus

May/June 2016 World of Wood 11

Longitudinal surface of a glued up Enkianthus campanulatus wood specimen

Redvein enkianthus by Nelis Mourik #7460LThis shrub is beautiful in flowering and autumn colors and is said to be the hardiest of all Enkianthus species. On the transverse surface its wood anatomy is of a stunningly ordered type.

12 World of Wood May/June 2016

Sixteen Year Wood Identification Project Just Completed by Gary Green #6654L

By 1998 I’d been collecting wood specimens for a few years and had been a member of the IWCS for two years. Being a life-long woodworker, quite a few species of wood passed by me and I could recognize and identify a number of them. My significant other Christine’s dad, Eddie was in his 70s and was working more or less full time at a manufacturer of enclosed utility trailers. His duties ranged from office courier to building maintenance and he was a working fool, to say the least. He didn’t waste a minute and everyone he worked with respected him. When he wasn’t at work on a big project, he would busy himself with something, including cutting up crates and pallets producing kindling for those he worked with who heated their homes with wood.I heat with wood and at that time was a home builder. I generated plenty of scraps for starting fires but Ed insisted on bringing me a big box of kindling. When he showed up with this huge box of scraps, I was obviously curious as to what species might be included and was flabbergasted to find an array of what appeared to be tropical hardwoods, red ones, brown ones, heavy ones and light ones. I told Ed I had to see where these came from. He surmised that they came from the packing crates that lauan (luan) plywood came in. “Show me! I’ll come over Monday!”, which he agreed to. This manufacturer used a lot of lauan plywood and had a huge warehouse full of crated plywood and each crate was stenciled “Product of Indonesia”. The wheels in my head were turning and I hoped someone in the IWCS could identify the woods and I’d make wood specimens to trade. I asked Eddie if he could save me some of these crates and he agreed. A couple weeks later he called and told me to come over with a trailer and he’d load me up with a forklift. I was shocked when I got there to find several big stacks, more than would ever fit on my large tri-axle trailer. But Ed insisted that I take them all and we put a double stack on that trailer so tall that I was afraid of clipping power lines on my 30-mile (~ 50 km) trip home. Stopping to check my tie-down straps every five miles, I made it home driving at a snail’s pace.

Then came the arduous task of taking the crates apart. These were “panels” about 3’ (~ 90 cm) wide and a bit over 8’ (~ 2.4 m) long, so there were short boards tying the long boards together. This lattice-work was gun-nailed together with each nail clinched (shot through both boards and bent over on the backside). So it was far more than a matter of prying the pieces apart and pulling the nails. I decided that there was way more wood here than I could ever process in a lifetime so I decided that I’d only keep the more than 8’ long boards and they had to be at least 1/2” (~13 mm) thick and 3” (~ 75 mm) wide. Obviously, crate wood is not premium grade material, so only the sound boards were worth the effort.

I recall thinking that there must have been at least a dozen different species of wood in these crates. Yes, there were well over a dozen! I only found out years later just how many there were. I started by taking baby steps and grouped together several species that had the same color, texture and weight. The next step was to write a letter to the editor of World of Wood asking if anyone would be willing to assist in the identifications. By now it was 1999 and few members used email, so I waited to see who would respond. I soon got a letter from Guy Simandoux #7800, from Versailles, France that he would help. Guy had purchased some wood specimens from

me previously and I recall that he had remarked that of the commercial species I had supplied a very high percentage was accurately identified. I was unhappy that even a small percentage was incorrectly identified, but Guy always supplied me with the correct identities.At about the same time Nelis Mourik #7460L, from the Netherlands, agreed to help. Indonesia was once a Dutch possession and after World War II the Dutch were very interested in studying Indonesian woods to see which would be suitable for rebuilding their country. So Dutch collectors had a very good collection of Indonesian woods for comparison. Guy chose to remain anonymous as he didn’t want to come out of retirement and get into the wood identification business. When referring of Guy to others I just called him “John”.

Guy has an engineering degree and worked for the French National electricity company. He was a manager responsible for the security of the nuclear plants. He’d always had a love for trees and wood and was friends with a wood anatomist who helped him at the lab he worked at. Nelis was and still is an organ builder and was very adept at identifying wood using the ‘GUESS’ program (http://what-wood.servehttp.com/). I selected several sets of boards that had features that made them easy to group together - same weight, color, grain, smell, etc., and cut samples to send off to Nelis and Guy. These were marked by letter to keep them organized.In early 2000, the results started trickling in. I decided that I wouldn’t

Average quality of the crate wood

Some of the exceptionally nice boards

A small portion of identified woods in question that got mailed to Raimund for a

look

May/June 2016 World of Wood 13

A truckload of Indonesian wood shavings headed to a neighboring farmer for animal

bedding.

consider it a positive identification unless Guy and Nelis arrived at the same identification since they weren’t comparing notes. I was astounded that for most part, they came up with the same conclusions. I wasn’t then and am still not much of a wood identifier. I know how it’s done, but never had the time or the inclination to learn it and certainly respect people who know how.Soon, I began making standard specimens of the known woods and had so much nice short pieces of some species that I sold some on eBay. I now wish I hadn’t done that. I even made Ed a small “mahogany” side table with no knots and only a couple nail holes. By this time, I had kiln dried all of the wood and sent it out to be surfaced so that it would take up less space and make it easier to group together same species, or so I thought.

I initially had about 400 - 500 board-feet (~0.94 - 1.18 m3) of these boards. Mind you, some boards were so badly split, full of nail holes or eaten up by insects that it was a challenge to get one or two standard samples from them. Some were easy to group together as they had very obvious characteristics. Of these, I continued to send samples to Nelis and Guy. Nelis was a working man and was finding it difficult to find time to work on them. Guy had a fast turn-around time. So I continued making specimens of the newly identified woods. In too many cases, I was learning that I was sending the same species as previous, so felt that I needed to get them all grouped together so I wouldn’t end up sending the same woods out six times. It soon got to the point that the differences in boards were fairly subtle. A razor knife and

hand lens became necessary to group them together. Although I couldn’t identify them, I was able to group them together and was confident that I was grouping the same woods.By about 2005, I was down to a few hundred boards, but they were so similar that I decided to stand them up ordered all around my shop based on color and weight and finish my part of the identifications. Many were more similar than I anticipated. I recall spending an afternoon trying to group these and decided that what was remaining was beyond my ability to differentiate. In other words, they started to all look the same as viewed by a hand lens. I had a bit of an anxiety attack and had to walk away for awhile. Eventually, I put these “subgroups” away for another time.Meanwhile, the identifications continued to come from Guy and some from Nelis, but I wasn’t sending any more material to be identified. One day in early 2008, I received an email from Willem Hurkmans #8761L, then from the Netherlands. In February, 2008, he visited Nelis, who showed him the box of blocks from me. I didn’t know it at the time, but Nelis passed them over to Willem who volunteered to identify them in exchange for a specimen to add to his collection. “So, who was Willem Hurkmans and was he capable?”, I asked Nelis. Willem is an expert at this and at the time worked for Leiden University with a huge reference collection. Very soon, I received an email from Willem with an attachment of 27 pages of his findings! This was a compilation of his notes listing International Association of Wood Anatomists features for each wood as well as his personal observations. In some cases, his conclusion was the genus and species, on others it was the genus only, and for several there was no conclusion. I have no idea as to how many hours of work this document

represented, but just typing the results would have taken me a week! This allowed me to process and label a good many specimens.In 2009, my “spousal equivalent” Christine and I attended the IWCS annual meeting in Soest, Netherlands, and had the pleasure of meeting Nelis and Willem and many other members I had corresponded with. We spent some time at the home of Willem and his wife, Marijke, and visited Willem’s home laboratory where he showed me the set of slides he had prepared of these Indonesian woods. Now I began to get a feel for the monumental task that he had volunteered for. Not only Willem, but Guy and Nelis as well. While at this Soest meet, we chatted about collecting wood in the US and firmed up plans for a 2011 Texas field collecting trip which was the subject of an article in WoW (January/February 2012). Willem came first to my Indiana home,

Although not a fun task, labeling means that these specimens are now finished.

From left to right: Willem Hurkmans, Herm Stolte, Gary Green and Nelis Mourik at the 2009 IWCS International Meeting in Soest,

the Netherlands. Meeting friends over a nice beer is a very good occasion for team spirit building and discussion of more serious business, such as the identification of problematic specimens...

