Sometimes painful growths appear on the trees, which are popularly called "witch's broom." At first glance, this benign formation in its shape resembles a human head. That is why it is generally accepted that the name of the growth comes from the ancient Slavic word "cap". It means "head" in translation.

Where can you find growths on trees

Caps are found on walnuts and oaks, on aspens, and however, the most common growth is found on birch. Cap is a bundle of thin twigs that grow from a drop-shaped neoplasm. Weigh "witch broom" can be about a ton.

stem? This is a growth that is located directly on the trunk of a tree. What is a kapokoren? This is a growth that has formed at the very root neck of the tree. Sometimes it can be seen above the earth's surface. An underground burl grows on the roots. He is found on the run. Releases their cap in early spring. These shoots are not viable and quickly wither. Sometimes burl is found on tree branches.

The beauty of amazing material

If you make a cross section of the burl, you can find its structure, in which the cores of the knots are pronounced. The drawing of such material is always very beautiful. Due to the accumulation of unblown buds, the cut is an amazingly beautiful picture of knots, curls and twisted fibers. At the same time, the pattern for each cap is strictly individual.

The burl formed on trees with a striped texture of fibers and contrasting color combinations is distinguished by its special beauty. Pine growths have such characteristics. However, they are quite rare on these trees.

You can find black dots in the texture of the kapokorn. They are located among the light stem fibers. These black dots are nothing more than non-viable shoots that release underground neoplasms.

Where is cap used?

As a material for carving, the build-up on the tree is not of particular value. Its rugged surface and striped mottled texture interfere with each other. When making crafts in this way, the relief of the carving does not look and the pattern of weaves and stains disappears.

Numerous areas of the burl have a mother-of-pearl tint. That is why given material, which has no special industrial significance, is valued very dearly. Burl products are mainly caskets and women's hairpins, cigarette cases and various small jewelry, bowls and chess and powder boxes, ink devices, and the material is also used to make knife handles.

What is cap in industry? This is a material that is used in the decoration of furniture. In this case, the growths formed on exotic trees are taken and used as veneer.

What is a cap for a master? It is a material that does not warp, crack, shrink or swell and is excellently processed. In addition, it is heavy and durable.

Where to find cap?

Growths grow on trees. Therefore, it is necessary to look for them in the forest. However, it is not so easy, because caps grow spontaneously, and only the most stubborn and big-eyed can see them. You can cut off the build-up only with a very sharply sharpened saw.
It is most realistic to find a cap at logging sites. There, these growths fall into the waste. At logging sites, there are also kapokorni, which you simply cannot find in the forest.

Preparation of material for work

Cap can be found on various types trees. However, the most beautiful and valuable in our area is the growth that has arisen on a birch.

Cap products are not obtained immediately. The material needs some pre-training. How to process birch burl? To do this, you need to use the steaming method. It is suitable for those growths that are not very large in size. The cap is cleared of debris, placed in an unnecessary pan and filled with water. Then salt must be added to the container. For a liter of water, its dosage is two tablespoons with a top. Salt can be poured and more. She will draw the juice from the tree. With this method, sawdust obtained during the processing of resinous wood species is also used. They need to be put into a bowl. The sawdust gives the burl a pleasant color that can range from yellowish-pink to brownish-buff. The resins found in the sawdust will add strength to the build-up and allow the texture to show up brighter.

After boiling water, the fire should be slightly reduced and the pan left on the stove for six to eight hours. As scale builds up, it should be removed. In the process of steaming, it is necessary to monitor the volume of water in the pan and periodically add it.

At the end of the “cooking”, the build-up is washed from sawdust under running water and placed in a closet for a day or two. After that, the whole process should be repeated at least two to four times. During the last cooking, while the tree has not cooled down, you should peel off the bark from it, and at the end put the growth in a closet for one to two weeks.

Having completely dried out, the cap in its characteristics will become similar to the bone. The material prepared in this way is excellently cut, sawn and polished. At the same time, it will not have any foreign odors.

Making caskets

Crafts made from birch burl in their beauty are not inferior to souvenirs made of wood and even surpass them. Often magnificent caskets are made from this material.

