I recently spent about 4 days trimming trees on our property!  The main reason was that some of the tree's branches, mostly the Leyland Cypress trees, were growing out far enough and then hanging downward enough to make it impossible to mow very well without getting slapped around and poked in every part of the body as well as having small fragments of their leaves all over me, which is fine, EXCEPT for those that find their way down the back of my neck and under my shirt! Talk about itchy!!!  Off point for a moment, but I find it hard to believe that there isn't some scientific name, other than "leaf", for Cypress leaves.  They are so different than what most folks think and visualize as a leaf! Anyway...

I have no idea why, but seeing the red core of the Cypress branches sparked an idea that maybe I could gain something more that simply an easier path and time of mowing around them! I began to quickly exam each branch, separating the ones with larger red cores off to the side.  I disposed of all the other branches by hauling them to what we call our "brush pile"!

When finished, after about four days, I carried a few of the saved branches over to my shop, toying with different ways I could "strip" the outer portion of the branches, leaving only the beautiful, incredibly delightful smelling core!

Unfortunately, I simply have not come up with a minimal labor, safe, speedy way to accomplish my goal.  So, just to get an idea of what the end product "may" be if I could develop a more efficient process, I cut a few sections from the branches, placed them, one at a time, into a bench vise and used a drawknife to shave away that outer bark and a bit of the inner bark to completely expose the red core! A drawknife (or draw shave) has a blade that is generally about 8" to 12" long with handles at each end.  You pull, or "draw", it toward you to scape or shave away wood, in this case, the outer bark. This particular drawknife  belonged to my father and, with his passing, I inherited it, along with a ton of other tools I rarely, if ever use! However, I also inherited a ton of hand tools I DO use on a regular basis, so, THANKS DAD!

As I was able to remove the outer bark, I took one section of the core and chipped it into smaller pieces while leaving the other two pieces whole.  On the two whole pieces, I simply drilled a hole in a scrap piece of wood and a matching hole in one end of the Cypress core, then inserted a larger type of toothpick into the core section and shoved the exposed section of the large toothpick into the scrap piece of wood, which allowed each of them to "stand" on their own.

The smell, when I place the Cypress near my nose, is fantastic!  However, I'm not convinced the smell is strong enough to have an effect on an entire room, even a small room!  So, while I have already developed what I believe is the perfect name for selling these little gems of nature, between NOT developing a simple way to produce an attractive end product, nor having completed the testing to see if it will, in fact, enhance a room or not, I have resisted the urge to run out and trademark my name for this product!

But I did include a few pictures just so you could see what I spent at least a portion of my time doing today!  I had intended to work outside in the yard today, but we are having a badly needed rainy day! No complaints from me! We absolutely need more rain!

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading about my silliness today and please feel free to comment or even ask any questions you may have about anything I have included in this blog or even anything you may have some questions about how to do yourself!  I may not always have the answer you are looking for, but I am sure willing to try, willing to help, and/or willing to steer you in the right direction if I am not 110% sure how to deal with it!

UPDATE!

As I feared, the Leyland Cypress does not give off near the amount of pleasant scent that a Cedar tree does!  In fact, if you aren't holding the Cypress material fairly close to your nose, you may not even notice any scent at all!  A bit disappointing, but not totally unexpected!  Also, if you are planning on building something out of Cypress, the red core may not hold up for long, depending on how you treat it or store it.  Apparently the red core is affected quite a bit by UV light!  What I believe this means is that it will start losing the red coloring and will likely, slowly start browning or turning a greyish color.  In most cases, even applying a good, clear topcoat will not slow this process.  If one can locate a clear topcoat with good UV blocking capability, it may go a long way towards retaining the red coloring.  I also researched what would occur if I were to simply apply a good quality furniture oil to the Cypress and I was pleasantly surprised to find that using oil on Cypress may actually preserve the red coloring for quite some time!  Good News!

So...my suggestion is to NOT waste time playing with the Cypress in hopes of gaining some pleasant scent to spread around your home.  However, if you are considering building something out of Cypress, you may want to research and evaluate where the item you are thinking about creating will be placed or stored.  You may find that you are going to have to oil it pretty quickly, and regularly, to retain the red color as the "turning" process begins as soon as it becomes exposed to natural sunlight!

With that in mind, I'm going to put some thought into what I could build, just to better understand the way different topcoats vs oils may work for keeping that beautiful red coloring!

Thanks for checking in and please feel free to comment, share your thoughts and/or ask any questions you may have!