wood name
BOTANICAL NAME: Juglans Nigra of the family Juglandaceae
Although numerous and widely distributed during past geological periods, members of the walnut family (Juglandacae) now comprise only about 20 species. These are found in the forests of North, Central, and South America, the West Indies, Southern Europe, and southern and eastern Asia. Six species of Juglans are native to the United States, but only two of them, black walnut (Juglans nigra) and white walnut or butternut (Juglans cinerea), are important as producers of lumber.
The walnut/butternut group (Juglans spp.) contains 15 species which grow in South America, Eurasia, and North America. The word juglans is the classic Latin name of walnut, meaning nut of Jupiter. North American species of Juglans are:
Juglans californica --- California black walnut, California walnut, claro walnut, Southern California walnut
Juglans cinereaa --- butternut, white walnut
Juglans hindsii --- California black walnut, hinds black walnut, Northern California walnut
Juglans major --- Arizona black walnut, Arizona walnut, little walnut, Mexican walnut, western walnut, nogal
Juglans microcarpa --- Arizona walnut, dwarf walnut, little walnut, Mexican walnut, river walnut, Texas black walnut, Texas walnut, western walnut
Juglans nigraa --- see below for common names
Juglans ruprestis --- Texas black walnut
Juglans is a contraction of Jovis glans, a Latin name designating the nut or acorn of Jupiter. Mythology describes a golden age when acorns were the food of humans and the gods lived on walnuts; hence the name of Juglens, Jovis glans, or Jupiter came about. Nigra (black) may refer to the black bark, the rich brown wood, or the dark outer shell of the nut.
COMMON NAMES: American black walnut, American walnut, black hickory nut, black walnut, burbank walnut, Canadian walnut, eastern black walnut, eastern walnut, gun wood, nogal, nuez meca, toctek, virginia walnut, and canaletto
TYPE: hardwood
COLOR: Heartwood variegated gray brown to dark chocolate brown, someimes with a purplish cast, often with dark streaks, sapwood nearly white.
Walnut is unusual in that the coloring agent in the heartwood is extremely water soluable; if you leave untreated walnut out in the rain or soak it in water, the color will wash out to a light grey. Heartwood is the wood one talks about when describing the color of walnut. Sapwood ranges from unattractive grey to really ugly grey-white. Commercial walnut is normally boiled; this process leaches the color from the heartwood to the boiling water and hence back into the sapwood, which produces a uniformly colored plank even though it contains sapwood.
The resulting color is more uniform than, but less attractive than, untreated heartwood; it will be more greyish than the untreated dark brown heartwood. Walnut so treated is called "steamed", and unless specifically stated to the contrary, one should always assume that walnut has been steamed. Millwrights use this process because it allows them to sell sapwood at heartwood prices, but it's not as much a ripoff as it might sound because (1) it is so commonly done that comparison pricing for walnut is based on "steamed" wood and (2) any finishing agent will make even "steamed" walnut look terrific. The "steaming" process leaves a water solution which looks a lot like a diluted form of a commercial walnut stain. For the most attractive possible results based on the raw wood, one should specify "unsteamed black walnut heartwood", even though it's hard to find and will cost even more than "normal" walnut. Small local millwrights normally do NOT steam the wood.
The wood develops a rich patina that grows slightly more lustrous with age.
GRAIN / TEXTURE / FILLER / FINISH / LUSTER: The wood is generally straight-grained, but sometimes with wavy or curly grain that produces an attractive and decorative figure. Texture is uniform and slightly coarse. It takes all finishing agents quite well and is readily polished to a high sheen. Burls, crotches, and stumpwood all produce various attractive figures, and black walnut is sometimes available in wavy, curly, or mottled figures. If quartersawn, the wood frequently shows alternating stripes if light and dark color due to uneven pigmentation.
PROPERTIES / WORKABILITY: The timber is moderately heavy, hard, tough, stiff, and strong (very strong for its weight) and is easily worked with both machine and hand tools. It excels at all forms of machining including turning, molding, routing, shaping, and drilling. It carves well and sands easily. It has a fairly high shock resistance, is strong in bending, and very strong in endwise compression. Nails, glues, and screws well with good holding power for both nails and screws. Walnut may be sliced or rotary cut and is used extensively for veneer.
All in all, walnut is a marvelous wood to work with and an attractive wood to use for furniture. That plus the ready availability and a price that is high compared to cheaper domestics but low comparted to many exotics, make it a favored wood of cabinet makers.