Belgian Trappist Ale as a catalyst gives you results, not limited to empty bottles... Continued on page 24.

14 World of Wood May/June 2016

Australian Wood No 83Acacia stenophylla by Morris Lake #7634

river coobaSyn.: Racosperma stenophyllumDerivation: Acacia is from the Greek akakia (to sharpen). Dioscorides used the word in the first century AD for the Egyptian thorn tree (Acacia arabica) which is prickly. Stenophylla is from the Greek stenos (narrow) and phyllon (leaves), referring to its narrow leaves. A. stenophylla is a member of Group 14 identified by their flowers in globular heads in racemes and flat, wide phyllodes.Family: Mimosaceae contains 40 to 60 genera with about 3000 species in Australia, America, Africa, Asia, Melanesia, the Pacific Islands and New Guinea. There are 17 genera with over 1100 species in Australia. Twelve genera and around 48 species are found in rainforests. Acacia, the wattle genus is the largest, containing more than 1000 species. They generally form a lower layer of trees or shrubs and are found in rainforests as well as open forests. They are a modern family known to be around 25 million years old.

Other names: River cooba is also known as munumula, balkura, gurley, gooralee, ironwood, Dalby wattle, river myall, belalei, eumong, native willow, black wattle, and dunthy. All of these names reflect the fact that it is spread over such a wide area of Australia that it is called by a different name in nearly every place.Distribution: River cooba is very widely distributed in inland arid areas from north-eastern Western Australia, east through the Northern Territory, to Queensland, where it grows west of the Great Divide, and south to the Murray, Lachlan and Darling River system in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia between Lake Eyre and the Murray River. It usually grows in heavy soils along watercourses which are subject to periodic flooding where it frequently forms monospecific stands.The tree: River cooba is a somewhat bushy tree growing to 20 metres (~ 66 feet) high, with a tendency to sucker. The bark is hard and tough, finely furrowed and dark brown to blackish. The branches are normally pendulous, which leads the tree to have weeping foliage as its characteristic form. The foliage (phyllodes) is tough, strap-like, dull green, up to 40 cm (~ 16”) long, 2–7 mm (5/64” – 9/32”) wide, innocuous with an acute to acuminate, often curved form. The creamy white to pale yellow flowers are globular and each flower head consists of 30-40 minute, individual flowers. Seed pods are grey or bluish-grey, 10-20 cm (4” – 8”) long, thick, leathery and are strongly constricted between the seeds. This species is rarely utilised by livestock, although it is reported to be good fodder for sheep.

Wood of Acacia stenophyllaThe heartwood is red-brown with light yellow sapwood. The grain is straight. It is very hard, heavy, fine-grained, nicely marked and takes a fine polish. It has an air dry density at 12% moisture of 960 kg/m3 (60 lb/cu. ft.) . There have been considerations for the species to be grown in plantation with possible harvesting around 30 years so there could be potential for commercial use of this species..

Mature river cooba by the river

Flowering branches

May/June 2016 World of Wood 15

Australian Wood No 84Acacia tephrina by Morris Lake #7634

boree Syn.: Racosperma tephrinumDerivation: Acacia is from the Greek akakia (to sharpen). Dioscorides used the word in the first century AD for the Egyptian thorn tree (Acacia arabica) which is prickly. Rigens, meaning stiff, refers to the stiff phyllodes. Tephrina is from Greek for grey, or ash-grey and which refers to the colour of the leaves. A. tephrina is a member of Group 4 identified by their flowers in globular heads on multiple stalks and flat phyllodes.Family: Mimosaceae contains 40 to 60 genera with about 3,000 species in Australia, America, Africa, Asia, Melanesia, the Pacific Islands and New Guinea. There are 17 genera with over 1,100 species in Australia. Twelve genera and around 48 species are found in rainforests. Acacia, the wattle genus is the largest, containing more than 1,000 species. They generally form a lower layer of trees or shrubs and are found in rainforests as well as open forests. They are a modern family known to be around 25 million years old. Other names: It would appear to have no other common name.Distribution: It is found from Brunchilly and Benmara Stations, in the Barkly Tableland, Northern Territory and also in central Queensland, mostly west of the Great Divide, from Einasleigh, south to near Cunnam-ulla, but reaching the coast near Bowen. It grows mainly on heavier soils, including alkaline and saline clays, in tall open woodland and in drier areas of low woodland and shrubland.The tree: This is a graceful tree growing to 20 metres (~ 66 feet) high and distinguished by its rounded canopy and silvery leaves. The bark is hard, fissured, thin, flaky, and grey to dark grey. The foliage (phyllodes) appears silvery grey because of a dense covering of flattened, silvery hairs. The leaves are straight to shallowly recurved, 7–11 cm (3 ¾” – 4 ⅓”) long, and 2–4.5 mm (5/64” – 3/16”) wide. The golden-yellow flowers are globular and clustered together on short stalks. The seed pods are usually sea-green in colour and lightly constricted between the seeds.

Wood of Acacia tephrinaThe heartwood is characterised by its rich, dark chocolate colour, which is bordered by cream coloured sapwood. It has an air dry density at 12% moisture of around 850 kg/m3 (53 lb/cu. ft.). Boree is a durable wood and was used extensively by Aboriginals. In our culture it has been used for fence posts where graziers gave them a life span of 50 years or more depending on the soil type and the choice of log. It has also been used for wood turning, and bush furniture, and is considered to have a future potential for commercial usage. Boree wood has also been found with a very nice ring-figure ((also called blistered).

Fissured, flaky barkLeafy branches

Mature boree trees

Ring figured heartwood top) and sapwood (bottom)

My name is Mark Peet and have been born and raised in the hands-on way of living life. My early years were shaped by the honest and challenging life of the small farm. This opened my eyes to the reality of life and death and the ever changing balances in life’s ever intertwining circles. When markets crashed and things got tight, life morphed. My father reverted back to his other hands on trade before my birth, carpentry. So from there on my life was influenced by wood. My older brothers became carpenters. I followed higher education and acquired a few equivalent degrees from Penn State. Shortly after graduation, I took up employment with Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources for a brief stint and then moved into a role with the USDA Forest Service. Marriage and children moved my employment to change. To be closer to home, I joined employment with several different landscape companies. I’ve since settled into a school bus driving position and perform consulting on forest and ornamental stock on the side. I still work part time for a landscape firm as a senior crew leader with a focus on training summer recruits.

My hobbies include participating in sport activities, aiding 4-H activities, supporting The American Chestnut Foundation, being a chair on the Greene Dreher Alumni Association’s scholarship committee, being a volunteer firefighter with Greene-Dreher Volunteer Fire Association, and teaching boy & girl scouts environmental education classes. And like many of you, I am pulled to assist many more activities than time to list.

Where do I see the IWCS? Great question; I see crossroads, and not just one set of them but several sets. We need to reintroduce our organization to youth and educational facilities across our area as well as the areas of our whole organization. As a trustee, I will not be able to actively participate in as many ways as I would like because I put priorities as God first, family second and work, in that order. What will I do? I will try to be available to our local regional members and represent them to the best of my abilities as well as get in touch with others in our organization. I expect our regional members to step up and assist me assisting them by providing information about activities throughout our vast area that could benefit our members. I hope to be able to send out mass e-mails and letters if need be to inform our members of these events. I hope to be able to staff an information booth at some of these events to bolster membership. I would love to meet up with others at some of these events to simply share in the experience.

Good day, Mark...

Mark Peet #9804L - Elected IWCS US North East Trustee, Oct. 2015-2018

Guess What!

In the year of 2017, the IWCS is having its 70th Anniversary. What would be a better way to celebrate than to attend the Annual meeting in Shipshewana, Indiana, USA?

Roger and Lynn Pletcher #8016 from Elkhart, Indiana will be hosting the meeting. The date is planned for September 5 through 8, 2017. Registration will be on Tuesday and the celebration will be through Friday.The location is the Farmstead Inn in Shipshewana. Lodging is at the Inn. (Tell the desk you are an IWCS member for a discount on the rooms.) There is a nearby campground for those traveling with campers.

Roger and Lynn are excited about planning different wood and craft classes and unique tours.

There will be more details as times moves closer to the event. Be sure and mark it on your calendar.

