Mulberry for weapons/canes

[JimStC]

Couldn't wait for cold weather. Went out with my Ka Bar 1248 2 days ago and cut a few branches of mulberry to get familiar with the wood at its less than optimal state. It is was very damp. It has two layers on top of the heartwood. There are numerous small branches that require removal. They don't appear to affect the integrity of the wood. Not a significant amount of knots. Looks like 4 on a 36" limb. I normally fill them with wood glue with good results on other woods. These knots are small. May just sand them.
I stripped a limb yesterday (one day of air drying) and left it outside to air dry for another day. It firmed up well and dried a lot more than I expected.
The heartwood is a very nice whitesh tan. The layer above it is a dark tan. It is an attractive wood.
Just went out for the whack test. Multiple hard hits on my birch tree with no negative effects other than on the birch tree which lost some bark.
Humidity here is 42%. Temp is 77 and dewpoint is 47. So it is a relatively dry day for this area.
I look forward to working on limbs that are cut this winter and dried.
Don't overlook this wood. It is formidable even at less than optimal state for cutting.
Edit to add: Go here for the density of mulberry vs other hard woods: http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/weigt-wood-d_821.html
Jim

 

[bikerdoc]

Sounds interesting.

Harvest and dry it over the winter and see what happens. I got some oak, fig, apple, and black cherry so far, more when it stops raining.

 

[JimStC]

Will do Doc. Those are my plans.

Jim

 

[Bikewer]

All I know of the wood is that it was used in the construction of the traditional Japanese Samurai "yumi" bow... Which was of laminated construction.