In the process of work, the burl boards are carefully connected to each other, making sure that their texture pattern is similar. A very responsible operation is the manufacture of wooden hinges. This stage requires precise formation of rounded spikes and grooves on the edges of the cover and body of the product. The hinges must fit snugly and accurately. Another difficult operation is drilling holes. In wooden hinges, this is easiest to do with thin steel wire. At the next stage, a lock crashes into the box. The product is almost ready. It should only be puttied, dried thoroughly and coated with alkaline varnish. After completion of these works, the box is treated with polish and wiped with alcohol. The product is polished until the wood acquires and all the veins of its amazing texture play brightly.

cane decoration

Using a cap, you can make a great gift for an elderly person with your own hands. The work can be done even by a novice. Hollow cylinders should be alternately put on a tube or a metal rod, which are previously machined from birch kapokorn. Details should be tightly fitted to each other, creating the impression of a single whole. A carved or smooth birch handle can crown such a cane.

Burl bowl

Various souvenirs can be made from wooden growths. Popular burl products are decorative bowls. A rough blank is made from a little raw material. Next, the blank is left to dry. If small cracks form in it, then they are lubricated with PVA glue. After the final drying, the product is given the necessary shape, it is ground, polished and varnished.

The Kyrgyz walnut is one of the most popular valuable tree species. Some of the lower parts of the walnut trunk, sometimes in the ground, are thicker than the rest of the trunk and have a very beautiful pattern, suitable for the production of magnificent furniture, therefore this part of the tree is used to make very valuable veneer. Walnut wood is used in the manufacture of butts for weapons, furniture, parquet, often walnut is used in interiors, business class cars. The outer layers of the walnut are grayish, strongly separated from the dark core, which is of the greatest interest for use.

Teak

Teak is found in some tropical countries such as India, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, as well as in Indonesia, Brazil. The wood is pale, rough with a yellowish sheen, with some oily smell. The wood is very strong, moderately resilient and hard. Teak is one of the most durable breeds, terrace board from teak can serve more than 50 years. Due to this, teak deck boards are often used in the construction of yachts and boats. This wood is perfectly processed, well glued. Teak is very popular in the manufacture of terraces, gazebos, some furniture, saunas and swimming pools.

Burlap wood is rare, natural material, developing in the form of growths on the branches, trunks and at the roots of individual trees, mainly deciduous species: oak, walnut, maple, poplar, but most often - birch. Caps are places of growth of closely spaced adnexal and dormant buds.

The most rare, beautiful, durable and, accordingly, the most valuable is the branch burl, which has small size(up to 15 cm in diameter) and needle-like structure. The most common, less dense and less valuable is the root burl - kapokoren, which can reach gigantic (up to 1.5 ... 2 m in diameter) sizes. The stem cap occupies an intermediate position between the above varieties.

For a long time it was believed that burl is a painful growth on a tree, arising from the “clamping” of the buds by sudden and prolonged spring colds, which sometimes occur during the growing season of the plant.

The appearance of outgrowths was also associated with external damage to the cortex at the site of one of the dormant buds, where the excess influx of juices is directed, contributing to their multiple multiplication.

However, scientists came to the conclusion that cap is a biologically normal, protective phenomenon. Burl birch is the most valuable variety of Russian downy birch and burl formation on it is a naturally inherited process.

As a result of observations, it was found that the health of such a tree is better than that of others, it is more viable during the spring flood and frequent changes in temperature, and is more stable in the wind.

Real cap, having under the bark uneven surface in the form of tubercles, papillae or needles, should be distinguished from the influx (suvel) caused by local deformation of the annual layers of wood. Such influxes have an increased density and an interesting, albeit less spectacular, pattern.

The burl has a significantly (50...70%) denser than the mother wood with a wavy, multidirectional fiber structure, which, in combination with a large number of the above-mentioned buds, form an absolutely unique cut pattern.

A unique combination of properties of burl wood:

The limited natural reserves, combined with the above properties, puts this material at the top of its value among other types of wood, with all the species diversity of the plant world of our planet.

According to some estimates, 1 tree with a burl accounts for, on average, 3000-5000 ordinary trees without a burl.

Due to the high value of the material, since 1959, the Central Research Institute of Forest Genetics of the USSR Academy of Sciences, which developed the technology for sowing and growing burl birches, has been studying the biology of burl and methods of growing it. A whole grove of such birches was planted in the suburbs. Since 1967, burl birch has been planted in several forestries of the Kirov region.

For the unique beauty of cap is called wooden malachite!

In general, the smaller the pattern and the larger the cap size, the more expensive it is.

The value of this unique material speaks historical fact, given in the book “burl box” (author Nadezhda Perminova): “... in 1837, for a growth of a cap of twenty pounds (a little more than 8 kg), they paid up to fifty rubles, ...., a thoroughbred bull at an agricultural exhibition was estimated at the same amount.”