If you have pictures or things from past meetings please bring them along.16 World of Wood May/June 2016

May/June 2016 World of Wood 17

Let me relate this little story that began a long time ago. Once upon a time back in the early 1990s, a man was hired to saw logs at the US Southeast Regional Meeting. He came prepared to ‘Saw Logs’. He arrived at the site, set up his mill and was ready to start. “Where are the logs?“ To his amazement, the pile of short, twisted and small diameter items, “logs” that most people would use as firewood, was what we wanted sawed. He then knew we were ‘Wood Nuts’.

Many hours of sawing and only minimal board feet were cut. This person was used to cutting thousands of board footage per day. After two days of sawing, maybe 500 board feet were cut. I would have loved to hear what he told his wife when he got home each evening. But he knew we were very special people. That is how it all began. (I think he felt so bad about the amount of wood he cut, compared to what he was prepared to cut, that he did not accept payment; instead fell in Love with this amazing group of people.)

So after that meeting, he and his wife joined the IWCS. Each year he sawed and never accepted any form of payment. Then as each year passed, they both became more and more involved attending more and more meetings and hauling more and more real logs. Many a thousands of miles they both drove hauling and gathering logs and lumber. All you had to do was make a phone call and say what we needed; before you even finished the sentence you heard “No problem, we will do it”. Then at a meeting, the chairman asked if anyone would host it for next year. With no hesitation they volunteered to chair the next meeting, which turned out to be 4 or 5 and also chairing an annual meeting. One of the meetings still holds the record for most funds raised at a meeting, about US $17,500.

Then the dear lord said it was time for him to come home. We were all heartbroken because we all fell deeply in love with these two members. It was very hard the first year. You would go in your shop and see wood they gathered, but then you would start

thinking of the enjoyment on their faces when you acquired the wood either as a gift or from an auction at a meeting. The organization was devastated at the loss of a great member and thinking we lost both of them. We were so very wrong for not really knowing her love of this organization and members.

Still needing someone to chair meetings she was still very willing to chair them; turned out to be 2 or 3 more. Then the organization needed a President Elect and she stepped up to accept the position; knowing she would be president in two years did not stop her. Then after about three months, the President wished to step down due to health reasons. “Surprise! You are the first female president.” Despite being president she still continues to chair or co-chair meetings, even the Southeast Regional for 2017.

It was my great honor to award Elaine and Manley Hunt the Honorary Life Membership award on February 13, 2016.

Newest Honorary Life Members by Garry Roux #6466HL

Regis-treeNew members of the International Wood Collectors Society

18 World of Wood May/June 2016

...continued from page 8.Each scanned section was ‘microsurgically’ repaired on the image through a digital process, pixel by pixel and precisely restored to the likeness of its original condition by devoting countless hours of extreme patience. No traces of the minute hairline cracks were evident.

I produced ‘abstract’ grain compositions from its unique ”hook-like” patterns.

With such a striking timber at risk of being reduced to little more than a pile of shattered crumbs and with years in the making, ruining or losing one of nature’s

creations was not an option for me.*Special thanks to the late Jim King for his contributions to researching and sponsoring the eventual identification of this beautiful species.

(The Editor’s Note: Jim was an entrepreneur dealing in fancy wood for crafts. He had a vision to valorize local wood in order reduce the need for deforestation for charcoal by finding local and foreign markets for select species at higher prices and return a higher revenue for the local landowners for the wood. He

started a private herbarium and created for each properly identified species a complete pressed botanical voucher mounted on and framed with its own wood. He invited Peruvian and foreign experts to identify trees, to assess the impact of logging by low impact means on the forest soil, sent specimens for identification abroad, and also commissioned collection of wood technological data. His company exported this wood to the US for a while. He passed away in 2012 and this unique, citizen-initiated timber identification project faces an uncertain future.

Timber grain composition, created from endgrain of pink flame wood (showing

sections of insect holes)

Sunrise along the Rio Amazonas (Peru) photographed from the back of a fast boat

Book Review: New Lens View Atlas by IWCS Member #9554 by Nelis Mourik # 7460LIWCS members Willem van de Groepand and his son Jochem are authors of the new books the titles of which translate to “Loupe Photos – Arranged by Genus” and “Loupe Photos – Arranged by Family”. The images speak for themselves in all languages. A total of 491 full color lens view images of commercial hardwood timbers and some other woods from ornamental trees and shrubs have been compiled as an aid to wood identification at the hand lens level. The two books contain the same images in different arrangements: in one book alphabetically by genus name (Loepfoto’s – indeling naar Geslacht”) and in the other book grouped into families within which the species are ordered alphabetically by genus name (Loepfoto’s – indeling naar Familie). This way, the interested wood enthusiast can chose the book that matches the order of specimens in one’s own wood specimen collection. The introduction is in Dutch and trade names in Dutch are also included. Nomenclature and other information are from The Plant List (www.theplantlist.org). In a few cases the Germ-plasm Resources Information Network (GRIN) (www.ars-grin.gov) was also consulted. Linear magnification of all lens view pictures is 12X.The caption gives the family, species, many com-mon trade names, source of information (The Plant List or GRIN) and status of name record. These books were authored, edited, and published by the authors. These 55-page hardcover books are profes-sionally bound (glued) and the size is 28.6 cm x 21.5 cm ( 11 ¼” x 8.5”). Price is € 37.50 for one book, or € 70.00 for the set, postage not included. For more information visit www.lensviewatlas.com or send an e-mail to wimgroep@xs4all.nl.

May/June 2016 World of Wood 19

DNA is a mysterious and amazing molecule. Encoding all of the instructions that create and run an organism, the simple code of two pairs of nucleotides holds the secrets of biology and life. From the basic cellular functions to the social behavior of primates and ants, all of the necessary information is contained in a DNA sequence. DNA is also a very rugged molecule, the double helix structure being quite stable and robust. It persists in tissues long after the organism dies and can be detected by modern DNA analytical techniques. A growing number of examples exist of DNA being extracted for very old animal and human remains, dating back hundreds of thousands of years, and being successfully sequenced and analysed. In regards to human evolution, evidence for hybridization between modern humans and Neanderthals has been produced from DNA sequences of 200,000 years old bone (1).Much of wood and all of the heartwood is dead tissue. Unlike most tissues in living organisms, the conducting elements of the xylem only begin to function after the cells die. These dead cells are interwoven with living cells of the radial and axial parenchyma and live fiber. Even heartwood, which is all dead, contains partially degraded cellular DNA. This DNA, like other ‘fossil’ evidence, can be used to identify the wood. Palaeogenetic analyses have been successfully performed on waterlogged archaeological oak wood from the English Tudor flagship Mary Rose, preserved in a marine environment for more than four centuries (2). The very long strands of DNA (measured in megabases, 1 megabase =1,000,000 base pairs) that form a chromosome become fragmented during the cell’s death, leaving DNA in short pieces. Fortunately, the stretches of DNA sequence used for identification are themselves quite short. These identifying pieces of DNA, called genetic markers, represent a known sequence of base pairs, are often less than 1000 base pairs long, and come from a known position in the genome. The most informative markers provide

a unique DNA sequence for each species or geographic location so that the identity is unambiguous but unfortunately, this is often not true. Therefore, multiple ‘genetic markers’ can be used to construct a ‘fingerprint‘ profile for identification. However, many factors such as drying, chemical compositions, high temperature, and long-time storage affect DNA quality and quantity remaining in the wood.

But your genetic markers are only as good as your database. The Icelandic medical data set has been a big boon for medical genomics in humans. Large databases are being created for our crops and domesticated animals so that we can better understand their functioning, in the hopes that we can improve them. Unfortunately, very little exists for the vast majority of tree species, as their genomes (the complete set of genes or genetic material present in a cell or organism) have not been the focus of many efforts. The stunning breakthroughs over the past decade in next-generation DNA sequencing technologies have changed the game fundamentally. The capacity, accuracy, and cost of sequencing entire genomes are improving at a rapid pace and it is now feasible for a small collaboration of scientists to completely sequence and analyze a genome, without any prior research or data existing for that genome.

These technologies create the opportunity for pursuing a completely new avenue for verifying the legality of wood, particularly as it is traded over international boundaries. The world’s forests are being challenged by many trends in the global market economy. Generally, wood is undervalued and many countries do not adequately capture the full revenue for their forests and its products. Strong enforcement tools for legal harvests could improve this revenue capture and lead to better management

of the forests.