DURABILITY: moderately to very resistant to heartwood decay; one of the most durable woods, even under conditions favorable to decay. Relatively resistant to fungus and insect attacks.
STABILITY: good dimensional stability. Generally, it is slightly less stable than genuine mahogany but more stable than oak or maple.
BENDING: good steam-bending classification.
ODOR / TASTE: Although the wood is tasteless, it does carry a mildly characteristic odor when worked.
SOURCES: Grows widely in United States and Canada but it is not as plentiful as many domestics, firstly because its growth is scattered, and secondly. because demands for the timber have greatly diminished or even exhausted the supply in many areas.
USES: Black Walnut is a prized species for decorative veneer panels, doors, furniture and cabinetry, with a warm, rich, high-quality appearance, and a wide variety of grain patterns and figuring. Walnut also has superior physical properties, making it a preferred wood for airplane propellors and gun stocks. Other uses include just about everything that one can reasonably expect wood to be used for. Here's a partial list: architectural millwork, boat building, cabinets, carving, carvings, caskets, chisel blocks, clockcases, decorative panels, decorative planking, decorative veneer, fine furniture, fixtures, flooring, framing, furniture, handles, hull timbering, instruments., interior joinery, interior paneling, millwork, moldings, musical instruments, novelties, paneling, stencils, trim, turnery, veneer panels, veneer, wainscoting, woodenware
TREE: Average tree height of 100 to 150 feet and a diameter of over 4 ft with 6 feet fairly common. Clear stems may go to 50 or 60 feet. Black walnut matures in about 150 years, but it may live 250 years.
WEIGHT: 35 to 45 lbs/cubic foot
DRYING: Dries rather slowly and care is needed to avoid kiln degrade; there is some tendency to honeycombing.
AVAILABILITY: Readily available with regional limitations that require shiping to some areas.
COST: It is one of the most expensive common woods (generally almost double the price of hard maple and about 50% more than genuine mahogany).
TOXICITY: none reported
Hobbit Note: I've seen a statement or two to the effect that walnut produces a wider variety of grain patterns than any other domestic wood, but I'm not sure that can be verified and I'm sure there are fans of other domestic woods that might disagree. Still, it DOES come is an amazing variety of figures, ESPECIALLY if you include crotches, burls and stumpwood, all of which are more readily available than for many species.
web quotes:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The color and grain variations in this popular wood are fascinating and endless. May be almost uniform in grain and color [especially "steamed" planks] or show striking grain patterns. I've seen walnut planks which almost rival zebrawood in contrasting light/dark stipes, and I've seen others (especially "steamed") which are almost as uniform as basswood and light gray in color.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The tree's most common name may be drawn from the dark brown to black pigment that permeates the ripened husks of the fruits that Native Americans and pioneers used as a stain or dye.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Black walnut is considered the "king of the forest". The wood, nuts, and price make this tree most valuable for utilization. A valuable and highly prized timber tree, the black walnut was
being exported to England from Virginia by Colonists as early as 1610.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Early settlers used walnut heavily for solid walnut furniture. Cradles were almost exclusively made of walnut in the nation's earliest eras. For gunstock, black walnut was unsurpassed, since no other wood has less jar on recoil.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Walnut furniture produced in earlier times often has a somber, heavy look in part because the wood of old growth trees is often darker.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
During the mid-1800s, walnut was favored for making waterwheels, due to its resistance to decay, as well as for charcoal for gunpowder, and railroad ties, which were made from the trunks. Oil extracted from the nuts was used in hair oil and as butter. The green shucks from the nut release a pigment used in brown hair dyes, and in pioneer times walnut was used in dying cloth and hair. The dark bark, in additional to the husks of the nuts, is used to make a yellow dye.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The species' compound leaves are one or two feet long with 15 to 23 lance-shaped, sharply-toothed leaflets attached to a slightly hairy stem. The light green, rounded fruits are 1.5-in. to 3-in. in diameter and consist of a thick, pulpy hull surrounding a single nut. The hard, deeply grooved
shell protects a kernel of unusually good flavor. The nuts grow in groups of two to three and drop in the fall of the year.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The nuts mature in a single season, during September and October, and frequently remain on the trees a week or two after the leaves have fallen. Black walnut grows readily from seed and saplings are easily transplanted for two or three years. During the winter months, walnut trees may be distinguished by their sturdy crowns, dark deeply grooved bark, stout twigs and the large gray, downy, terminal buds. The black walnut and butternut are the only two species that have chambered pith, which can be seen by cutting a cross section of the twigs.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Tent and walnut caterpillars sometimes disfigure but rarely kill the trees. Leaves are subject to leaf spot diseases that are unsightly, but not particularly harmful.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
As the supply of black walnut timber has been depleted, large plantations have been developed in Oregon and California.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The roots of the walnut tree release a toxic material which may kill other plants growing above them. From the time of ancient Greeks until well into modern European history, walnuts symbolized fertility and were strewn at weddings. Just the opposite, in Romania, brides who wished to delay childbearing placed into the bodice of their wedding dresses one walnut for each year they hoped to wait.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The nuts are much in demand for use in cakes and candies.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The walnut tree that predates all the rest is believed to originate in Central Asia. In the book, The Encyclopedia of Wood, writer Luke Hughes traces its “travels” from Asia to Italy, where it was transplanted by the early Greeks. From there the Romans took it north, dedicating the tree to the god Jupiter and calling it jovis glans or Jupiter’s nut. That name became the basis for its botanical name juglans. Hughes adds, “There was no wide dissemination of the tree or timber in Europe before the time of Charlemagne, though the Romans had certainly introduced it to England by the first century A.D.”