Today, on the world market, the price of burl wood (solid and veneer) is several times higher than the price of any other, including: oak, elm, walnut, mahogany and any exotic species.

The unique combination of material properties, limited stocks and the uniqueness of the burl pattern in each product, ultimately, determined the generally recognized, high aesthetic value and corresponding consumer price of products made from this wood, which is used in the decoration of the most luxurious interiors, as well as in the manufacture of appropriate level of utilitarian items.

Each such product initially contains spirit of elitism.

(Based on the book "Kapovaya casket" by N.I. Perminova, the city of Gorky, Volga-Vyatka book edition, 1984)

For those who like to work with wood at home, we offer a carving kit. It includes four types of wood, mainly walnut, oak, elm, mahogany, bars with a size of 150/200/50mm. The cost is 1500 rubles. You can also buy a 90mm walnut stock blank or a knife handle blank.

Lamella, veneer and deck

From the edged board presented on the site, we can produce you a lamella, deck board with a thickness of 3 and 10 mm. Production time is 2-3 days, the cost is 350 rubles / m2, excluding the array. Deck board cost 10 mm walnut 2500 rubles / m2.

Stump

You can buy a stump of elm, walnut or oak from us. Now in the warehouse there is an oak stump 1.5 m long, 1.2 meters in diameter. You can also order a stump of any size. Such material can be used for any furniture or interior solutions. According to your sketches, we can make chairs, an armchair or a sofa from a large trunk of an oak tree.

Edged board in stock in Moscow

In our warehouse in Moscow you can buy edged board European walnut, elm at the best price.

Edged board is used for the production of most wood products.

Perpendicular edges to the planes of the bases allow you to conveniently use the edged board for joining in structures, the production of doors, furniture, stairs.

Also, thanks to its simple shape, the edged board is easy to pack in tight pallets and transport.

Lately products from a semi-edged board come into fashion.

Unedged board available in Moscow

An unedged board is a rare and exclusive material for work; it is a board with uncut edges, a board with a wane.

Unedged board is used for interior solutions and designer furniture.

Due to long and thorough drying, humidity and internal stress meet the standards and norms, so sawing and re-gluing such a board does not make sense, it must be used as a whole.

Unedged board is used for bar countertops, solid board tables.

All boards shown on the website are in stock.

Description of wood species

Beech

Valuable wood species with a homogeneous structure, strength, soft colors, easy to sand, as well as subsequent painting or tinting in any color. After treatment with hot steam, it becomes flexible and easily bent, giving the board the desired shape. This feature is quite often used in the manufacture of expensive pieces of furniture, exclusive flooring and finishing elements.

Oak

Oak - hardwood, predominantly grows in our hemisphere. Mature oak wood is yellow-brown in color, becoming darker with age. Its wood is resistant to moisture, as the structure of the tree is finely porous. Used for production quality furniture, stairs, floors. Oak has a unique and peculiar pattern that gives finished products noble appearance, excellent quality and good wear resistance.

Elm

Karagach grows in the southern European part of our country, in Central Asia. It is a sound rock with small yellowish-brown outer layers and a brownish-brown core. The unusually beautiful texture and excellent pattern of elm wood is highly valued in furniture and plywood industries.

Maple

Maple grows in the Mediterranean and Central Asia, the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere. This is a fast growing wood. The trees themselves are large, and the wood is quite dense and hard, it is distinguished by uniformity. Maple can be used to make furniture, doors and musical instruments. Its wood is light, and due to its density, this type of wood is perfectly processed, that is, maple is an excellent material for carving.

Red tree

The most famous wood species in the world, very popular in Europe as a material for the production of a huge number of household items - furniture, panels, veneer and plywood, doors, windows, stairs, musical instruments, caskets, figurines, etc.

Kyrgyz Nut

The Kyrgyz walnut is one of the most popular valuable tree species. Some of the lower parts of the walnut trunk, sometimes in the ground, are thicker than the rest of the trunk and have a very beautiful pattern, suitable for the production of magnificent furniture, therefore this part of the tree is used to make very valuable veneer. Walnut wood is used in the manufacture of butts for weapons, furniture, parquet, and walnut is often used in interiors and business class cars. The outer layers of the walnut are grayish, strongly separated from the dark core, which is of the greatest interest for use.

Teak

Teak is found in some tropical countries such as India, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, as well as in Indonesia, Brazil. The wood is pale, rough with a yellowish sheen, with some oily smell. The wood is very strong, moderately resilient and hard. Teak is one of the most durable species, teak decking can last over 50 years. Due to this, teak deck boards are often used in the construction of yachts and boats. This wood is perfectly processed, well glued. Teak is very popular in the manufacture of terraces, gazebos, some furniture, saunas and swimming pools.