DNA for Wood Identification

Over the past several decades, the importance of legality in the international timber trade has become increasingly obvious to both consumer and producer countries. The dynamic between consumer and producer countries is complicated because most of the producing countries are developing tropical countries, often with weak governance and rapidly expanding infrastructure, while the consuming countries are developed and considerably wealthier on a per capita basis. Most of the pressure

for sustainable forestry and certified legal timber has come from consumer countries, whose populace is concerned about environmental costs of illegal logging in biodiverse tropical rainforests, while producers have little incentive to meet these standards, given the often weak enforcement in their own country and the small dividend provided by being ‘green’. In this situation, consumer countries are now trying to more tightly regulate international trade and what products are coming into their countries. Stricter laws have been implemented to require that importers must verify that their imports were harvested legally. ...continued pn page 28.

Use of DNA for Verification of Wood Legality by Chuck Cannon1 and Chai-Shian Kua2 #10024 1. Director, Center for Tree Science, Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois 60532, USA 2. Global Tree Conservation Coordinator, Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois 60532, USA

A tropical oak (Lithocarpus platycarpus) being cut down in a forest reserve in the Belum region of northern Perak state

in Malaysia. The chainsaw operator was working in the area already and the tree had been marked to come down during the forest inventory. The author asked the logger to bring

it down with a heavy heart. The samples have been used in several scientific studies.

20 World of Wood May/June 2016

Eric Krum has recently been appointed as the IWCS Corporate Membership Coordinator. Eric was born in Huntington, NY, but has lived all over the US as his family moved around a lot due to his father’s job. Eric joined the US Army and ended up living all over the globe to include two tours in South Korea and the Middle East. Retiring in 1995 from the U.S. Army as a logistics and acquisition officer, he is currently working as a lead information technology engineer for the MITRE Corporation working for the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology in the area of cyber defense. He lives on a wooded lot in Maryland with his wife Paula and a myriad of animals. One nice thing about living in northern Maryland is the large selection of wood species as the area along the Chesapeake Bay is the northern edge of many species that grow in the south. Furthermore, it is the southern boundary of many species that grow in the northern areas of the North America. Eric joined the IWCS in 2010.Eric has had a true love of wood all his life and has been collecting wood and making saw dust for over 40 years. His wood collection, while including a couple hundred standard wood samples, is mostly in larger sizes for making saw dust. Eric’s goal is to collect samples for all the native North American woods. He really enjoys making useful items out of wood both flat and round wood objects. Eric is slowly building a collection of wood species from across the globe in the form of three (3) inch (~ 7.5 cm) diameter turned wood boxes. In 2015, Eric designed a flyer for the IWCS and asked vendors from across the wood related industries to distribute the flyer to their customers on behalf of the IWCS. The flyer is designed to introduce the society to people who order wood and other related items. His effort to contact and work with the vendors lead to his nomination as the society’s Corporate Membership Coordinator. Eric asks that if you know a local wood store who would be interested in setting up an IWCS display in their store and offer a copy of the IWCS Flyer to their customers, please drop him an email at KrumE101@comcast.net for some flyers and dispenser (see three examples above) to give to the store. It will take all of us working together as a team to get the word out about the IWCS to potential new members and to get vendors’ support.

Eric Krum #9467- Appointed IWCS Corporate Membership Coordinator, April 03, 2016

The 2016 IWCS and the Australasian Annual General Meeting Will Be Held In

Charleville Outback, South West Queensland, AustraliaThe official program will run from Monday, Sept. 12. to Saturday, Sept. 17, 2016.

This meeting will feature the inland woods of Australia.We will hold our meeting in the Raceview Complex at Charleville race track which has three excellent rooms with plenty of space to set up displays, sample swaps, auctions, etc.Our program will include inspection of a wide range of trees on Maryvale Station, Morven and Aughatella, including mulga, emu apple, bowyakka, poplar box, wilga, false sandalwood, native orange, and silver ironbark to name a few. We will also visit Tregole National Park with dense stands of ooline (Cadellia pentastylis) south of Morven. Local attractions in Charleville include Royal Flying Doctor Service Base, WWII American Air Force Base near RFDS Hanger & School of Distance Education (incorporating School of the Air) to name a few. The AGM and a craft day will all be part of the program.Our host tree will be bowyakka (Acacia microsperma), of which we will see some fine individuals around, and have both standard specimens and wood of other sizes available. Please advise us in advance as to what sizes, other than specimen size, you might require – email Col Martin cmartin@icr.com.au or Brian Davis briandavis43@bigpond.comGeneral inquiries Harry Dennis (#9260) dennispastoral@bigpond.com.Attendees wanting to do tours either prior or after the event may find these websites useful:www.ourtbackspirit.com.au/tours, www.outbackausietours.com.au, www.reef.outback.com.au,Alternatively there are numerous tour operators in Queensland offering tours of outback or barrier reef, etc. Registration form and further details are on IWCS website (www.woodcollectors.org).

May/June 2016 World of Wood 21

22 World of Wood May/June 2016

The 2016 Florida, USA, regional meeting started out with few people, other than those who showed for the business meeting, but many more arrived during the following days. Frost was forecast for the east coast of Florida but it did not affect us in Eustis at Lake Yale. In fact, it turned quite warm and protection against the sun was necessary. Much wood was on the grounds near the tent, but not much inside the tent at first. Hmm..it made us wonder, but by the time of the wood auction, there was plenty of wood inside the tent as well.

The small meeting rooms were busy

with demonstrations or open turning sessions. Duane Keck conducted a morning and an afternoon session on wood anatomy on Thursday, Feb. 11. The objective was not to teach

identification, rather it was to instruct on the wood structure. Eleven people attended. Duane recommended tools for doing this at home. He commented that a 16x 1-inch hand lens is sufficient for most purposes. He provided sets or 36 specimens total. Duane pointed out that if at all possible to identify, hold the specimen bark side up, when trying to observe and read features, especially of ring porous woods. There were multiple sets of specimens, so everybody got to work. Several printed handouts were also distributed that covered the information presented and were something tangible to take home.

Jean Sumner’s slide presentation explained how she and Lloyd, her late husband, designed and built their home, The Nautilus House, from hundreds os species of woods in an eco-friendly style.

2016 Florida Winter Woodfest Meeting Report by Mihaly Czako #5220L

Interesting new wood was brought from the Montgomery Botanical Center, Coral Gables,

Florida by Alan Curtis and Don Lown - Indian gooseberry, Phyllanthus emblica.

Another new wood from Montgomery Botanical Center - black sapote (Diospyros digyna) has a vivid golden yellow sapwood and areas of brown with darker brown or

olive stripes.

Turning demonstration by new member Lee Sky

Inside the wood auction tent

Mark Weaver Jr. has worked a lot day after day at the wood mill

Duane Keck introducing wood parenchyma types

Duane Keck ‘s students

Duane’s study specimens were numbered and bolted together in groups of five.

May/June 2016 World of Wood 23

Barbara Mills gave a presentation on the Honor Flight program and donations were collected during the session. Our donations were acknowledged and thanked – see letter on page 21.

Hints were dropped - too subtle to pick up on – throughout the meeting, in a voice a bit too loud for conversation with a person next to one. Why would

First Past President Garry Roux want to mention the possibility of having his Pink Hospital Gown brought with him? Or what would he be recruiting the other Past Presidents for? The craft auction concluded and everybody was

told to prepare for something. Then Garry reappeared, rather his Pink Fairy alter ego, and his helper Lucy Cruise had a load of things in boxes. They did not seem like the door prizes; we were done with those already. President Elaine Hunt was kindly summoned to the podium – try figuring Garry’s tone out, what with the Pink Fairy’s dis-cordant appearance and the somewhat disconcerted way of wearing it. Garry would not want the outfit to be taken for anything more than what the pow-ers it endowed him with. Elaine, elated that the program went well and her du-ties were over for now, was surprised, a little nervous, not knowing what to expect. The audience was equally lost, chuckling or nervously giggling, or just gasping. Elaborate proceedings in jest ensued with suspense mounting. Garry presented Elaine with many, a barrage, of gifts and props, complete with pink hair and a special wand, and thus transformed Elaine to Wonder Woman, and that is when it turned serious. Elaine and the late Manley Hunt were recognized at this meeting as the miracle makers, whose voluminous contributions to the success of many Florida meetings, and whose services

to IWCS in various capacities were honored and rewarded by presenting them Honorary Life Membership.

Please read Garry’s words on page 17.

The youngest member of the Weaver family, showing the bidders an interesting piece - his

hard work is greatly appreciated.

Items on the craft auction table: New Zealand tree fern, logwood (Haematoxylon campechianum)

and bottlebrush (Callistemon citrinus) burr, among others.

