Cap processing. Cap (growth) - a defect in the development of a tree and a valuable ornamental material Cap birch that

CAPA PROCESSING

On the trunks of birches, high above the ground or at the very root, one can sometimes find spherical tree growths covered with a brown rough bark. These are caps.
The beauty of birch burl wood was not immediately revealed to a person. At first, he appreciated only its extraordinary strength. A small cap with a piece of the trunk and a hollowed-out cavity turned into a durable and convenient ladle or ladle in the hands of a craftsman. From the burl, a bowl or brother was hollowed out more.

But in such products, the peculiar pattern of the burl remained undiscovered. The wood has only been roughly processed. Only much later, when they learned how to cut burl into thin plates and polish it, they began to appreciate it as an excellent decorative material. AT early XIX century, Russian cabinet makers began to use burl along with fine wood for decorative furniture. At the same time, the first caskets and snuff boxes appeared, made entirely of burl. Some skillfully made products were literally worth their weight in gold. "Kap was often combined with other materials - most often inlaid with mother-of-pearl, boxwood and ivory.

Relatively recently, the production of products from burl arose in Bashkiria, which is famous for its reserves of burl birch. In the spring, as soon as the snow melts, burl harvesters go to the mountain forests of the south of Bashkiria. They carefully cut off the growths from the birch trunks, then the saw cut is thickly smeared with paraffin, oil paint or lime so that harmful microbes do not get into the tree, so that it does not wither, does not die. After a few years, burl can grow on it again. It has been noted that burl wood grows two to three times faster than normal birch wood. The harvesters are lubricated and the burl itself is cut off so that it does not crack before processing.

A burl growing on a tree trunk is commonly called a stem burl, and at the root - a kapo-root. Kapo-root is found in the forest much more often than stem burl, and reaches one and a half meters in diameter. According to the shape, the caps are divided into two types: circular, encircling the trunk around, and lateral, growing on the side of the tree.

On the cut, the texture pattern of the burl is a complex interweaving of annual layers, iridescent when the angle of illumination changes. In a good cap, the annual layers and cores of dormant buds are visible in the cut in the form of many concentric circles and dark brown dots. The more such dots with concentric circles, the livelier and more decorative the drawing. There are usually more dormant buds in stem burl, so the texture on its saw cut is more beautiful than that of kapo root, and its wood is more valued by craftsmen.

Sometimes the texture of the burl has such a bizarre pattern that, with some imagination, in the chaotic interweaving of wood fibers, one can distinguish images of fantastic animals, landscapes. It is impossible to find at least two pieces of burl with the same pattern, so joinery that has the same shape still does not look like one another. Each of them is unique.

It is impossible to cut down the burl yourself from trees standing on the vine: without knowing all the intricacies of this matter, you can destroy the tree. Unauthorized sawing of cap is fined on a par with felling the forest. But if you are interested in processing burl, you can cut it from fallen trees in the warehouse of the nearest timber industry - with the permission of the storekeeper, of course.
Start processing the cap by sawing it into plates, choosing their thickness depending on the size of the intended product. The beauty of the texture pattern largely depends on successful sawing.

Over time, you will learn from the shape of the burl, from the location of the sleeping buds, to immediately determine how best to cut it in order to discover the hidden beauty. Try to cut the cap in such a way that the cutting plane cuts across the maximum number of dormant buds.
Usually, on a fresh cut, the texture pattern of the burl is pale and barely noticeable. To make it manifest, the burl wood is steamed. The easiest way is to boil the blanks over low heat for two to three hours. But the best result is the steaming of wood in sawdust. Wet the sawdust and put it on the bottom of the pan with a layer of about 20 mm, put a layer of blanks on top, cover it with a new layer of sawdust, etc.

Now put the pan in the oven for two to three hours. As a result of steaming, tree sap is removed from the burl, from the uneven drying of which the wood could subsequently warp and crack. At the same time, the blanks are dyed with natural dyes contained in the cap, and acquire many shades - from golden amber to dark chocolate.

After steaming, dry the cap for several hours in a drying cabinet, and if it is not there, then just in the air, but for at least a week.
Now you can cut, grind and glue various products from blanks - some of them are shown in the figures.
Most often, burl products are covered with alcohol shellac varnish. Its film is quite resistant and gives a warm yellowish color with a soft sheen. You can also use nitro varnishes - they have a more intense shine and make the texture pattern clearer and more contrasting. Before coating, you need to thoroughly sand the surface of the product with sandpaper - first large, then fine.

