What is Ironwood?

[jb616]

The ironwood that resembles beech is sometime called "musclewood" as the stem looks like a body-builders' rippling muscles. Grows out back of my house in wet areas.

This is the Ironwood that I have. I made a cant hook handle out of one and it is tough as nails. I also had a guy take one to make a longbow. Never heard how it turned out. I honestly think Hickory is harder wood though. 

[SwampDonkey]

Dried to 12%, Hophornbeam has a specific gravity of 0.70, shagbark is 0.72, black locust is 0.69, live oak is 0.88, osage-orange is 0.8. I don't see anything for blue beech (musclewood), is it more of a shrub than a tree? I saw a huge service berry (well 12"  stump with suckers off it) this summer. I know that is hard wood to, but I don't have any figures. I mostly see it no bigger than 3" diameter. Who knows what species, there's many.

[Klunker]

here is a box I made from Ironwood. The ends are cherry, but there rest is Ironwood. Ostrya virginiana.
You have to find a rare larger tree to get some of the more tan colored heartwood. The sapwood is very light colored (think Sugar Maple).
not any harder to saw, plane etc than any other hardwood if your using good quality tools.
I have a bunch of boards that I sawed up for lumber of the stuff. 12" dbh  is a rare large Ironwood, its a understory tree that doesn't get very big.
Very slow growing.

[SwampDonkey]

Biggest hop-hornbeam I saw was 3 feet through. Very old, growing along an old cedar rail fence where they also dumped field stone clearing land. The old field was woods again. They don't get very tall here, maybe 60 feet. Most of the time we always used it for firewood, most was never big enough to make a board. But mom's uncle made tool handles (axe handles) and whippletrees for mom's brother.

[Al_Smith]

When you find it ironwood is usually less than 6 inchs .Oh yes indeed dry is hard as a rock .Real dry about like cutting concrete .Most I've found are windblown on the ground .I've never done but it might work well for a peavey handle in place of hickory .I've never seen any large enough to make lumber from .

[Klunker]

When you find it ironwood is usually less than 6 inchs .Oh yes indeed dry is hard as a rock .Real dry about like cutting concrete .Most I've found are windblown on the ground .I've never done but it might work well for a peavey handle in place of hickory .I've never seen any large enough to make lumber from .

I have made a bunch of lumber from Ironwood that I've cut from my small woodlot.
I guess it all depends upon how big you have to have your lumber.

I have lots of Ironwood lumber that's up to 10" wide x 3-4ft long. Plenty big enough to make boxes and smaller woodworking projects.

If all one is going to saw up has to be at least 12" wide x 8ft long there is alot of stuff that gets passed by that is useful to alot of woodworkers.

[barbender]

 I don't think I've ever seen an Ironwood (hop hornbeam) bigger than 8 or 10" dbh in northern MN.

[Ron Scott]

The same here in northern lower Michigan and they have been few at 8-10 inches.

[SwampDonkey]

They grow very slow even in the open in full sun. 4 here on the lawn have been here over 30 years, not very tall and not very fat. Great ornamental tree with those showy green hop sack in summer though. 

[Ianab]

It's worth checking out this link. It's the various trees that are called "Ironwood". 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironwood

It seems every location around the World has at least one tree that's called Ironwood, Australia probably takes the record for the most. 

[SwampDonkey]

Yes, there's probably 3 species of 'ironwood' in North America. That's why I call it a 'forestry term'. No one else uses hop-hornbeam, for what we call ironwood in the industry. But that old hard nosed English dendrologist in university insisted on 'ironwood' for O. virginiana, despite the contrary use of hop-hornbeam of local craftsmen and farmers and woodsmen. You didn't do well if you didn't follow his 'doctrine'.  Ironwood was a foreign term to me, never heard it before. What's that?    But then, look at 'poplar', that's a local term although all our mills here call it poplar or popple instead, aspen being the industry term. Locally, poplar refers to balsam poplar (balm of Gilead) up here and popple is trembling or large toothed aspen. South of here in Carolinian forest 'poplar' refers to tulip tree, some call it tulip poplar, a more hybrid term.

[g_man]

When we first came here it was a pretty much liquidated wood lot. In some areas hophornbeam ironwood acted as a pioneer species coming in first after the blackberries. Then persisted as an under story tree as they got over taken. I have only used it as firewood. A few got pretty good sized - over a foot. The gnarly log on the left is one I cut after it died - I still remember loading it several years ago.




gg

[dougtrr2]

For my forest management plan the state forester recommended removing most of the ironwood on my 8 acres.  She said it was blocking the understory.  They were all pretty small less than 4".

A friend who was a civil war re-enactor took quite a few as they would make his role playing more authentic.  Don't remember exactly how he was going to use them, but he was quite happy to take them.