Exhibits in the main auditorium

IWCS members have a great collective talent - David Mather is a published author.

David Mather cutting a sabicu (Lysiloma sabicu) log (the yellow sawdust is from black

sapote that was sawed at the same spot)

Outdoor bench and moose statue chainsaw carved by Dan Collom, Rosedale, IN, are ‘test driven’ and promoted by the past presidents

present - from left to right - Art Lee, Alan Curtis, and Garry Roux, while President Elaine Hunt is

at the speaker’s podium.

A generous donation by Harry Rae to the craft auction. Take your game to a different level,

or a different plane rather; why should chess be limited by gravity? Made from maple and Siberian peashrub (Caragana arborescens).

Robert Ritchie is very good at and is happy describing the items in the craft auction.

Garry reading the long list of contributions of Elaine and Manley Hunt.

24 World of Wood May/June 2016

...continued from page 13.we collected in Texas, then returned home, where Willem spent over a week. He agreed to have a look at my remaining Indonesian woods with the plan to group like woods together. I thought this would be a rather simple task for someone with Willem’s knowledge. He made a razor cut on the end grain and examined every piece with his hand lens. Each was marked with an identification number or letter, or both; a task of about two days. He made immediate identifications of many to the genus with amazing accuracy. I felt bad (“No, you shouldn’t”. – Willem) that I put a house guest through that much trouble, but was delighted to now have this part of the task done.The next step was to get a representative piece from each group shipped to Willem’s home for a “real” identification. I agreed to send three specimens from each along with extra material to be cut/sliced/sectioned for identification. As I recall, this was 6 Flat Rate Priority Mail boxes worth. I’m told that one set went to Nelis and another to Henk Bakker whom I also met in Soest. By this time, Willem had donated his specimen collection to NEHOSOC and was now acting as the first custodian of the collection.Soon after, in 2013, Willem’s life got rather complicated as it was found that Marijke would benefit from taking a retirement sooner than later as they had planned. So they made some whirlwind plans and soon moved to Crete (Greece). Willem handed over his set of yet-unidentified wood specimens to Nelis, shortly before moving to Crete. Soon after, Nelis contacted me that he had found a new player, Raimund Aichbauer from the Netherlands, willing to continue the job, in January, 2014. Nelis notified me that Raimund was a recent retiree and a fellow member of NEHOSOC and together they would work on the identifications. Raimund would do the identification by hand lens and microscope, using NCSU’s ‘Inside Wood’ program, and Nelis would check the results. ‘Agrees’ would be OK, doubts and ‘disagrees’ would go into a discussion process until an ‘agree’ would follow. I was warned that Raimund was just retired and didn’t want to spend all of his time doing wood identifications, so be patient.

Although I’m not the most patient person and I was anxious to wrap up this project, I could certainly under-stand that a recent retiree would want to do what he wants to do, so I was prepared to wait years if need be. I didn’t record the date, but within a couple months I received an email from Raimund and Nelis with an attachment of pages of Raimund’s findings. I was ecstatic! Now it was just a matter of finding the time to take this stack of lumber and process it into standard specimens. Remember, this was crate wood full of defects, cracks, insect damage, nail holes, etc. Quite a few of these 8’ boards were so poor that they wouldn’t yield even one specimen. So the going was slow. To complicate things further, some of the boards which had been grouped by number didn’t seem to match each oth-er. I didn’t want to chance producing misidentified specimens, so I further separated them and labeled each with a letter following Willem’s assigned number and sent these to Raimund.This turned out to be a good idea as my hunch was correct and Raimund came up with different identities on

many of these, some being new to this collection. This was a good thing! By September of 2015, I was nearing the end of this project but, alas, a few more in question got sent to Raimund. I assumed he had to be growing weary of all of this but he assured me that it was a learning experience for him. By early 2016, all identifications and specimens were made and all are now labeled. Many, many are now sold or traded and in the hands of collectors worldwide. Following is this list of woods: ...continued on page 26.

Botanical Name Common Name FamilyAcacia cf. mangium akasia Mimosaceaeaff. Cathormion sp. cathormion Rubiaceaeaff. Magnolia sp. chempak Magnoliaceaeaff. Metadina sp. meraga Rubiaceaeaff. Serianthes sp. boboy / jeungjing MimosaceaeAglaia sp. ta-shua MeliaceaeAlstonia sp. pulai ApocynaceaeAnisoptera sp. mersawa DipterocarpaceaeBeilschmiedia sp. medang LauraceaeCalophyllum inophyllum mentangur / laurelwood CalophyllaceaeCalophyllum sp. bintangor CalophyllaceaeCananga odorata kananga / ylang-ylang MagnoliaceaeCanarium denticulatum canarytree / kedondong BurseraceaeCanarium sp. kedondong BurseraceaeCareya cf. arborea tummy wood LecythidaceaeCratoxylum cf. arborescens geronggang HypericaceaeCyathocalyx sp. mempisang AnnonaceaeDacrycarpus imbricatus dacryberry, common PodocarpaceaeDactylocladus stenostachys jongkong CrypteroniaceaeDillenia sp. simpoh DilleniaceaeDipterocarpus sp. keruing DipterocarpaceaeDryobalanops sp. kapur DipterocarpaceaeDuabanga moluccana benuang laki LythraceaeDurio sp. durian MalvaceaeGluta renghas rengas AnacardiaceaeGonystylus sp ramin Thymelaeaceae

Specimens staged on my 40’ (~ 12 m) long workbench ready for sanding and labeling

May/June 2016 World of Wood 25

Book Review by Mihaly Czako #5220L

Dictionary of Plants used in Cambodia = Dictionnaire des Plantes utilisées au Cambodge = Rukkhaj ̅ati proeprâs knu ̇n prades Kambuj ̅a. by Dr. Pauline Dy Phon, 2014, Phnom Penh, Cambodia: published by the author. 915 p., hardcover, 29 cm. It can be ordered from www.marymartin.com. Price is US $ 55.00 plus postage.This is the first photographic flora of Cambodia. Ms. Pauline Dy Phon, doctor of botany of Cambodian origin, devoted her entire career to the study of Cambodian flora. She died in 2010. (The bibliography of her works is available at http://aefek.free.fr/travaux/news00010ae1.html). Her dictionary systematically presents some 1254 edible, medicinal, dye, and timber species used in Cambodia. For all species, names in Latin, Khmer, English and French (when the names of these plants exist in English and French) are provided. There is a brief botanical description and the various uses are presented. The dictionary contains many color photos. Each species is illustrated either as a B&W drawing or a color photo of the live plants or the herbarium specimen. This is the only source of information on the uses of a great many woody species in the region. For example, those of Dalbergia entadoides Pierre ex Gagnep. (illustrated by color photo), a robust liana used for temporary construction. Its root is traditional medicine for fever and the young leaves are consumed as vegetable. This book is becoming rare but it is a good investment if you are interested in the flora of Cambodia.

The above mentioned website has a link (http://aefek.free.fr/travaux/iso_album/wholebook.pdf) to a free electronic English language publication entitled “Cambodian Tree Species Monographs” produced in 2004 by the Cambodian Tree Seed Project funded by the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA, http://um.dk/en/danida-en/). This set of monographs cites many of Dr. Dy Phon’s works and describes 21 species. Each monograph is entitled by the Latin name. Cambodian name, other common names, family, and Cambodian commercial grade of the timber are listed under the first subheading. This is followed by paragraphs on the habitat and distribution (illustrated with a color vegetation map), botanical description, phenology (flowering and fruiting times), fruit and seed, seed collection, sowing and germination, as well as seedling production. There is a section on uses as well as current status of conservation and IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) Red List classification. Color photos of the tree in its habitat, the fruit, seeds, and

seedlings are of good quality. A list of references is provided at the end.

