I hate to admit it. After all, I have been a wood carver for awhile. And, bass wood has been good to me. I have carved it into a lot of smaller pieces. I wasn’t sure what the tree looked like. Where do bass wood trees grow? How big do they get? What are the leaves like? I have learned that bass wood is a gift for wood carvers. The grain is usually very consistent and free of knots and abnormality. So, I set out to get to know bass wood the tree, and here is what I have learned:
American basswood, known in scientific circles as Class: Magnoliopsida, Order: Malvales, Family: Tiliacea, Genus: Tilia
The tree is a hardwood. American basswood ranges from southwestern New Brunswick and New England west in Quebec and Ontario to the southeast corner of Manitoba: south through eastern North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas to northeastern Oklahoma; east to northern Arkansas, Tennessee, western North Carolina and north east to New Jersey.
American basswood is also known as American Linden. (Linden wood) I saw a fish carved from basswood, appropriately titled Bass Wood. I think it was one of Charlies pieces? Maybe you also have speculated on why the name basswood? The
common name used in North America is Basswood, derived from bast, the name for the inner bark. And for all of that, why the heck is a fish called Bass?
And this description from the web site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilia_americana
“It is a medium-sized to large deciduous tree reaching a height of 60 to 120 ft (exceptionally 129 ft) with a trunk diameter of 3-4 ft at maturity. The crown is domed, the branches spreading, often pendulous. The bark is gray to light brown, with narrow, well defined fissures. The roots are large, deep, and spreading. The twigs are smooth, reddish-green, becoming light gray in their second year, finally dark brown or brownish gray, marked with dark wart-like excrescences. The winter buds are stout, ovate-acute, smooth, deep red, with two bud scales visible. The leaves are simple, alternately arranged, ovate to cordate, inequalateral at the base (the side nearest the branch the largest), 10-15 cm (can grow up to 25 cm) long and broad, with a long, slender petiole, a coarsely serrated margin and an acuminate apex. They open from the bud conduplicate, pale green, downy; when full grown are dark green, smooth, shining above, paler beneath, with tufts of rusty brown hairs in the axils of the primary veins; the small stipules fall soon after leaf opening. The fall color is yellow-green to yellow. Both the twigs and leaves contain mucilaginous sap. The flowers are small, fragrant, yellowish-white, 10–14 mm diameter, arranged in drooping, cymose clusters of 6–20 with a whitish-green leaf-like bract attached for half its length at the base of the cyme; they are perfect, regular, with five sepals and petals, numerous stamens, and a five-celled superior ovary. Flowering is in early to mid summer; pollination is by bees. The fruit is a small, globose, downy, hard and dry cream-colored nutlet with a diameter of 8-10 mm.[1][3][4]”
I used to “catch” a lot of basswood at the lake while fishing. I would drag
it up from the bottom, firmly attached to my fishing lure. I “caught” a really big one once….. but it got away!!!
There are 2 groves of basswood trees at the state capital. as you go South on Lincoln towards the capital there is an entrance to a parking lot. Go in that parking lot and park, on the right is the Okla Tax Comm Bldg and a grove of Basswood trees planted in memory of the Victims of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. On the left is the Okla Ed Dept and another grove of Basswood trees to make a total of 168 trees. I think they were planted by a group from Iowa. Walt and Harriot told me about them and they would have more details about the planting. At least you now know where to see some trees.
Thank you Richard,
I will make a point to go and visit!
When quartersawn, basswood can show beautiful figuring… quilted, “fiddle back” or tiger stripped….just like what is seen in maple.
I used a piece for a box top once…. glitters and shimmers in changing light.