Really old wood

[workinforwood]

I scored this wood off a flatbed truck the other day coming out of Arizona. Sometimes it pays to be a trucker with a CB! :biggrin:

I wouldn't know what kind of wood this originally was, but it is dated at 250,000 yrs old and looks like marble. The one piece that looks kinda spalted..that is the bark of the tree. He had a whole truckload of this stuff chained on his flatbed. When I followed him into a rest area, these where some pieces that had broke off during the ride and landed on the deck. I traded him my daily writer pen, a skull with a sword through it, for these and a few other really tiny pieces not worth photographing. That piece of bark is about 5 wide and 14 long and weighs about 6 lbs. The load is on the way to Canada where someone makes tables out of the logs by slabbing them up and polishing them out.

 

[greggas]

it almost looks petrified...is it very hard? Has it turned to mineral??

 

[workinforwood]

Oh yes, it is as petrified as it could ever be.

 

[witz1976]

wow neat...have fun turning that stuff!

 

[wood-of-1kind]

I The load is on the way to Canada where someone makes tables out of the logs by slabbing them up and polishing them out.

Tables, tables, tables? Naw, I make 'petrified' pens with the stuff. Jeff, nice score(goal?) on the 6 lbs. that I am now short.:wink::biggrin:

 

[bitshird]

Jeff, I have some that came from the petrified forest in Arizona, the stuff is Agatized, it has to be cut with a Lapidary saw and ground and with a minimum of water fed Silicon Carbide but best done with Diamond, it makes some nice cabachons for jewelry.

 

[workinforwood]

Pretty sure this is that same stuff Ken. I heard there was a guy with a huge museum full of it and the government opened their own museum which basically forced him out of business and so he is selling all his logs. It would look awesome spun into eggs or globes, but i don't have the equipment or inclination to do that, so it will just go on the shelf with all the rest of the rocks, agates and what not. It's cool stuff. Shows how mother nature is constantly destroying itself and rebuilding itself at the same time.