Green spots/streaks in maple bowl blanks

[JohnG]

Hi all,

I know there aren’t a ton of bowl turners here, but I figured this might be an easy answer. I have some green spots/streaks showing up in maple I’m turning bowls from. Is this inherent in the tree or something I did wrong in storing the pieces? They are there as I turn the bowl, and don’t seem to be changing over time after the bowl has been turned. The wood is still quite green (wet) at the time of turning.

 

I grabbed some pieces of maple from a tree that fell in October after one of the hurricanes passed through. They were already cut to 2-3’ lengths and about 8” diameter. I painted the end grain with some latex paint. I cut a couple of them down to the rough blanks and put them in a cardboard box with some of the shavings to keep them from drying out too fast during the couple weeks it would take me to turn them into bowls. I had read that people put them in paper bags with shavings, but I don’t have any paper bags. 

Any tips or insight would be greatly appreciated! I am far from an experienced turner.  

[..Kev]

Looks like some spalting to me but, I'll leave it to the more experienced to call..

[Mark J]

It is probably something intrinsic to the tree.  But go with it.  It will probably add a lot of interest to the finished bowl.  People actually seek out spalted maple and ambrosia maple.  

[JohnG]

Cool. I have turned three bowls from this stock and two of them have had it. I’m all for spalting, ambrosia, and other things that add interest to the wood. I just figured if it was something I was directly causing, I could either avoid it or try to take advantage of it. 

Thanks!

[wdwerker]

If the ends of the cut pieces touched the ground before you got to them fungus spores could have already made contact. Or it might have already been in the tree.

[JohnG]

I’m sure the pieces did touch the ground. Good to know for if I end up with a fallen tree. 

The tree smashed a friend’s fence, and their only focus and concern was to remove the tree and fix the fence. They are not woodworkers and thought it was strange that I asked to come take pieces of it 

I’m also not sure what the condition of the tree was before it fell. It was mostly cleaned up before I arrived. It’s quite possible that it had some previous issues and the strong wind was the final straw. 

[Mark J]

Be sure to post a pic or two of the finished bowl.  Be interesting to see how that comes out.

[JohnG]

These are my first experience with green turning, and I'm really just winging it. I'm turning them to final size and letting them do their thing as they dry. I figure that I can flatten the bottom on the belt sander after they settle a bit. After just a couple days inside they developed a decent wobble.

The bowl I turned tonight, and posted the initial picture of, is the smallest and thinnest walled one I have done. One of the logs I got had a big crack in it, presumably from when the tree fell. I was able to save a piece of it and this was the largest round I could get from it. I also decided to try making a tenon 'foot' for this one. I intentionally left it larger than I think looks proportional, knowing that I will need to flatten the bottom in a few days. Quarter for scale.

 

And a pic of the three I have turned. The first two were completely turned on a faceplate, then I used a thin parting tool to remove the bowl from the faceplate and cut a slight hollow into the bottom.

 

These live edge bowls have been making me be more patient to avoid losing chunks of the bark. The middle bowl above was the first I turned and I got too aggressive in removing the bulk (or too lazy to sharpen my gouge again) and lost some bark. I tried to find the piece to glue back on but couldn't. You can see a couple of the spots/lines of green-ish on the top bowl.