Hughes and others believe that the English name for the tree comes from the Old English term wahl, which means foreign. The European walnuts (Juglans regia) are named most commonly by the country of origin. Today, European walnut is most commonly found in France, Italy and Spain, but still grows in other parts of Europe.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Larry Frye, executive director of the American Walnut Manufacturers Assn., in Zionsville, Ind., said that walnut has been a popular furniture wood around the world because of, among other things, its inherent durability. Since Colonial times it has been transformed into beautiful furniture designs and is found in many heirloom and antique pieces. Walnut is popular for architectural woodworking and decorative panels and is considered to be one of the finest cabinet woods in the United States. It is one of the few woods that improves with age, finishing beautifully and developing a rich patina as the years go by — a fact that has earned it the nickname “the aristocrat of American woods.”
Another possible reason for its nickname is its statuesque appearance. Walnut is one of the largest hardwood trees found in the United States and, of the two species of walnuts, the American black walnut grows taller than its European cousin. Another difference between the two species, Frye said, is that American black walnut will darken with age, while the European walnuts may become more pale with exposure.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Herbert Edlin and Maurice Nimmo, authors of the book, The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Trees, write that the unusually grained wood known as burr walnut “fetches very high prices as veneer; these burrs are large swellings on the trunk caused by abnormal cambium growth owing to infection by fungi, bacteria or other agents. This is an interesting example of diseased wood being more valuable than healthy timber.” [NOTE: "burr" is British for burl].
Besides being a beautiful cabinetry wood, walnut is an excellent choice for carving and lathe work. It is also a common choice for gunstocks. Walnuts are indispensible trees for gunstocks,” said Hugh Johnson in The Encyclopedia of Trees. Because of the woods’ weight, elasticity and smoothness of touch, walnut handles a gun’s recoil better than any other wood.
American black walnuts contribute other “products” to the American economy. The bark of the trees and the husks from walnuts are used to manufacture yellow dyes. The walnut shells can be used in glues, plastics and for cleaning solutions. Then, of course, the trees yield a popular treat — walnuts. Both American and European species yield edible walnuts; Juglans regia was brought to this country specifically for walnut growing and is widely planted for that purpose in California and Oregon. Although the shells of the black walnut trees are thicker and harder than the English or European walnuts, some growers have developed thinner shelled varieties. Walnuts from both species are typically harvested by shaking the tree.
American black walnut has one “bad habit” according to Johnson. “It is capable of poisoning neighboring trees and shrubs, particularly
fruit trees (including its own offspring) with a substance called juglone in its roots. Apple trees near walnuts are often known to die mysteriously.
It is a sinister development in the battle for survival: happily a secret the walnut can’t impart to other trees.”
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Despite the expense, if you prefer dark cabinetry walnut is probably the most attractive wood available at a comparable price; only by going to much higher priced "exotic woods" can one find a more attractive dark wood. I've seen some really well done pieces of furniture made of pine with a well done walnut stain (not as easy as it sounds, since most pine with a walnut stain tends to look like really dirty pine) which, by themselves look quite attractive. When put up next to even a moderately well done piece made of walnut, the stained pine goes back to looking like just what it is --- stained pine.