Q. What is the difference between hardwoods and softwoods?
A. Hardwood trees belong to the botanical group angiospermae; usually broad-leaved and deciduous; common hardwoods are oak, maple ash, hickory. walnut. Softwoods are needle bearing and coniferous. Common softwoods are pine, hemlock spruce and fir. Because of the differing applications and growth characteristics of hardwoods and softwoods, the grading methods differ also.
Q. Where are America's hardwood forests?
A. Hardwood forests are most abundant east of the Mississippi River. Hardwood species dominate the northeastern U.S. and Appalachian Mountains.
Q. How long does it take for a hardwood tree to grow before it is mature enough to harvest?
A. Most hardwood stands mature in 70 to 120 years. With proper management, renewing the forest takes less time. The time required to mature a hardwood tree depends on the species. An oak tree requires 80-120 years to mature, whereas a poplar tree can mature and be ready to harvest in 40 years or less.
Q. Are we running out of trees?
A. Some news reports make it seem as though we are running out of trees. To the contrary, we are actually growing more trees today than we were 50 years ago. The net volume of hardwood growing stock on timberlands in the U.S. was 184,090 million cubic feet in 1952 and 335,722 million cubic feet in 1999, which represents an 82.4% gain.
Q. Who owns the U.S. timberlands?
A. 58.7% of the U.S. timberlands is privately owned. The forest industry owns 14.4% and 17.3% are owned by the U.S. government.
Q. When trees are harvested, how do we make sure the forests come back?
A. Hardwoods are usually allowed to come back naturally. Harvesting large, mature trees in a hardwood forest lets enough sunlight reach the forest floor to stimulate new growth..
Q. Does ITL own its own timberlands and sawmill?
A. Yes. ITL is a vertically integrated hardwood manufacturer with timberlands and sawmills strategically located in the finest hardwood growing areas.
Q. Why does hardwood need to be dried?
A. All wood growing in trees contains a considerable quantity of water, commonly called sap. Although sap contains some materials in solution, for the most part, it can be considered plain water. Most of this water should be removed to obtain satisfactory service for most uses of wood.
Q. What is moisture content?
A. The amount of moisture in the wood is termed moisture content. The moisture content of lumber is expressed as a percentage of the dry weight.
Q. What makes ITL different from other hardwood producers?
A. It doesn't matter how close you are to your hardwood supplier. What matters is how close your supplier is to the sawmills. At ITL, we own modern sawmills in the premium timber regions. We harvest our own trees, process the wood in our own mills, dry it in our own kilns, and package it in our own warehouses. All right at the source.
If you have a question regarding ITL or hardwood lumber, please click on the "CONTACT" button and send us your question.
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