North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Lon J. Rombough" <lonrom@hevanet.com>]

   While pruning a tree with three varieties on it, I noticed that Liberty
sprouts took noticeably more effort to cut than similar or even larger
shoots of Holstein.  Large shoots I could cut with hand pruners on the
Holstein needed a saw on the Liberty.  This made me wonder if anyone has
evaluated the traits of the wood of various apples.  Why, you ask?
   In "A Reverence For Wood" by Eric Sloane, he descibes how, in Colonial
times, many things were made of apple wood because it was hard and durable
when well cured.  I tried that with some apple crotches of about an inch in
diameter and found that they were quite strong when cured and made very good
hooks for hanging clothes.
   The point of all this is to ask if there are any woodworkers/carvers who
have used apple, and if you have noted, as I did, variations according to
the variety of apple.
-Lon Rombough