A Burl Bowl is a Treasure

Have you had the good fortune to walk in an ancient forest and see a burl? Searching for burls is like a wonderful treasure hunt. It is not often you find one. And if you do, you most likely cannot take it home. It is either on private land or too big to carry or too high on a tree trunk.

Burls for the wood artists are hard to come by. They are scarce. If you are lucky enough to know of someone who works in the woods or know an old woodsman, you might be able to buy a few, that is, if they still have a woodpile out back with aged burls. It is much more fun to find a woodpile of burls than "googling" for them on the internet!

Burls are unique, naturally occurring growths on trees, occasionally found in the forest. Among red cedars fewer than one tree in a thousand will host burls. Several theories have been advanced in explaining why they form. We like to think they are similar in origin and development to pearls in oysters. Many burls are probably crown galls, having the typical irregular, fungating growth pattern resulting from shifting concentrations of bacteria in the growing layers

Perhaps an irritant, organic or otherwise, got under and into the bark which the tree then proceeds to isolate (in the same fashion as a grain of sand in the oyster), and grows cells around it, the tissues multiply and multiply, adding a new layer every year, similar to annual growth rings on all trees. Most burls have wonderful grain structure, with dense hard wood, and when polished are most handsome. Some burls are not symmetrical...they are full of swirls and grooves, lips and sink holes and bark inclusions. There are woods that "flame", or they have tiger stripes or cats' paws. Some patterns may be wavy, swirled, marbled, or feathered; they may have eyes or be spotted.

The odder the shape the better the vessel. These strange shapes are what we strive to take advantage of as we sculpt the burl to become a bowl. These unique jewels of the forest become useful and attractive.Many wood artists only "turn" burls. They are not shaped by hand tools or power tools. Another reason why free form burl bowls are a treasure. There is something more alive about a free form bowl rather than one turned on a lathe.

Burls are seldom found on trees less than 50 years old. The burls themselves must grow for at least 50 years to be useful for the wood carver. The burls that Phoebe works with range in age from 40 to 300 years old. The trees from which the burls are found in are usually 100 to 400 years old. Occasionally Phoebe has found burls on trees that are at least 1500 years old. A treasure bowl indeed.

Their high incidence on exposed headlands with negligible numbers on nearby protected trees has strongly suggested that salt spray or salt ground water or other water of low oxygen content might be a major factor in their origin. Burls are an antiquity, a work of art, a showpiece, yet they can also be functional pieces of art and be used as much as be admired.

Angie Bailey Photo

Read more about the types of wood used for burls HERE