Burl on the tree - ash

The ancient Slavic word "cap" means "head": usually the growth really has a rounded shape. Other old Russian names: bolona, ​​vyl, smelting, vyplyv, influx, zavoy, paport, roll, goiter, swirl, brush. In some sources, the burl is also called the "witch's broom" or "vortex's nest", which is not entirely correct, since these names denote a completely different tree pathology.

Cap is formed on all deciduous (mainly) and conifers trees. In Russian latitudes, it can be found on birch, poplar, maple, linden, aspen, oak, ash, elm, walnut.
The size of the burl varies from a few centimeters to several meters in section. It takes decades, or even more than half a century, for the formation of a build-up of medium size.
Cap is a rather rare occurrence, and to find at least one specimen in the forest is great luck. However, there are trees with several or even many growths. As well as places with a cluster of burl trees.

Caps on the tree - birch

Usually caps are divided into stem and basal.
The stem burl is formed on thick branches or trunk and can be lateral (developing on one side, most often southern) or circular (capturing a branch or trunk in a ring).
Root outgrowth - kapokoren - is formed on the root collar or roots of a tree. In the first case, it is above the ground, in the second case, it is completely hidden and can be detected in spring along young shoots near the main tree trunk, which quickly die.
A tree can simultaneously have caps of different types.

If you remove the bark from the burl, then an uneven, embossed surface will open under it, completely covered with needle-like, serrated and pineal tubercles - these are undeveloped buds.

There is already a rudimentary ring structure around each dormant bud.

dormant buds

→ Tree protection - antiseptik.info

Why does the cap appear

Opponents insist that this is not without the influence of external factors of a natural or anthropogenic nature. In particular, mechanical damage to the cortex (by animals, birds, people, rampant elements, etc.) at the site of a dormant kidney. This assumption confirms the fact that on walnut plantations, where vegetative propagation grafting (which is actually an injury), a burl often develops on a rootstock below the grafting site. When the fruiting period of the nut comes out, the tree is dug up along with the burl that has grown to a solid size by that time and is sold as a secondary product.

According to other versions, the formation of a burl can be caused by fungi, bacteria, viruses, insects, weather anomalies (like sudden spring frosts), changes in the ecology and radiation background, a special mineral composition of the soil, geological faults, groundwater.

According to the conclusions of Soviet scientists, the formation of a burl is a biologically useful, protective property for trees, acquired in the process of evolution in response to adverse conditions. external environment. Moreover, it is a genetically fixed (hereditary) quality. in the Moscow region and Kirov region successful attempts have been made to cultivate trees with outgrowths using planting material from burl birches (seeds and cuttings for grafting). It was noted that such trees are more viable and hardy.

Texture of birch burl

The burl is used in its entirety to create artistic products, in veneer - for finishing exclusive items and furniture. Burls of thuja, myrtle, camphor and some other trees retain their characteristic aroma even after processing.

