Sourcing Wood

All of my log didgeridoos are made using salvaged wood; I never harvest from living trees for the purpose of making a didgeridoo. My favorite places to source logs are from arborists, beaches, and storm fall/natural cause.

Befriending arborists can be a unique opportunity. Most wood that is cut during tree work will be chipped, and tree workers are often happy to give wood to someone wanting to put it to a better use. Also, urban areas tend to have more variety of tree species than what would otherwise naturally grow in an area, offering unique pieces to work with.

Certain beaches are natural collectors of driftwood, this can depend on their vicinity to rivers, their orientation relative to wind and current, as well as other factors. I have found that most of the driftwood that I've collected is already seasoned (see next section) even if it's wet. The variety of woods I typically find varies a bit between the northern California coast and the Washington coast, and includes mostly Red Alder, Maple, Cedar, Redwood, Monterey Cypress, Madrona, and Bay Laurel. One thing I enjoy about collecting driftwood is learning how to identify wood species without all of the usual queues from a living tree.

I always carry several hand saws in my truck, and sometimes a chainsaw. During winter storms, trees fall or break limbs, and someone has to clean up. There was one storm during my last year of school that brought down a massive Coastal Cypress tree on the median of the street I would take. After class that morning, I drove back to the fallen tree and managed to fill the back of my truck with freshly fallen Cypress logs - a bountiful gift! I drove back to school, got some strange looks while parking, and went about my business.