The Wood Doctor discusses the many species classified as red oaks.

Q. What is the difference between red oak and white oak?

The Wood Doctor describes how lumber is steamed and why it is done.

American Lumber says its specially designed custom grade Super Common Red Oak offers a 25 percent higher minimum yield than standard #1 common lumber. It's exceptional quality exceeds industry grading parameters.

Purchasing by cabinet, component and flooring plants will pick up slightly as their inventories thin out over the next two months.

Since I started milling lumber, determining the difference between red oak and white oak has been a challenge. I’ve got a good handle on it now, but there are plenty of times (at least once a week) when a customer has a piece of wood that they want to identify. It is usually some old barn lumber and usually some sort of oak.

Cabinet and furniture manufacturing — key domestic markets for cherry — are growing slower than expected, or not at all, and flooring sector purchases of cherry are now very low. The excess production of both hardwoods is driving down price.

U.S. hardwood exports were beginning to be pinched by Wests Coast labor strife and a rising dollar. Red Oak was in very strong demand, as U.S. sales reached $219 in October, and were up 28 percent for the year so far at $1.97 billion.