As woodlot owners, I imagine that the majority of us have developed some skill in identifying the trees around us, using characteristics such as leaves, bark, buds, seeds, tree form/silhouette/size, and habitat preferences. A related but perhaps lessdeveloped skill for many of us is the ability to identify the same trees from the inside—by the distinct character, properties, and uses of their wood. While this knowledge would have been a critical survival skill for the indigenous people who inhabited this landscape, as well as for the early European settlers of our region, today, with the ready availability of lumber from all over the world (as well as the ubiquity of steel, plastics, and composite lumber) there is less 'need' for such knowledge, and so less opportunity to learn about it.
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