Sapele

Sapele - wood of valuable species, it is one of the types of redwoods, however, its wood is denser and heavier. It grows mainly in Africa, tropical Asia. Sapele wood has a reddish, sometimes brown tint, the vessels are very small, and the fibers form a striped pattern on a radial cut. Often used in the manufacture of furniture that decorates the interior, floors and various products.

Saxaul

For those who like to cook on an open fire, we brought saxaul wood. Saxaul charcoal is considered to be the best raw material for barbecue, barbecue and use in the tandoor. They give more "heat" than other types of wood. When using saxaul coals, you can be sure that food will not get harmful substances, resins and other impurities. Dishes cooked on saxaul have a unique taste and delicate aroma. Saxaul is packed in boxes weighing 5 kg, this is enough to cook up to 10 kg. meat.

Ash

A deciduous tree that grows throughout Europe. It has a hard, large-vessel wood with a matte finish and a greyish-white to yellow color. Density - 750 kg / m3. Ash lumber is used in the manufacture of furniture, interior finishing materials, sports equipment.

What are caps and suveli, how do they differ? How and where are they prepared? How to quickly and efficiently dry the growths at home?

Cap

So, to begin with, let's define some concepts.

Cap(aka " witch broom") is a benign formation on a tree, which is a bundle of thin twigs growing from a drop-shaped (most often) growth. When cross-sectioned, it has a texture with pronounced knot cores. It is difficult to process due to the strongly curly texture and a huge number of knots. Extremely beautiful , durable, perfectly sanded and polished.

Separate numerous areas have a mother-of-pearl tint. It has no great industrial value, but is valued very dearly because of its beauty. If it is used in industry, it is only in the form of veneer for furniture finishing (mostly exotic wood burl is used), as well as for the production of small items such as caskets, cigarette cases, women's hairpins, and small jewelry (birch burl). The use of burl on knife handles is considered good taste and is also prized by wood carvers for its unique texture.

It is impossible to find two identical pieces of burl - even halves of a sawn burl have a different pattern, the growth is so heterogeneous. It grows on many trees (linden, alder, birch, maple, oak, etc.), but the most valuable and beautiful is birch (from those growing in our latitudes). The growth is usually small, at most the size of a volleyball or a large plate.

It does not make sense to cut some kind of pattern on the cap, since the texture clogs everything.

The photo shows a birch burl. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a cut of a birch burl (I took these pictures near the local police station, and, as you understand, they wouldn’t give me anything to cut down there ... But I contrived and found an ash burl; most of the burls are similar in texture and differ only in color and size of knot cores).

(swirl) - as the name implies, the growth got its name because of its structure. "twisted structure",

This is putting it mildly. Suvel is a drop-shaped or spherical growth on a tree (there is also an annular variety, it covers the tree trunk around the perimeter), it usually grows 2-3 times faster than the tree itself. When sawn, it has a texture similar in pattern to marble and mother-of-pearl (this is the main sign of difference from mouth guard; in the future, do not confuse suvel and cap). The presence of mother-of-pearl stains on a polished tree creates a beautiful iridescent picture that glows from the inside. The twist is also poorly processed, like the burl, but not as hard. The size varies from the size of a nut up to 1.5 meters in height (I myself saw one on a birch) and up to 2 meters in diameter (an annular suvel completely covered the tree trunk).

In the Vatican, there is a font much more than a meter in diameter, carved from a single piece of suvel. He himself once sat in an armchair carved from suveli. Holds fine thread perfectly, but it is not recommended to cut the suvel. It is better to sand and varnish (impregnate with oil). The product will only benefit from this.

The most valuable is the root or butt streak. The presence of dark veins and well-defined twisted annual rings. This is a fairytale. BEAUTIFUL, that says it all. The barrel suvel is distinguished by a finer texture and a finer "frosty" pattern. And lighter wood. In terms of strength, the butt suvel is slightly superior to the stem one due to the structural features of the tree trunk. Suvel is strong, beautiful, easily polished and polished. Well-dried and processed, it begins to "glow" from the inside (with proper impregnation with oils, the tree becomes like amber and even a little transparent). Usually has a color from pale yellow or pinkish brown to quite ocher brown. It all depends on the conditions and drying time. Cap has the same colors.

As you can see, the suvel does not look like a cap at all.

- this is a mushroom (not to be confused with a tinder fungus) and we do not need it for our purposes.

