Worst smelling wood and best smelling wood?

[RayRayYJ]

I've been milling now for a year and a bit, so I have limited experience as in the number of species I've cut, but some trees are far more enjoyable to the nose.

Just resawed some oak and man it smells awful! Milled a bunch of big leaf maple and it's not as bad as those oak boards, but smell like burnt b-hole.

Never Milled when I lived in KY, but do most hardwoods stink when you mill them?

I sure do appreciate Doug Fir and Western Red Cedar now!

What's your worst and best smelling?

[sawguy21]

I would try to find something to keep me out of dad's sight when he was cutting oak plywood on his small table saw, that stuff is vile.  ;D

[DRB]

Best=Sassafras
Worst=Cottonwood

Close second best would be Eastern Red cedar or walnut.
Close second worst most oaks stink bad when green

[sandsawmill14]

i agree with DRB   
cottonwood is the worst followed by the red oaks
ERC / sassafras is the best and hickory is a close 2nd                                    

[WDH]

I love the vanilla smell of white oak.  I love the smell of walnut (I love everything about walnut  ). 

[dustyhat]

I love white oak. red oak makes me think i stepped in crap.

[Bill Ragosta]

I've not done any milling...yet, but Black birch smells great when cut with a saw.

[Kbeitz]

I think locust wood stinks...

[Ox]

I like black cherry and sugar maple and don't like popple and black locust.

[ozarkgem]

Best ERC  worst Cotton wood and PinOak

[Magicman]

I love sawing SYP which has......well, a Pine resin smell.  I dislike sawing ERC, although I saw many tens of Mbf every year.

All lumber that I saw smells like $$$.   :D

[Greyhound]

I'm not a sawyer per se, but I love the smell of cutting cherry and walnut.  I had about 1.25 mbf of dead red oak sawn and it really smelled bad, probably bacterial (sapwood was punky rotten); however, the heartwood was solid and yielded gorgeous, mellow lumber after drying.  I absolutely love the smell of sassafras when it is cut, but it does make me sneeze violently.  Black birch is awesome smelling when cutting for firewood.  I love the "Ben-Gay" wintergreen smell.  As or maple - fresh and clean lumber should have very little smell. (?)  Tulip poplar is likewise very neutral in smell.

[sawman]

Cottonwood worst so far in my book
Cedar the best

[4x4American]

For some reason I love that pungent oak smell, kinda like salt and vinegar chips...  I like the smell of most any wood but I would have to say pine and black birch are up there.

[Chuck White]

I like the smell of Tamarack!

It's got a fragrance that resembles the old Cloverine Salve they used to sell, back when I was a kid!

[longtime lurker]

Worst: Silver quandong smells like vomit.
            Leichardt smells like, dunno it's a horrible burn the back of your throat           acrid smell.

Best: Coachwood - caramel latte with a hint of vanilla
         Qld Maple - Juicy Fruit chewing gum
          Raspberry Jam - just like the name.

[woodmills1]

regular oak is a fine, +$$$ smell for me, but some have a fungus and are stinky cheese or feet smell.  Try some black birch, it smells like birch beer and the wife says wow better than maple.  I am with ya my friend, the white pine is a nice every day smell.  If I visit somewhere after cutting pine people say I smell like wood.

[etroup10]

My favorite is definitely black birch. The worst is cucumber magnolia. that stuff smells like manure.

[POSTON WIDEHEAD]

Pickled Water Oak is the worst!

[Brucer]

For me, best is Western Larch, worst is Grand Fir.

[5quarter]

Worst:  Silver quandong smells like vomit...
           

Silver quandong sounds like vomit... ;) :D

[5quarter]

I love the smell of most woods. cherry, maple and EWP are great to saw. But growing up in WNY, my favorite is apple wood. We used to split it and burn it on a regular basis. smells like apples. even more so when you saw it green.

several nasty woods come to mind; cottonwood for sure. I'm not fond of catalpa. bacterial infected oak is nasty, but I really can't take the acidic, resinous odor of the Bur oak that grows around here. I have to wear a respirator when I saw it.

[SawmillSylvia]

I love cottonwood! It smells like swamp.

Spruce smells delicious, I can't get enough of green hemlock, and cedar is amazing until my eyes start itching. Fir is wonderful too. When I get lucky enough to work with Bubinga at the shop (obviously we don't get to mill bubinga), I smell like roses and I'm not going to whine about that. How can you choose which smells the best? The unique smells are some of the best parts of working with wood!

And I can't complain too much about diesel and saw gas mixed in either... the smell of production is too sweet.

(I spent the week ripping melamine and gluing edge banding for my day job, day dreaming about the smell of real wood... they all smell great compared to that stuff.) 

[Satamax]

Having recut a fair bit of lutherie wood.  I absolutely love European Yew. But i don't know about cuting it all day. As it realy has a strong smell. Belize cedar is nice too, but get sawdust on your tongue, and you'll regret it all day. Some rosewoods are fantastic, but i have encountered one or two which smell like but. And coccobolo smells like burnt caramel. Tho gets you rashes etc. Not a wood to cut without a propper mask.  I can't remember if it's frake, but there's an african exotic wood which smells like poo.

[Kbeitz]

Abies concolor or white fir. It smells like oranges...
It's noted for the  longest lasting Christmas tree.