Ancient bog oak from Schwanau
Bog oaks are fossil stem or sessile oaks, which have lain in the bog for centuries or millennia. Stored in the bog, the tannic acids of the wood react with the marsh gases of the bog, causing such wood to discolor very strongly. Salvaged logs reveal their inner richness especially when they are processed into veneers. The bog oak then shows a discoloration ranging from blue to green-gray to deep black. The texture of the decorative, coarse-pored wood is strikingly striped or veined and especially radial with conspicuously broad wood rays.
In December 2022, Schorn & Groh was involved in the salvage of a bog oak trunk at the Ottenheim gravel plant. But how old such trees actually are could only be determined with special examinations. The buyers from Schorn & Groh had a good gut feeling right from the start. An age examination carried out by the CEZA Institute showed that this trunk is indeed exceptionally old. It is a whopping 3,595 years old (+/-20 years, more precisely from the period between 2023-1889 B.C.) The ancient trunk was processed into high-quality sawn timber by the Karlsruhe-based timber specialist Schorn & Groh.
The log was divided into 2 lengths in total. The butt log has a length of 2.80 m and was cut into rift in true quarter cut. The thickness of these boards is 36 mm, the widths range between 10 and 20 cm. The second length of 2.80 m was also cut to Rift in true quarter cut. The thickness of the planks here is 30 mm, the widths range between 10 cm and 20 cm.
Currently, the boards are in Schorn & Groh’s open-air storage facility in Kippenheim. The sawn timber of the two initial lengths will be available kiln-dried from mid-2024.