mahogany or oak and its value

[rebocardo]

To make a long story short, I have a customer that needs trees cut down while it is still cold, so people will want to take the (pine) wood. Problem is he does not have much money and I can't afford to do it for free.

So, I am thinking about taking in trade some stair treads that are suppose to be mahogany, to me they look like oak.

It seems to have an open type fiber with tracks or hollows (I guess stringy ?) when sanded and viewed from the side. The treads are basically (2) 2x5 joined together.

First the side view and end view, the top view of it is the wood stained. I don't know why anyone would stain mahogany which makes me think it is a local oak species. I have never cut down a mahogany tree and there are just not that many in GA to go look at  for a comparison ;) so I am lost.

If it is mahogany I was thinking of offering $2 a BF (is that fair for used mahogany?) and using the stairs to make a table to resell.

So ... is it mahogany or something else?







Happy New Years!

[WDH]

Definitely Oak.  The rays give it away.

[Furby]

It's Oak with a Mahogany finish. ;)
Some folks don't know better and some folks only remember the finish name.

[crtreedude]

Yeah - it isn't mahogany. Mahogany is a tropical tree. The grain is way too pronounced for mahogany. And since I have mahogany, you can trust me on this.

Also, mahogany is not stringy. If it was mahogany, 2 dollars a BF would be stealing.

There are lots of trees that can be called mahogany, but only 2 are really valuable. That would be Honduran Mahogany and Cuban Mahogany. Cuban is more expensive (we are growing both).

[rebocardo]

Thank you very much guys.  8)

I was pretty sure it was some type of oak with the rays and such, but, I didn't want to discount his "stuff" out of hand and rip him off either since he was told it was mahogany when he bought them. Really, I wouldn't be able to pick that or teak out of a line up of boards unless it was compared to something easy such as pine.   :D

[metalspinner]

Mahogany is considerably softer than oak, as well.  It would not pass the fingernail dent test much less make a good stair tread.