- [Matt] Hi everyone, my name is Matt. Welcome to my backyard. This time got a special
guest here, this is Paul. He brought this Pecan Crotch
all the way from New Mexico. It's got an interesting story behind it. So we're going to get a sign up today. So Paul's going to tell us
a little bit about the log, it's history and his story and then we're going
to get it onto the mill and we're going try and
cut a cookie off the end. - So this Pecan tree is
about a 100 years old. Out in front of my parents' yard, they have a five acre old kind Orchard in Southern New Mexico. The tree, as you can kind
of see in some other faces, were starting to die off and was no longer producing any nuts. So we decided to take it down and since I'm a woodworker, we wanted to make something
really nice out of it. So we started off with this limb that was a couple of years ago, and then we took down these two limbs and took down the rest of the tree. Interesting story about this limb, when I cut it down, there was all kinds of
wonderful critters in there, wasp and cockroaches and beetles. There was also a little bat. And so that was kind of interesting. The space is roughly 43 inches in diameter and it is about 100 year old tree. It's been sitting outside for
about a year and a half now ever since we've cut it down. So this side is facing South,
so it's nice and checked. So, even though I did put anchor to on it. The top is about 46 inches or so and the height is about roughly 36 inches. So it's a good size log. As you'll see, when we
start cutting it up, it's kind of all over the
place on character. (laughs) - And then- - It's one of Matt's kind of logs (laughing) - [Matt] So, here goes a
question for you to answer. So the rest of it's already been sawn, why is this one here? - [Paul] Because my chain saw
mill can only do 30 inches. I wanted to get the
entire width of this thing as much as I possibly could. And I don't know of anybody in this world except for maybe one person in Texas, that has a bandsaw that can
actually handle this one. So I'm a big fan of just like everybody
else out there is of Matt. So I asked him if he was kind
enough to do this for me so. - [Matt] That's been on
the list for a long time. (laughing) Got the saw set up and we're going to cut little charcuterie size stuff of this little limb here, until we get down to the
actual crotch section. So we'll have a little more
yield, both from small stuff and we'll do that until again we get down to the full width cut and then we'll fire to
start making some slabs. (power saw rattling) - [Matt] Oh, yeah. (power saw rattling) That is such a deep red. The other pecan I had was super pink. - [Paul] Yeah? This is like a super deep brown red. Look at this crazy green,
look at thhis stuff. - [Paul] It's crazy. - [Matt] A little bit of figure there. (plane engine roaring) Well the figure on this one too. This one's got some
ripples coming through here and some really cool color. So what do you think? - Ah (laughing) - [Matt] This is nice. - It's breathtaking,
absolutely breathtaking. - [Matt] So we got one more
piece of periods and take off and I think, what do you think? Do you want to start making
the actual slabs now? - Yeah.
Or one more? - [Matt] One more cutter slabs - [Paul] I don't know. or like a thicker because we're not all the
way down to the wood yet. We're still in the bark over here. - Yeah. - So maybe even a piece
of like nine quarter eight quarter, six quarters,
something like that. Just to get us further down here and then we'll start
making the actual slabs. Let's do that. (power saw rattling) - Wow That is nuts. Like just absolutely nuts. - Sporting. This is the first dead, dead limb. Second dead limb. That one was still alive. - That's just cool. It's gonna be really cool. Now I start getting
into the actual figure. This combined with actual figure because it was just color right now. Not figure. Okay, let's make some slabs. (power saw rattling) (groaning) (power saw rattling) That's about as many slabs. We can get a full width on. So we're gonna offload these and then we'll roll a
little remainder piece over and cut some more stuff out of that. But it's time to look at wood. Paul, show us the wood. Well Oh, that's nuts and not
saving the good ones yet. We're not even in there yet. - That's the scary part. 34. That'll be fun. - Make some friends. Show me the wood. Yeah, so you're starting to
get into the crotch figure now I see. That's good. That's what we wanna see. A little bit crotch through here and still have the crazy
flame grain down here. Show us that wood. Yeah, that's got some
crotches coming out ...... that you're in and out for real. Yep, there's the good stuff. - [Paul] Still sporting. - This stuff is crazy. - Look at that. Wow. It's like 40 ish in the narrow area. (laughing) 43, 44 up here. So that's a pretty good size of crotch. Okay, this one should be the best one. It should have the most
