what wood is this?

[floatinglife]

I live in Washington DC area. I found this piece of wood log near my home but have no idea what it is. The wood seems freshly cut. It is very heavy due to large content of water. The wood looks red-brown. rings are not apparent although perceivable. The bark looks nice and clean. Different from barks of most of other trees, which is neutral gray of gray with a hue of green, the bark of this wood turns out to have a hue of reddish brown.

I tried to cut the wood using my chisel, it is pretty hard.

Anyone knows what wood is it? Thanks!

[pallin]

It would help a lot if you told us where you are, that is, what part of the world or country. If you put such information in your profile, it would appear at the top of your posting.

[floatinglife]

Oh, yes, I forgot to disclose my location. I am in Washington DC. Thanks.

[Robson Valley]

With all sorts of introduced tree species as landscape ornamentals, very difficult to say given how far south you are.
Can you cut a very thin, fine shaving, transversely, across a couple of growth rings? You might be able to see if the pores (vessels) are arranged in annual bands or whether they are spread throughout each year's annual increment of wood. That narrows it down quite a bit.

[Claude]

The bark looks like chinkapin oak. Quercus muehlenbergii Fact Sheet
http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/specialcolle...e/plate_68.jpg

Another possibility is slippery elm
Ulmus rubra Fact Sheet
http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/specialcolle...e/plate_11.jpg

Yet another is sycamore maple
Acer pseudoplatanus Fact Sheet

Claude

[Bob K.]

The middle picture looks like it might be an oak of some kind...perhaps red oak.

[Beaujangles]

I live about an hour south of DC and the roadsides are absolutely littered with red oak from Irene. Absolute tragedy that it's all just sitting on the roadside, I've run out of space for more though..

[floatinglife]

Thanks everyone for your reply. Here is a closer look to the grain. Robson, by planing a thin piece of wood I found that most of the pores locates on the lighter rings.

[Robson Valley]

A complete "growth ring" ususally begins with the widest stretch of wood looking quite uniform (the so-called spring or early-summer wood) up to and including the hard line of wood cells which are produced in the later part of summer. . . . gotta get it all done before winter.
If there is no obvious band of visible pores/vessels, the wood is said to be "diffuse porus".
If that's true, it pretty much eliminates the oaks/Quercus sp.

Wood anatomy is like a fingerprint. I don't have more than 200 species in my microscope slide collection but as I'm retired, no more microscope!