Sometimes painful growths appear on the trees, which are popularly called "witch's broom." At first glance, this benign formation in its form resembles human head. That is why it is generally accepted that the name of the growth comes from the ancient Slavic word "cap". It means "head" in translation. Where to find growths on trees Caps are found on walnuts and oaks, aspens and black alders. However, the most common growth is on a birch. Cap is a bundle of thin twigs that grow from a drop-shaped neoplasm. Weigh "witch broom" can be about a ton. What is a stem cap? This is a growth that is located directly on the trunk of a tree. What is a kapokoren? This is a growth that has formed at the very root neck of the tree. Sometimes it can be seen above earth's surface . An underground burl grows on the roots. He is found on the run. Releases their cap in early spring. These shoots are not viable and quickly wither. Sometimes burl is found on tree branches. The beauty of an amazing material If you make a cross section of the burl, you can find its structure, in which the cores of the knots are pronounced. The drawing of such material is always very beautiful. Due to the accumulation of unblown buds, the cut is an amazingly beautiful picture of knots, curls and twisted fibers. At the same time, the pattern for each cap is strictly individual. The burl formed on trees with a striped texture of fibers and contrasting color combinations is distinguished by its special beauty. Pine growths have such characteristics. However, they are quite rare on these trees. You can find black dots in the texture of the kapokorn. They are located among the light stem fibers. These black dots are nothing more than non-viable shoots that release underground neoplasms. Where is cap used? As a material for carving, the build-up on the tree is not of particular value. Its rugged surface and striped mottled texture interfere with each other. When making crafts in this way, the relief of the carving does not look and the pattern of weaves and stains disappears. As a material for carving, the build-up on the tree is not of particular value. Its rugged surface and striped mottled texture interfere with each other. When making crafts in this way, the relief of the carving does not look and the pattern of weaves and stains disappears. Numerous areas of the burl have a mother-of-pearl tint. That is why this material, which has no special industrial significance, is valued very dearly. Burl products are mainly boxes and women's hairpins, cigarette cases and various small jewelry, bowls and pipes, chess and powder boxes, ink utensils and spectacle cases. The material is also used for the manufacture of knife handles. What is cap in industry? This is a material that is used in the decoration of furniture. In this case, the growths formed on exotic trees are taken and used as veneer. What is a cap for a master? It is a material that does not warp, crack, shrink or swell and is excellently processed. In addition, it is heavy and durable. Where to find cap? Growths grow on trees. Therefore, it is necessary to look for them in the forest. However, it is not so easy, because caps grow spontaneously, and only the most stubborn and big-eyed can see them. You can cut off the build-up only with a very sharply sharpened saw. It is most realistic to find a cap at logging sites. There, these growths fall into the waste. At logging sites, there are also kapokorni, which you simply cannot find in the forest. Preparation of material for work Cap can be found on various types trees. However, the most beautiful and valuable in our area is the growth that has arisen on a birch. Cap products are not obtained immediately. The material requires some preliminary preparation. How to handle birch burl? To do this, you need to use the steaming method. It is suitable for those growths that are not very large in size. The cap is cleared of debris, placed in an unnecessary pan and filled with water. Then salt must be added to the container. For a liter of water, its dosage is two tablespoons with a top. Salt can be poured and more. She will draw the juice from the tree. With this method, sawdust obtained during the processing of resinous wood species is also used. They need to be put into a bowl. The sawdust gives the burl a pleasant color that can range from yellowish-pink to brownish-buff. The resins found in the sawdust will add strength to the build-up and allow the texture to show up brighter. After boiling water, the fire should be slightly reduced and the pan left on the stove for six to eight hours. As scale builds up, it should be removed. In the process of steaming, it is necessary to monitor the volume of water in the pan and periodically add it. At the end of the “cooking”, the build-up is washed from sawdust under running water and placed in a closet for a day or two. After that, the whole process should be repeated at least two to four times. During the last cooking, while the tree has not cooled down, you should peel off the bark from it, and at the end put the growth in a closet for one to two weeks. Having completely dried out, the cap in its characteristics will become similar to the bone. The material prepared in this way is excellently cut, sawn and polished. At the same time, it will not have any foreign odors. Making jewelry boxes Handicrafts made from birch burl are as beautiful as souvenirs made from Karelian birch wood, and even surpass them. Often magnificent caskets are made from this material. In the process of work, the burl boards are carefully connected to each other, making sure that their texture pattern is similar. A very responsible operation is the manufacture of wooden hinges. This stage requires precise formation of rounded spikes and grooves on the edges of the cover and body of the product. The hinges must fit snugly and accurately. One more complicated operation is drilling holes. In wooden hinges, this is easiest to do with thin steel wire. At the next stage, a lock crashes into the box. The product is almost ready. It should only be puttied, dried thoroughly and coated with alkaline varnish. After completion of these works, the box is treated with polish and wiped with alcohol. The product is polished until the wood acquires an amber color and until all the veins of its amazing texture play brightly. Cane decoration Using a cap, you can make a great gift for an elderly person with your own hands. The work can be done even by a novice. Hollow cylinders should be alternately put on a tube or a metal rod, which are previously machined from birch kapokorn. Details should be tightly fitted to each other, creating the impression of a single whole. A carved or smooth birch handle can crown such a cane. Burl bowl Various souvenirs can be made from wooden growths. Popular burl products are decorative bowls. A rough blank is made from a little raw material. Next, the blank is left to dry. If small cracks form in it, then they are lubricated with PVA glue. After the final drying, the product is given the necessary shape, it is ground, polished and varnished.-