amount of crotch figure. You can already see it. Picking through here all the way down. That's incredible. Stuff. This is crazy. You know what you're doing. You know what she's getting into. (laughing) Woo. I like this. I dunno. Weird yellow spot. - Yeah. - It's kind of wild. That's some seriously
intense crotch vigor. For real. And this is the point I
think I got so excited that I knocked the
receiver out of my camera and lost the audio for this
little few segments here but it's pretty easy to recreate just like splish splash. Ooh, ah Crutch figure. Ah This stuff was absolutely amazing as I'm actually looking back
and watching the footage. I forgot like how excited Pau was to look at all the wood, every single cut. I'd be trying to get the
camera off the tripod for the next shot. And he'd already made their
splashing water on the slabs. (laughing) It's just, that definitely
was a lot of fun to be around someone who
has so much appreciation for the beauty of the wood. Now here, we had a sequential
pair of slabs on the trailer and we had them opened up as
it book-matched from the end. What I like to call an end match. So Paul was just showing me how
he's planning on joining two of these together at the ends
to create a longer tabletop. So at the end match should be
able to get a longer tabletop in this case about eight feet long. So we kind of normalish size tabletop after it's all trimmed down to size. (soft music) Once we got through loading
the rest of the slabs onto the trailer we can go ahead and
flip over the remainder and saw was left out of it. Trying to get as much material
out of this thing is possible since it has traveled so far to be here. (soft music) (power saw rattling) - Red - Yeah, it's like the rest of it. (laughing) Surprise.
- Yeah, Imagine it. - This is some cool stuff. Yeah, pecans all loaded up. Paul also brought these
two goofy pieces of Apple. So we're gonna give these a cut and see what's going on in there. You've got this like
crazy furrow on this one. And the other one here has got some crazy spiral thing going on. So like a flat facing cup, roll them over and then we'll slice them up
into live edge board things. (power saw rattling) Yeah, this one's got some rot to it. That's cool. (power saw rattling) So past the punky spots. Now we're just into the
colorful spalted parts from this rotted area here. That one's got some cool color too. Hey, you got some crotchs figure. Hey That's a win in my book. Oh, look at that old limb. You see the tree grew
around an old limb cut off or pruned judging by
how clean that cut is. That's cool. See, Paul's a lot more gentle
with the water than I am. (laughing) I am very much more aggressive. - I am free to call her right over. We're kind of on water. - Well, this is the we're
at 10,000 lakes here so I got plenty of water here. Oh, this is cool. Let's figure it out here. That's awesome. Apples, nice. So the Apple and pecan is all loaded up back on the Paul's trailer,
ready to head back to Colorado. Him and his wife went on a
little bit of a vacation thing. So we've been sightseeing for a few days. At least this is gonna
head back with them today. And it's a heck of a load of wood. I'm really happy and really
thankful that Paul made a trip. It's allowed me to see
things that I don't normally get to see because you know pecan doesn't really grow around here. And I don't see a whole lot of
Apple, at least not that big. So thank you again for that Paul. He did offer me some of the wood, but as someone who has
way too much wood already, I declined. Mostly I picked up, I kept a few small pieces. I think that made them happy. (chuckling) So when those are dry, we
have a piece Apple and a piece of Paul's pecan to make
something out of, you know whenever that happens in the future. So this was a lot of fun. It is so much fun being
around other people that are passionate about wood especially as someone who's
passionate about the piece of what they have to bring,
they happened to bring by because I have so much
emotional connection and memories for that person. So if you haven't had the opportunity to get around someone
who's also passionate to get around someone who is as passionate about the same things as you are I highly recommend doing it. So that's my little thing. (chuckling) So I hope you enjoyed this
sawmill a little adventure thing. I certainly did to pecans. Amazing. Anyhow, thank you
as always for watching. I really appreciate it. Any questions or comments on the saw mill or anything back in the shop, please feel free leave me a comment. As always I'll be happy
answering your questions you might have and, until next time. Happy woodworking.