Botanical Name Common Name FamilyHeritiera javanica lumbayao MalvaceaeHeritiera littoralis looking-glass tree MalvaceaeHomalium sp. malas SalicaceaeHopea cf. odorata merawan DipterocarpaceaeHymenodictyon orixense jati awang RubiaceaeIntsia sp. merbau CaesalpiniaceaeIrvingia malayana pauh huse IrvingiaceaeKingiodendron cf. alternifolia danggai CaesalpiniaceaeKoompassia malaccensis kempas CaesalpiniaceaeKoompassia cf. excelsa tualang CaesalpiniaceaeKoordersiodendron pinnatum bugis AnacardiaceaeLitsea or Persea sp. medang LauraceaeMangifera sp. mango AnacardiaceaeMelia sp. kakera MeliaceaeMichelia montana champak MagnoliaceaeNauclea aff. subdita tjangtjaratan RubiaceaeNauclea orientalis bangkal RubiaceaeNeonauclea sp. bangkal RubiaceaeNothaphoebe sp. medang LauraceaePalaquium sp. nyatoh SapotaceaeParashorea malaanonan seraya, white DipterocarpaceaeParashorea sp. seraya, white DipterocarpaceaePayena leerii nyatoh SapotaceaePellacalyx sp. merbuloh RubiaceaePentaspadon sp. pelaju AnacardiaceaePlanchonella obovata menasi SapotaceaePolyalthia aff. hypoleuca metapis AnnonaceaePometia pinnata taun SapotaceaePterospermum javanicum. bajur MalvaceaePterygota cf. horsfieldii ochoro MalvaceaeSandoricum sp. santol MeliaceaeShorea aff. kunstleri balau merah/heavy dark seraya DipterocarpaceaeShorea cf. balanocarpoides meranti, white DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. seraya, heavy red DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. meranti, red DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. meranti DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. Anthoshorea section meranti, white DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. Eushorea section balau, yellow DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. Rubroshorea section meranti, light red DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. Rubroshorea section meranti, dark red DipterocarpaceaeShorea sp. Richetia sub-group meranti, yellow DipterocarpaceaeSindora sp. sapetir CaesalpinicaceaeSwintonia sp. merpauh AnacardiaceaeSyzygium cf. acuminatissimum kelat MyrtaceaeSyzygium sp. kelat MyrtaceaeTerminalia cf. bellirica ketapang / bastard myrobalan CombretaceaeTrema sp. mengkirai CannabaceaeVatica sp. resak DipterocarpaceaeWeinmannia cf. blumei riggit CunoniaceaeXylopia sp. mendjangkan Annonaceae

Yes, a sizeable listing, some produced only a few standard specimens while over 300 Dipterocarpus sp. specimens were made. By my count, 2,987 specimens were made with 578 still available. For sure, one of the best of each found a place in my personal collection. If you’re interested in any of the remaining 578, contact me for an inventory list.In hindsight, had I known how many hours would be spent by so many people, I’m not really sure I would have pursued this. I know I spent a couple hundred hours (don’t really want to know the total) and I’m sure that the hours spent by the above named assistants number into the hundreds. I’m thinking that the only payment to these assistants was wood specimens, so I’m hoping it was a labor of love for them.Somewhere in this project prior to Raimund stepping in, several unidentified specimens were sent to Mihaly Czako and one in particular piqued his interest as he noticed a camphor odor upon opening the mailing box. He never told me how many hours he spent but he would send weekly or monthly updates and I’m assuming it was many. He narrowed it down to the Dryobalanops genus, and based on the aroma, was hoping to narrow it to the species, but this was not possible because more than one species of Dryobalanops, including. D. aromatica, has camphor and the published anatomical data would not permit identification to species level.On his part of this project, Willem comments: “I was thrilled - and honored, as I am certain that Nelis and Raimund also were - by the intellectual challenge of identifying such a large range of woods. Also it’s very satisfying if you can put your knowledge to good use. Moreover, the identification work created a lot of goodwill, leading to donations, some substantial, of wood specimens to the [NEHOSOC, http://www.nehosoc.nl] Reference Collection.”“Specimen collectors please note, many times the specimen(s) key out, using the keys and illustrations of the Inside Wood database; other times the identification is doubtful. As an example might I mention the Lauraceae family, where there are

26 World of Wood May/June 2016

…continued from page 24.

May/June 2016 World of Wood 27

genera like Ocotea that present difficulties in this regard. Lauraceae species cannot be identified without (e.g.) flowers in full bloom, ripe fruits, etc., and sometimes even the genus cannot be assigned with certainty. The same certainly applies to the Dipterocarpaceae which is a major constituent of Indonesian forests. The very fact that forest loggers, who are in principle very familiar with the species they are culling, are unable to distinguish between them, but resort to assigning them to trade groups, is telling. Of course, the same difficulties reflect in e.g. reference collections - several validated specimens, reliably assigned to species, may be present, but using wood anatomy, they just cannot be reliably distinguished. It’s for a good reason that Mihaly resorted to chemistry and physics to distinguish between Dalbergia species (Fabaceae family)! Any and all identification methods of wood alone have limitations.”

Raimund comments: “Your story shows that cooperation is the key to success. It is a positive experience of people from different countries and backgrounds with a common interest who are willing to share their knowledge and spend their time at a joint hobby. Although it is time consuming, the benefit is that, as a side effect, I have learned a lot, especially about the Dipterocarpaceae family. As a result, I can now transmit this knowledge to others.”Nelis comments: “As a member of a society, it was my intention to help another member who is putting so much time and energy in supplying

wood specimens, one of the main goals of IWCS, but who gets stuck on the identification. If one has the woods, and the other has the knowledge, together we can achieve a great result. This is how IWCS works, with an emphasis on ‘international’.”

Mihaly comments: “I learned some Indonesian while translating the wood anatomy literature on Dryobalanops species and learned much about the diversity and chemistry of Dipterocarpaceae.”

My thanks to all who helped bring this project to a conclusion and to all of those who purchased specimens, which I trust covered the costs of transportation, mailing many boxes overseas, kiln drying, planing, machining, etc. All of this really only makes perfect sense to a collector.

Select Bibliography: Appanah, S. and J.M. Turnbull, A review of dipterocarps : taxonomy, ecology, and silviculture. 1998, Bogor, &Kuala Lumpur, CIFOR & FRIM (ISBN 9789798764202). Chu, F.-T.F., Anatomical Features of the Dipterocarp Timbers of Sarawak. The Gardens Bulletin, Singapore, 1974. 27: p. 95-119. Desch, H.E., Dipterocarp timbers of the Malay Peninsula. 1941, Kuala Lumpur, Malaya: Caxton Press. Liu, P., F. Chen, and J. Yang, Identification, properties and uses of some Southeast Asian woods. 1988, Yokohama & Beijing, ITTO InsideWood. 2004-onwards. Published on the Internet. http://insidewood.lib.ncsu.edu/search Ogata, Ken; Fujii, Tomoyuki; Abe, Hisashi & Baas, Pieter, 2008.Identification of the Timbers of Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific.Kaiseisha Press. ISBN 978-4-86099-244-6 Soerianegara, I. and R.H.M.J. Lemmens, Plant resources of South-East Asia. no 5 (1) Timber trees : major commercial timbers. 1993, Wageningen; Bogor: Pudoc-DLO] ; Prosea Foundation. Soerianegara, I., R.H.M.J. Lemmens, and W.C. Wong, Plant resources of South East Asia No. 5(2) : Timber trees: minor commercial timbers. 1993, Wageningen, The Netherlands: Centre for Agricultural Pub. and Documentation. Sosef, M. and L.T. Hong, Plant resources of South-East Asia. No. 5 (3) Timber trees : lesser-known timbers. 1998, Leiden: Backhuys Publishers. Sudarna, N.S., Anatomi dan identifikasi kayu kapur (Dryobalanops) (Anatomy and identification of kapur (Dryobalanops) wood). Jurnal Penelitian Hasil Hutan / Forest Products Research Journal, 1993. 11(1): p. 21-28.

Editor’s Note:

With reference to the terminology used in the listing of species, the term “aff.” (for the Latin “species affinis”) meaning “related but not identical to the named species” is an open taxonomic category which is usually applied to a species believed to be undescribed by science or it indicates that the specimen is closely related to the named species but show features that make it obvious that it is a different species. The term “cf.” (Latin for confer = compares with) is used sometimes to indicate that the specimen is very similar to the named species, but has certain minor features not found on typical specimens. “Section” is a formal taxonomic category below the rank of genus, while “sub-group” is an informal one.

One quarter of the NEHOSOC Reference Collection, which in all occupied 190

metres (~ 625 feet) of shelf length and ran to well over 9,000 specimens, representing about 6700 species! Having the Reference Collection makes a huge contribution to identification work as it enables checking

your specimens against (you hope) reliably identified material.