Burl VARIETIES OF WALNUT Cap is a growth on a tree with deformed directions of growth of wood fibers. Usually found as a rounded outgrowth on a trunk or branch, filled with small woody nodules of dormant buds. Caps grow at the expense of the cambium. A defect in the shape of a tree trunk; a type of defect is called an outgrowth. Other types of outgrowths should be distinguished from cap: smooth and more or less spherical suvel, and outgrowth irregular shape caused by tree cancer. Growths occur on trees as a result of some abrupt change in the development of a plant, which may have a natural or anthropogenic cause. Some of the burls grow underground like root tumors and therefore cannot be found until the tree is dead. Such outgrowths sometimes appear in the form of a group of round, cone-shaped protuberances, interconnected by rope-like roots. Burls are almost always covered with bark, even underground. The reason is to protect the tree from insects and fungal diseases. On some types of trees, burls can reach significant sizes, for example, on trees of the Sequoia genus. The largest known burl was found in 1984 in small town Tamworth in Australia on eucalyptus. He reached 6.4 feet (about 2 meters) in height and had strange shape, reminiscent of a trombone. (Information from Wikipedia) A very unusual wood with a complex texture of fibers is obtained from burls, one of the most valued for its beauty, rarity makes it even more expensive. The variety of burl textures is determined by the growing conditions of trees, flat or mountainous area. This makes the burl pattern unique and varied, which is why burl wood is in demand by artists, sculptors and cabinetmakers. There is a wide variety of good known types burl (each from its own type of wood), they are used to make veneer, board games , interior items, costume jewelry, picture frames, household items, knife handles, in the interior decoration of cars and for small crafts. The famous eyed maple looks like burl wood, but is not. Burl wood is very difficult to work on a lathe or with a hand tool due to the heterogeneity and uneven direction of fiber growth. At the same time, the twisted fibers compact each other during the growth of the burls, making the wood of some burls very durable. The most expensive furniture is made from walnut wood. In addition, it is widely used for the interior decoration of aircraft, ships, cars, wagons, for the manufacture of various products in art crafts, as well as in carpentry, turning, weapons (for stocks) and all kinds of small handicrafts. In addition to stem wood, the so-called burls are of exceptional value. These are growths of a more or less oval or round shape, formed at the base of the trunk, on the trunk itself, occasionally on the branches of walnut trees. The nature of cap formation is still a matter of debate. However, scientists A. V. Kuzmin, A. S. Yablokov, M. T. Sushko and many others consider burl formation to be a normal genetic trait of some tree species, including walnut, that arose in the process of evolution. According to M. T. Sushko, walnut burl trees have greater vitality and live longer than trees without burls under the same conditions. It is assumed that caps are formed due to the development and growth of colonies of subcortical dormant buds. These growths are of very different sizes and masses. The largest root caps sometimes reach colossal sizes - up to 2 m in diameter, and their mass exceeds 1.5 tons. Stem nodules are much smaller: diameter up to 1-1.4 m, weight 500-800 kg; and, naturally, the smallest growths are formed on the branches of a tree - several tens of centimeters in size and weighing 100-400 kg or less. Walnut mouthguards have gained extremely wide popularity in the world market for their unusually beautiful rare pattern and are worth their weight in gold. On the transverse section, the growths have a patterned artistic pattern, which is decorated with numerous dark graceful spots, the so-called "bird's eyes", with a diameter of 3-6 mm. Their combination with intricate complex wavy lines creates an intricate wonderful pattern with colorful colors and a special brilliance that transforms when the angle of incidence of light changes. Extraordinarily picturesque bizarre patterns and wonderful qualities of walnut burl wood have been appreciated from time immemorial. Even in past centuries, it was widely used by the peoples of all continents for interior magnificent decorations, intarsia of the most famous palaces, temples, museums, historical buildings, theaters, in general, the most expensive architectural structures. So, the front and residential interiors of Versailles (Paris), the Grand Kremlin (Moscow) and many other famous palaces of the world are finished with walnut wood. Burl wood is also used to make the most expensive, carved, figured furniture, expensive inlaid boxes, other souvenirs and jewelry. Naturally, the world selection of walnuts is also aimed at breeding exactly burl walnut varieties and there are already certain successes in creating such varieties.

Instruction

From each kidney-needle, a large number of which concentrated on a small surface, forming a cap, a branch could grow. Due to the fact that there are a lot of buds, not a single one can get out of the wood. From the collection of buds, a texture is formed that is unusual in shape and pattern. Not a single layer of wood can compete with burl for the natural beauty, complexity and rarity of the material. The unique birch burl is called wood malachite, there are interesting burls on cherry, bird cherry and walnut. A cap is often called an influx, but this is a misnomer. Professionals can easily distinguish a cap from an influx - a layer of wood of the same tree, but with mixed growth rings. The influx when cut resembles marble with white veins.

