Spalt your own wood

[Cherryville Chuck]

I found this out quite by accident. Spalting is the early stages of wood decay. The trick is to catch it before the wood turns punky. I had a neighbor saw up some birch logs for me years ago and I had heard from old timers several ways to air dry the lumber. One trick I tried was taking a few of the boards and storing them in the attic of my shop under a pile of planer shavings. What I didn't know at the time since we had just moved onto the property was that the roof leaked directly above that spot. Two or three months later I went up to check on the boards and found that the sawdust was wet. When I checked to see how the boards had fared they had spalted but were still perfectly sound. There may be other ways to do it but I know that one works.

[Herb Stoops]

Did you patch the roof?
I have seen that happen in an open air shed where lumber is stored rough-sawn and stickered. The damp winter air in the Great Pacific NW can do the same.
Herb

[DaninVan]

One of my Guild friends bandsawed up a bunch of Cherry for me a couple of months ago (https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/indu ... ter-cherry). That's the PNW here.

At the time I checked the moisture content and it ranged from 20% to 35%+. I stickered it and stood the 4' long bundles up, but off the concrete floor in my woodshed.
Checked it again last week ...it's evenly holding at 20% on all of it. Guess it won't dry further until the warmth of Spring and Summer.