Nelis’ identification samples displayed on the dining room table. On the left is the 1999

box, split in two. On the right, his portion of the 2011 Flat Rate Boxes, 2 of the 6. All

samples are clearly numbered and/or labeled. Nelis also noted that other people drink their French brandy on the living room table, not speaking of a good beer. Gary added that it

looks like his dining room table all of the time and he is told that some people eat on those

things…

Raimund’s microscopes and part of his reference book collection

...continued from page 19.In the USA, the existing Lacey Act was expanded to include all wood products and the final amendments have been fully implemented. The proof of legality is typically based on a paper trail through the chain of custody. The chain of custody of timber products is obviously a critical aspect of legality.

Once the tree is cut down and removed from the forest, following its route to the consumer through the supply chain is difficult without good records. Papers can be falsified. Something inherent to the material, such as DNA, would be the best evidence.

These demands to prove the legality has led to the development of DNA based tests. The ability to extract DNA from wood in various conditions and ages has been demonstrated for more than a decade now. Again, even though the DNA is highly degraded when it is extracted from wood, the marker sequences used for identification are typically quite short in length. The new next-gen DNA sequencing technologies actually require the DNA to be highly fragmented into small pieces prior to the process of sequencing. The massive amount of genomic data being produced for a wide array of organisms will allow us to more quickly create meaningful genetic markers for numerous purposes. One obvious way that these markers could be used would be in determining the legality of timber harvest. Because the DNA is intrinsic to the sample itself, marker systems, and thus testing tools, would be viable at almost any point in the chain of custody. There are two main objectives for DNA-based marker systems: 1) determine the taxonomic identity and 2) determine the geographic origin. The first test could be used to prohibit the import of endangered species while the second test would prohibit illegally logged timber. Much progress has been made for the first test while the second remains a very substantial challenge.

Two ObjectivesSpecies Identification

A major effort was initiated to create a barcode of life, based upon the idea that a short sequence of DNA

can contain a unique marker for each species. The Barcode of Life project is using a small number of standardized genetic markers, primarily from the cytoplasmic genomes, to create a database for all species. To date, DNA markers (the rbcL and matK regions of the chloroplast genome) from approximately 330,000 species of higher plants have been deposited in the Barcode of Life database (3). Hence, it is possible to use DNA sequences to identify a piece of wood to genus level, but pinpointing to the species level can be challenging.

These types of barcode genetic markers typically use portions of the genome found in the mitochondria (animals) and chloroplast (plants). These organelles contain their own genome, separate from the one in the cell nucleus, and they are also inherited independently from the nuclear DNA. In most flowering plants, the chloroplasts are inherited from the mother plant or ovule while those from the pollen are rejected from the zygote. This means that the chloroplast DNA is not mixed with each generation and the evolutionary history and genetic relatedness of individuals can be more easily determined. Unfortunately, as these organelles can be transmitted from

one species to another during any hybridization event, the reliability of these markers for taxonomic identification can be weak, particularly in diverse genera with lots of closely related species. Hence, these markers fail exactly when you need them the most. Because of this tendency for individuals of different species to share the same chloroplast markers, nuclear DNA markers, which are more species-specific than chloroplast DNA, can be included to the barcode. But because of the genetic mixing of nuclear DNA that occurs with each generation, the relatedness of the individuals becomes more complicated through time and requires a larger database.

Generally speaking though, the ability to identify individuals to species is possible, particularly when the species has no close relatives in the market. For example, if a species is the lone representative of a genus on the timber market, then the genetic markers for that species are easy to develop and implement. Teak is a good example, as it is the only species in the genus Tectona and it would be difficult to misidentify this wood. Often, these distinct timbers also have distinct wood anatomy, which makes the DNA based test unnecessary.

28 World of Wood May/June 2016

Typically, the logs are tracked by a simple paper system. The trees in the forest are tagged by a forest inventory team from the government. Each tag has several identical pieces. Each piece is attached to a log and one is left with the stump. In the log yard, these tags are noted as they leave

the log yard. You can imagine this is a very easy system to cheat!

May/June 2016 World of Wood 29

Again, DNA markers are most likely to fail when you need them the most.

For most tropical timbers, things are not so straightforward and a long list of closely-related species may be on the market at the same time, coming from the same region. So, if one of the species is highly endangered and should be restricted on the market, then the genetic marker system needs to be carefully verified to insure that markers are unique for the rare species. In these situations, the generic barcode approach using a universal marker is unlikely to be sufficient but a specific set of markers for the protected species will need to be developed.

Determining Geographic Origin

Another objective of DNA fingerprinting is to determine the geographic origin of wood or wood products. This approach is based on the idea that the individuals of a tree species in one location or one population are more closely related to one another than they are to individuals of the same species in a different location or population. From large plots where every tree is mapped and identified, we know that the individuals of a species are generally clumped and basically form groves. We also know from biogeographic studies of several species, particularly in the Asian tropics, that trees from different landmasses and islands can be readily distinguished from one another based on a single genetic marker.

The degree of spatial resolution possible depends a great deal on the biology of each species. If a species has widely dispersed seeds, like a fig (Ficus spp.), no strong geographic pattern would exist in the populations as the offspring may germinate many hundreds of meters away from the mother tree. Likewise, if the pollen typically travels a considerable distance of hundreds of meters during each pollination event, the geographic pattern would be weaker. On the other hand, while hybridization and gene flow between species in a locationcan make taxonomic identification difficult, this evolutionary behavior is actually GOOD for determining geographic origin because all of the individuals in that area will tend to

converge on a single genotype (genetic marker set), particularly of the chloroplast.

Two main methods for determining the geographic origin of timber exist and they differ widely in their approach and power. The first and most simple is a point-to-point system where DNA samples are obtained either prior to felling or immediately after felling. A database of genetic markers, different than the universal DNA barcode and specific to the felled logs, is generated using standard procedures.

The markers in this database can then be used to verify the identity of the logs anywhere along the chain of custody. This method requires the cooperation of the logging company and can only be used to reward a responsible producer and prevent the switching or laundering of logs along the supply chain. However, this approach is labor intensive and could face logistical and even legal challenges, given the likely proprietary nature of the database and the lack of knowledge about the genetic variation in unsampled timber beyond the single logging concession.

Without adequate testing, it is impossible to know if the markers are actually unique to the controlled logs or the markers were simply missed in other populations. Double-Helix Tracking (http://www.doublehelixtracking.com/ ) is a company in Singapore that has been using point-to-point technologies for several years now, primarily on merbau (Intsia), and has enjoyed some success.

The other method is considerably more difficult but would be much more powerful. This approach requires accumulating a sufficiently large and comprehensive database for all populations of a protected species and its close relatives and associating the genetic variation with the geographic distribution to identify a DNA fingerprint for each location. This type of database would provide a more effective tool over the market as it does not require the cooperation of the producers and would provide legally robust markers, given sufficient sampling both taxonomically and geographically. On the other hand, the creation of an adequate database

is considerably more challenging and will require a great deal more resources. In 2011, Bioversity International (Rome) (http://www.bioversityinternational.org/), in collaboration with the German government, created a network for the purpose of creating a comprehensive geo-based database of genetic markers.

Database is Body and Soul

All of these DNA marker systems gain their power and validity from the core database, which holds all of the unique sequences related to taxonomic identity and geographic origin. In human criminal cases, the probability that two people share an identical DNA fingerprint is based upon the detailed understanding of the frequency of these markers in human populations. The database, which associates each individual genetic fingerprint with each individual person, provides the meaning to these markers. Additionally, the database has to meet legal standards, not just peer-reviewed publication standards. The evidence must be reliable and transparent, therefore it should be carefully maintained and protected, but it also should be as publically available as possible.

Unfortunately, we are a long way from obtaining a database sufficiently large and accurate to reliably determine the geographic location of a piece of timber. We must also recognize that the biology of each species will greatly determine the actual resolving power of the database. This technology will not be useful for all species but could be very effective for some. The advance of next-gen DNA sequencing technologies can certainly change this situation quickly, particularly if a short list of good candidate species, of both conservation concern and possessing an appropriate biology, were the original target. While the database is THE vital aspect of the application of DNA-based technologies to the international timber trade, it is unclear who is going to pay for its creation. The most logical way forward is focusing the point-to-point approach onto particularly vulnerable species, utilizing as much technology as possible. The market is also fairly volatile as the market cycle for each particular valuable hardwood can be

30 World of Wood May/June 2016

relatively short. If the development time for a marker system requires years, then the tool might only become effective after the bulk of the endangered species has been harvested.