Doug in SW IA

[SwampDonkey]

Ironwood (hop-hornbeam) can be a thicket in a thinned out sugar bush. Sometimes it's beech thicket instead. On our land it tended to ironwood, but at my uncle's further north it was the beech. Neighbor's have lots of beech on some hardwood lots, other lots none, like our was. I've been on a lot that was 95% beech, it was mostly dead rotten or dying to. All the hard maple was cut off, just beech left. Nothing bigger than 12". Some maple stumps where 30" across.  Most of our beech is junk, hard to make firewood from it.

[Rhodemont]

I have pockets of ho Hornbeam in my forest. They are no bigger than 10".  Forty years ago I did not not know what they were but looked like real nice straight fence posts to me.  They all rotted out in a year or two.  So since then they are fire wood other than some that I cut for my Farrier who uses it to make whippletrees and handles for axes, hammers, and other things.

[barbender]

I know one mill we cut for on their lands, wete reconsidering their approach on thinning oak stands because all that was regenerating underneath were ironwood and a few maples. I think they were leaning more towards small clearcut in oak. One method is called a "string of pearls", they are small clearcuts of 2 acres or so, connected by a skid trail. I think k that might be called a shelter wood cut elsewhere?

[JD Guy]

Question: Is "whippletree" another name for "single tree" for hitching horses ?

[Rhodemont]

The  whippletree is the spreader bar that the horse work harness traces hook onto the ends.  In the center a hook for the logging chain to attach. 

[Magicman]

Yes but a bit more:  Whippletree LINK

[olcowhand]

While I don't want to generate a lot of confusion here, or be contrary- I'll give my personal history of the term "Whippletree". I've spent every bit of 55 years around horses, including Saddle horses, Driving horses and Drafts. I've owned and driven Teams of Drafts (Belgians, Percheron, Clydes & "Grade"), including one three- horse hitch. I've owned and driven Driving horses in a single hitch, in weddings and parades.
My opinion of the definitions given online is a bit too broad. I think the proper comparison that is shown would be to the term "Singletree", which are used to transfer the force of a single horse to the "pull". In cases where there are multiple horses in the hitch, there would be a single one in use for each animal. They would transfer the force to "Eveners", "Double trees", etc. My point is there are terms for each of these components, and them being connected doesn't make them all a "Whippletree".
I will also say that my experience has been that the term "Whippletree" is more narrowly applied to rigs that are set up for a single horse hitch in a buggy, sulky or sleigh, with staves and a Whiffletree bolted to the Stave frame. These typically don't have hooks to connect a Trace chain, but some apparatus to connect the Leather Tugs usually found on light Harnesses.
I'll go out to the barn and get pics of some of these things, but after seeing how the online definitions show everything from neck yokes to sets of eveners, I wanted to add my $0.02- even if it doesn't mean that much.
I will also add that the intended use of Hop Hornbeam for any of the aforementioned uses is still viable, and I intend to use mine to these ends.
I invite more discussion from folks like Swamp Donkey or @DbltreeBelgians about these definitions. My upbringing was in a very small part of the Horse world, and I'm always eager to learn more.

[SwampDonkey]

In my experience a whippletree (we called it whiffletree up here, one in the same) was a term used with a pair of horses. A 2 horse team pulling a plow, hay wagon, log sled, manure spreader and so on. My uncle and mom's father never owned a tractor or a skidder. Dad used a horse to yard in the 70's but soon got a used skidder. You didn't have to feed it. Hop off up at the woods yard and head home. He was home free. Got rid of them cows about the same time.  Said he can't continue working around the clock.

[SwampDonkey]

Dad and a neighbor were going to cut wood one day with the horse. They had the one horse sled, put a bale of hay on it for the horse. Neighbor's wife looks out the window. She never seen nothing like it before, the men pulling the sled across the field and the horse eating the hay off the back of the sled. 

[olcowhand]

Thanks, my Horizons just expanded. You're saying this is a "Whippletree", and folks I learned from would call it "Eveners" or "Double Tree" (on my Barn Wall...):



My (too narrow, it would appear...) interpretation of Whippletree was always:



or:

I still think Hop Hornbeam would be well applied to any of these, including neck yokes. I appreciate your insights. 

[Magicman]

 @hardtailjohn 's pair of Clydesdales : 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl04wUmygA8

And:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gpzngjmTC8

[SwampDonkey]

Yes that on the wall. Of course, if you broke one of the parts, you'd say I need to fix the whiffletree. So any one of them bars would need fix'n as a part of the whiffletree. That's my understanding.

A singletree is used on a single horse for yarding wood. A wooden bar with iron fittings. The middle fitting attaches the yarding chain to the log. The ones on the ends go to the harness.