Sweet Gum trees

[TonyF]

What can I do with Sweet Gum trees? (besides burn 'em) Do they make good framing lumber? What about a rail fence? Pole barn? I understand they warp when they dry.

A local sawmill here does not have much of a market for them -- one place makes pallets out of them and and another railroad ties, but no demand at the moment.

I have about 30 trees I need to find a use/home for.

Thanks,

Tony

 

[vaskeet]

Pulp wood or fire wood are the only things I can think of Randy

 

[woodchuckie]

We have sold some which went for logs (lumber) but they were big trees. Don't know what they use the lumber for. I think it's softer than pine.

 

[Taylortractornut]

A friend of mine with a mill sells alot of it to build rafters in pole barns and as lath on them and some flooring for corn cribs and barn siding. He sells alot of it. One of our equipment shops perfers gum blocks of different sizes for cribbing as it wont split when dried out.

 

[kenmac]

I have about 30 trees I need to find a use/home for.

Tony

I have about 20 less than I had. If I can only get about 8 more cut they would be gone for good. I hate those gum trees and the balls they produce. I paid to have mine cut . None of the loggers I talked to wanted them

 

[jeffreythree]

Gum moves a lot when drying, starts out straight and can look like a pretzel when dry. If any are big and old enough to have decent heartwood, then it can have what they call red gum for furniture lumber cut from there. If you don't have a serious woodworking hobby where you can use it yourself, then there probably is not any use for them unless you can get the tie or pallet mill to buy them.

 

[TonyF]

A friend of mine with a mill sells alot of it to build rafters in pole barns and as lath on them and some flooring for corn cribs and barn siding....

That is what the sawyer at the local mill mentioned, some of the locals like to use it for furring strips and lath because nails won't pull out of it.

 

[TonyF]

I have about 20 less than I had. If I can only get about 8 more cut they would be gone for good. I hate those gum trees and the balls they produce. I paid to have mine cut . None of the loggers I talked to wanted them

We've probably taken out and burned close to 100 of them. I thought I was done then we discovered a low wet area that needs work, so the trees in it have to go. After this round I'll be down to about 8 or 10. I don't mind leaving them in the woods where the balls do no harm.

They are a sturdy tree, no doubt, heavier than pine, tough on the chainsaw, massive roots hard to dig out, while the pines next to them jump right out of the ground.

Tony

 

[TonyF]

... If you don't have a serious woodworking hobby where you can use it yourself....

My hobby right now is removing them

 

[kenmac]

We've probably taken out and burned close to 100 of them. I thought I was done then we discovered a low wet area that needs work, so the trees in it have to go. After this round I'll be down to about 8 or 10. I don't mind leaving them in the woods where the balls do no harm.

They are a sturdy tree, no doubt, heavier than pine, tough on the chainsaw, massive roots hard to dig out, while the pines next to them jump right out of the ground.

Tony

They seem to love wet areas. The ones that I've cut down and cut up seem to be full of water. After the wood sits for a while & the water runs out they tend to rot fast.. I've cut some down that were arounf 80' tall. They tend to grow very tall for some reason