Chain o’ Custody

Even if the perfect DNA-based marker system that could determine both taxonomic identity and geographic origin were created, several challenges to its successful implementation would still exist. The most basic questions relate to simply who would maintain and verify the necessary database. Clearly, a third independent body needs to hold and regulate this data. This type of system already exists for certification schemes of sustainable logging practices in the field. Given a regulatory body to maintain the database, who could then use the technology? Is it only valid at the border, applied by government custom agents or is it consumers, after the purchase of the final product, who determine wood legality? Another issue is the increasing size and demand in the domestic market of producing countries, which are rapidly developing their own infrastructure and economies. All of the wood on the international market could be perfectly legal but the illegal logs then are absorbed by the domestic market, which will be much harder to regulate.Ultimately, for this DNA marker system to be sustainable, it must clearly and fairly reward good behavior over bad behavior. Good producers must gain a clear premium over illegal loggers. Additionally, a sufficient portion of the reward must go back to the local level to support forest protection and monitoring. If forest managers cannot be sure that

their forests are protected, they have little incentive to manage the forest sustainably. Illegal logging cannot only be punished at the international border, as the punishment does not actually reach the people conducting the illegal logging. Illegal logging must also be punished at the local level.

To maximise the usefulness of the database and bring as many contributors and benefactors as possible to a mutual goal, the DNA marker system should not just be used and designed for enforcement and punishment. If linked to important phenotypic characters, like wood quality or regeneration capacity, the genetic markers could also be used to improve wild timber species and potentially make them profitable in a plantation model, as this type of intensive agroforestry can be more easily regulated and can relieve pressure from wild populations.

The potential for genetic improvement is probably sufficient for the generation of a large database. This production database could then be adapted for enforcement applications.

Finally, the best test for timber legality on the international market will be a combination of technologies, utilizing the strengths of each approach. The composition of stable isotopes in a wood sample can reveal on what type of soil and where in the world it grew. A promising new technology is gas chromatography coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry (4) used recently to detect differences in agarwood (Aquilaria spp.). Apparently, this technology can also distinguish among rosewoods, which can be a great challenge based upon

other techniques.

Last but not least, improvements in the ability to use simple wood anatomy need to be explored, like an automated system for wood identification using standard wood sampling protocols. Like the genetic marker systems, the ability of wood anatomy to distinguish among species is reliant upon the creation of an adequate database of knowledge. Large central databases exist and continued training of wood anatomists is necessary.

References1. S. Sankararaman et al., (2014): The genomic landscape of Neanderthal ancestry in present-day humans. Nature 507, 354–357. doi:10.1038/nature12961 pmid:24476815

2. A. Speirs et al., (2009): Chloroplast DNA from 16th century waterlogged oak in a marine environment: initial steps in sourcing the Mary Rose timbers. In: Archaeological Science Under a Microscope: Studies in Residue and DNA Analysis in Honour of Tom Loy (Eds. Haslam, Robertson, Crowther, Kirkwood and Nugent). Chapter 13 pp 165–179. Terra Australis

3. http://www.boldsystems.org/

4. Espinoza, Edgard O., Cady A. Lancaster, Natasha M. Kreitals, Masataka Hata, Robert B. Cody, and Robert A. Blanchette. 2014. “Distinguishing Wild from Cultivated Agarwood (Aquilaria spp.) Using Direct Analysis in Real Time and Time of-Flight Mass Spectrometry.” Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry: RCM 28 (3). Wiley Online Library: 281–289.

WOOD MEETFebruary 8 – 12, 2017

Southeast Regional Winter WoodfestLake Yale Baptist Conference Center –

Eustis, Florida USAFebruary may seem like a long way off but it will be here before you know it. Counting this issue (May/June) of WoW, we only have 4 issues left before the meeting. Again, Patti Dickherber is in charge of the registration and Elaine Hunt will be putting the program together. There is already a carving class, a craft class and the hands-on open turning on the schedule. If you have any

ideas or would like to give a class or demonstration please contact Elaine.The Craft Auction will again be on Friday evening and we ask that donations be handmade items, woodworking tools, WoW collections and exceptional or rare wood. The Wood Auction will be on Saturday. If you have any wood you would like to donate, please bring it along when you come. The sawmill will be running each day and wood can be bought directly off the mill or you can take your chances at the auction. Anyone buying wood must register and have a bid number. We will be bringing back and old

favorite. The Recycled Wood Contest. If you have some wood that was one thing and you can make it into something new, bring it with you. The entries will be judged by the attendees and a prize will be awarded on Saturday evening.We are already looking forward to the meeting and seeing old friends and making new ones. Come join us, there is enough fun for all.Program: Elaine Huntmanleyelaine@aol.com, 352-726-1717Registration: Patti Dickherberpdickherber@yahoo.com, 317-740-6593

May/June 2016 World of Wood 31

Member’s Listings and RequestsMembers with wood specimens and books for saleI am interested in doing some swaps. I have 2,200 specimens 60 x 6 x 90 mm of all sorts of imported and home-grown woody plants.Lionel Daniels #6509

600-plus different kinds of wood specimens precisely crafted and labeled, most identified from trees in the forest. I have woods from the USA, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, Australia, and others. Contact me for a list. Alan B. Curtis #1132HL

I provide wood specimens from around the globe, accurately dimensioned, nicely sanded and labeled. I maintain a mailing list and send notification when new specimens become available. Contact me for a list. Gary Green #6654L

www.woodsbygwgreen.comI have a good range of more than 400 species of Australian rainforest and outback woods in specimen size or as egg blanks. I will also cut to your requirementsColin Martin #7189

I will sell the following booksUseful Woods of the World $10 + postage of $4.25, More Useful Woods of the World $10 + postage of $4.25, A Man of the Woods (Richard Crow biography) $10 + postage of $3.90. All three books are a total of $30 plus postage of $7.00. Dennis Wilson #2324L

Back Issues of World of Wood I can buy, sell and trade back issues of the magazine. Get the missing issues you need at $2 each, and less by the year or by the decade. Half of all proceeds go to the IWCS endowment fund. Issues available from 1948 on, free shipping in the USA.Richard Kuehndorf #8593sales@rarewoodsandveneers.com

Over 1,000 different wood specimens from around the world. Over one-third are specially figured like blistered, curly, fiddle back,quilted, birds eye, mottled, burled and over 200 species from Vietnam. Réjean Drouin #3589

I have logs, planks & whatnot. Must sell off. Some are pretty rare: leadwood, S. African red ivory logs and planks, snakewood logs, one ebony log from Belgian Congo, etc. Will send list. Link to wood collection for sale is: https://picasaweb.google.com/102643740416360449393Dennis Brett #257SU

I have over 1,000 different specimens of wood from around the world for sale or trade. I have some larger pieces of woods for collections of crafts from different wood species. Please send me your list for trade. Contact me for my latest list.Dennis Wilson #2324L

Attn. jewelry makers! I have boxes of scraps for those who make and sell wooden jewelry. I will pay postage. Once you have received the wood, ask me for the cost of postage. Look it over. Whatever you think the scraps are worth, send a check for that amount to IWCS Secretary-Treasurer and may include the cost of postage. Let IWCS have the benefit of a couple bucks contribution. Dennis Brett #257SU

African Wood Specimens: Contact me for list of African species available. All woods from environmentally approved sources.Barry James #9380

I have two or more specimens of more than 700 to 800 different woods from around the world in my stock. I would like to exchange or sell. They are standard or other sizes. Contact me for my list.Dieter Becker #6362

WANTED: I am new to collecting and have about 150 samples at 25 X 25-50 X 300 mm size. Due to my display, the thickness must be at least 25 mm and length 300 mm. I am very interested in expanding my collection. I still need many common species as well as exotics. Please send a list of what you have available with prices. Thank you!Bob Gilbert #10018

A total of 491 full color lens view pictures of commercial hardwood timbers and some other woods from ornamental trees and shrubs have been compiled as an aid to wood identification. Published by the author. € 37.50, excl. shipping.Willem van de Groep #9554www.lensviewatlas.com

International Wood Collectors Society2300 West Rangeline RoadGreencastle, IN 46135

NON-PROFIT ORGU.S. Postage

PAIDIndpls, IN 462Permit No. 8

WOW! Running out of ‘space’ collecting remote exotic timbers. Collecting Jupiter, moon and other terrestrial bodies from our solar system - colourful timber species collected from around the world. Image components photographed from the far reaches of our world including, Antarctica, Namibia, Svalbard, Amazonian Peru, and Norway - story by Vince Manna on

page 4.