Is Birch A Hardwood Or Soft

Softwoods include pine redwood and cedar.

Is birch a hardwood or soft. Even though some varieties of birch lack character when compared to other domestic or more exotic hardwoods birch is still sought after for furniture and flooring because of the ease of working with it. Birch is a popular type of hardwood flooring for its versatility and variety of color options. The specific gravity of sweet birch is 0 65. Both woods make great flooring for your space but there are some differences.

This happens to be generally true but there are exceptions such as in the cases of wood from yew trees a softwood that is relatively hard and wood from balsa trees a. Birch is easily. Birch hardwood flooring is one of the most popular wood species to be used for interior spaces. And softwood comes from conifer trees that are generally evergreen.

In general hardwood comes from deciduous trees leafy or flowering trees that generally lose their leaves in winter. The wood of sweet and yellow birches is hard strong and heavy. Other soft hardwoods. Types of wood comparing american hardwoods softwoods and tropical hardwoods.

Some examples of hardwoods include maple oak alder birch cherry hickory mahogany and walnut. Paper birch wood is lighter and not as stiff hard or strong. Classifying wood as either a hardwood or softwood comes down to its physical structure and makeup and so it is overly simple to think of hardwoods as being hard and durable compared to soft and workable softwoods. One interesting aspect of birch is that it usually has a light colored sapwood and darker heartwood.

With some birch flooring options the sapwood and heartwood may be blended to provide an interesting contrast that makes the birch flooring unique. Yellow birch and white birch are the two most commonly found in woodworking. Birch hardwood has a straight tight grain. Yellow birch rates 1 260 paper birch 910 and gray birch 760.

Sweet birch has a janka rating of 1 470. On a hardness scale birch lumber ranks at the top with hard rock maple and in fact is often mistaken for maple. Birch is reserved for butcher blocks some tool handles and specialty. Equally popular and similarly durable is oak hardwood which has been used for floors boats and barrels for centuries.

Birch is a native hardwood that comes from the genus betula. Because of its grain it is often chosen for flooring in an unfinished state.