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Where to look for growths... Naturally in the forest. BUT! There are no specific places of growth, they grow spontaneously, and the most beautiful outgrowths will be found by the most big-eyed and persistent. This activity is akin to hunting for mushrooms - who is more and more about e gal forest, and that got more.

We cut off the growth. We do this with a sharp saw. Otherwise, you will be tormented by sawing, and the tree will begin to shaggy. We do not clean the bark.

I highlight in red:

If the growth is "trunk-embracing" or hooded, then it is more correct to refrain from cutting it down - the tree may die. It is advisable to acquire such burls and strands during legal logging, when the tree is doomed anyway.
It is desirable to cut off growths in dry time year, ideally in late August, early September, before the start of sap flow.
Do not forget to cover up the cut on the tree oil paint or wax, or something like that.

Drying

So how to dry? The method of "steaming". I must say right away that this method is suitable for small pieces of wood: somewhere in half soccer ball or a small log.

We take an unnecessary pan (bucket), and throw a piece of wood there. The pot should be taken exactly unnecessary, since during the cooking process a very tricky broth is formed, which is then very troublesome to wash. It is better to clean the piece of wood from all sorts of tatters of birch bark and other fragile and dangling tails - they will fall off anyway.
I consider birch growth as the most accessible and beautiful. The rest of the growths are cooked using the same technology. The log is accordingly cleaned of any debris and fragile particles. We pour water. It is convenient to do this with a faceted glass (it contains 250 ml). Water should cover the piece of wood by about a centimeter or two. The tree naturally floats up, but let's press it to the bottom and see everything. Pour water, no matter what, cold or hot - it will boil anyway. You can throw a piece of wood into a saucepan no matter how much it is a pity, the volume of a separate piece of wood is important, and not the total volume of wood.
We take table salt, which is not a pity. We don't make soup. Pour 2 large tablespoons per liter of water
with a top of salt. It is possible and more, no matter how much it is a pity, it's okay, it's impossible to overdo it. The main thing is that the water should be sugary salty. You can use the sea clean water(namely, clean, otherwise it will be disgusting to smell like mud). Salt will draw juices from the tree, but the tree will not saturate.
We find sawdust of resinous wood species. Spruce, pine, the easiest to get. We take a saw: and forward. We need two powerful handfuls of sawdust (we rake the sawdust with both hands). It is sawdust, not shavings from a simple hand planer. The shavings will come from an electric planer (you can get it at the nearest sawmill or cut it yourself). I always use them. They are quite small and are usually plentiful and easy to obtain. The more resin in the sawdust, the better. And the smaller the sawdust, the better. We fall asleep in a saucepan. Sawdust will give the suveli a pleasant ocher color. From soft pink-yellow to ocher-brown. Also see O The wood will add strength and texture to the wood.
When the water boils, reduce the fire and leave it simmering for 6-8 hours, maybe more, as long as you have enough patience. If the saucepan is large, then you can not turn down the flame, let the water boil and bubble. But you need to watch that the water does not boil away completely. Salt, sawdust, temperature and time will do their job. Add water as needed. During the cooking process, a red "broth" is formed. And scum. Scale is best removed immediately. It is very difficult to wash off.
It took 6-8 hours (depending on the size of the piece of wood). We take out the wood. Rinse under running water from sawdust. Water from a pot
we throw it out as useless, but you can leave it for the next time, if there is where to store it. But pouring water is easier. We throw the growth
on the closet, wrapping nothing. For a day or two, let it cool down.
We repeat the process of cooking and drying 2-4 times, depending on the volume of wood. You can use a pressure cooker to speed up the process. Time is reduced to 4-6 hours.
At the last cooking, you need to quickly peel off the bark while the tree is hot. Although she herself should fall off by this time. Carefully!!! Hot!!! Use gloves!
We throw it on the closet for a week or two. The wood is basically already dry, but let the remaining moisture go. The tree will "rivet" to the atmosphere. After the final drying, the tree will become like a bone, and it will be possible to cut, saw, grind it. There will be no foreign smell. It will only smell like wood.
In the process of accelerated drying of wood, it must be remembered that small cracks, and therefore it is necessary to give
allowance for their removal in subsequent processing.
Once again I remind you that large pieces cannot be dried like that. Cracked. Necessarily. Checked.
After the final adaptation of the tree to the atmosphere, we make a product from it. It is desirable to impregnate the suvel and cap with oil, and, if
there is a desire, then wax too. The tree will show the texture, "play", as they say, all its inner beauty will appear.