Cap is divided into two varieties: needle cap and root cap. Needle is the rarest, it grows very slowly and only in early spring- when the leaves hatch on the trees, its growth stops. When making a transverse incision through the cap, you can find the place of its origin, the pattern will resemble a funnel, tapering towards the center of the trunk - this is the beginning of the needle cap. The large cap is very hard to find and highly prized. Cap-spine is similar in structure to needle-back, but there is a difference in the pattern of wood texture, which is darker and larger. It develops on the roots and in the root zone, on trees growing on wet soil- near streams, swamps and along river banks.

Even because of the big and beautiful cap to spoil living tree not worth it. Moreover, it is not difficult to find this natural anomaly - many burls develop on tree trunks in city parks, on poplars, American maples and lindens. A large number of trees are cut down every year, and it is not difficult to extract burls from them. If the need to remove the cap from a living tree is very great, this is done from late autumn until early spring, while the movement of sap in the tree is slowed down. For sawing, a saw with universal teeth is taken, the cut is made strictly along the trunk, vertically, without affecting the main wood. If the movement of the saw is very difficult, a spacer is made from a pair of wooden wedges that are hammered into the slot. After the cap is completely separated, the saw cut is immediately painted over with oil paint or drying oil. It is useless to paint over a cut made in the spring - the movement of the juice cannot be stopped by this, and the tree will inevitably be very sick.

Burl lends itself well to processing, it does not crack, warp or swell, and besides, its strength is several times higher than the wood of the tree on which it grows. The best option use - immediately after harvesting, clean the cap from the bark and saw it into planks 3-5 mm thick, so that later it can be used for the production of caskets or mosaics. In this option, the use of burl is more optimal, and in the manufacture of various bowls, vases and bowls, most of the material is lost. The most interesting burl pattern is obtained with a chordal cut, as a rule, it is a lot of points, each of which is surrounded by rings of a different shade, and different-color stains flow between the rings.

Sources:

• Growths on a birch

The texture of the burl often has such a bizarre pattern that you can see a finished image or landscape on it. In other cases, the burl is sawn and processed.

Instruction

If the cap is quite large, and, according to the idea, more than one thing, but several, can be made from it, it is sawn before processing. Most often, a cap is sawn into plates of various thicknesses: the thickness depends on what products are planned to be manufactured. To obtain the best pattern on all blanks, the cutting angle must be thought out in such a way as to cut as many dormant buds as possible. On a fresh cut, the pattern is hardly noticeable, but an untreated cap is easier to cut. But before making it into a product, the cap is steamed so that the drawing shows through completely and it can be shown in the work. It is best to steam the cap in small ones, you can do this in. You will need an unnecessary pan of a suitable size, the dyes released by the wood will be difficult to wash off. Sawdust is placed in a thick layer on the bottom, then a cap is laid out on them - but not close, there should be half a centimeter of gap between the blanks. From above, they are also laid with sawdust, but not in such a thick layer.

It is poured with salt water, but mainly the lower layer, so that the water only touches the workpieces, without completely covering them. Salt is taken per liter about a tablespoon, maybe a little more. Close the lid and put on a very slow fire. After boiling, the workpieces should be steamed for 6-10 hours, water should be added to the pan periodically, checking every hour. The pot is then removed from the heat and left to cool. The blanks are removed from the cooled sawdust, the sawdust is washed off with a jet of water, left to dry, turning over to dry evenly every few hours. Drying usually takes 3-4 days. After the blanks dry out, you need to repeat the process of boiling, then dry again, and so on at least 3 times. If, after three steamings, the bark itself has not fallen off the blanks, it must be removed. Having steamed the burl blanks for the last time and, having removed the bark, the wood is left for the final drying. It is best to dry them outside, turning every few hours for the first 3 days, then once a day. After that, it’s a good idea to dry the workpieces in a special drying cabinet 2-3 times.

Large pieces of a solid burl, larger than a soccer ball, are not suitable for processing in this way. In the process of cooking or drying, the cap will definitely crack, and may burst. Figures from a solid burl are processed in the same way as any tree - they are polished, varnished. Boiling is best for burls that are sawn into thin slices. When steamed, these blanks are dyed with natural dyes in a wide variety of shades, from light golden to chocolate brown. After this lengthy treatment, you can begin to further improve the cap. Finished products are coated with alcohol or acrylic varnishes. Nitro-varnishes can also be used. Before coating, the surface is polished with emery - first large, and then the smallest, and wiped from wood dust with a soft cloth.

Sources:

• Cap processing