Few Bog Oak pens made in Ukraine. Are 5000-7000yrs old claims true?

[yaroslaw]

Hi there.

I'm probably the biggest expert in Bog Oak given I've made much more than 1000+ Bog Oak pens over the last 10 years. I live in Ukraine (where there's a lot of it in rivers) and was lucky to meet and become friends with a guy whose father's hobby was finding and processing this exceptional material. I make him some Bog Oak pens, he gives me wood.
It's my main seller, just got an order for another 20 bog oak pens yesterday.

Having said that, I was always really dubious about claims on US sellers' sites about 3000-5000-7000yrs old Bog Oak. I was always telling my customers "it's probably 1500-2000 yrs old" with black wood and 1000-1500 with greyish-brown.

A year ago, just before the full-blown War started, my friend presented me with a big board (2"x4-5") of Bog Oak so I took an offcut and sent it for Radio-Carbon (C14) dating. And I have my certificate back, stating I have 2950+-75 year old wood.
It's almost pitch-black all the way through the heartwood after an oil finish, it has A TON of small internal "cracks", and it dulls HSS tools after just a few passes. I have to sharpen my skew several times just to take last finishing passes and if not fortified with thin CA at the ends it may self-destroy in a blink of an eye.

And now it seems to me like claims about 5000-7000yrs old bog oak are a bit "overestimated". I bet you really don't want to have and work with something older than 3000yrs. I would prefer to work with 2000 yrs old Bog Oak but I've got what I've got. And 1000-2000-3000 yrs for customers is really not that much of a difference. Some prefer more black, some prefer lighter colors, but it is about looks and not age.

It's not a fault of fine US folks who sell this material nor penmakers - C14 dating is rather expensive so no one wants to test materials unless they have a lot of it. And you really can't check the age any other way, as even if I show you a certificate (real certificate from a lab, not a useless piece of cardstock you get in a penmaking shop) there's no easy way to verify it was from the same piece of wood. And Photoshop can make things much more complicated in a moment...

So what's my take on it? Take it with a grain of salt. Don't overpromise your customers. They'll be happy to have 2000yrs old pen as much as 5000yrs old. I personally don't belive 5000 or 7000 yrs old Bog Oak is at all workable, seeing how fragile and mineral infused is 3000yrs old wood. But I may be proven wrong.

If you have any questions about working with this beatyfull material regardless of it's actual age, feel free to ask.

Cheers, Yarek.

 

[Dieseldoc]

interesting . well done.

 

[jttheclockman]

Love the story. Love your pens. Love the clip. Love the wood and the finish or nonfinish.

As for authenticity, I never believe all these blanks that say they come from this tree or that tree or are WWII woods and so forth. Yes you can have a piece of paper or card that states that but what does that really prove. Never was into that type blank and have never made one and will never. I could never back up the claim so why bother. WaYYYYYYYYYY too many nice looking woods and acrylics out there that have no story and do not need one. My opinion only.

 

[Alan Morrison]

Bog oak from the Midlands in Ireland have been carbon dated by Queen's University, Belfast as dating back to 4464 BC + - 9 years.
I would not be disagree with their assessment nor would I believe that every bit of bog oak is the same age.
Love your pens, by the way, Yarek.

Alan

 

[yaroslaw]

Love the story. Love your pens. Love the clip. Love the wood and the finish or nonfinish.

As for authenticity, I never believe all these blanks that say they come from this tree or that tree or are WWII woods and so forth. Yes you can have a piece of paper or card that states that but what does that really prove. Never was into that type blank and have never made one and will never. I could never back up the claim so why bother. WaYYYYYYYYYY too many nice looking woods and acrylics out there that have no story and do not need one. My opinion only.

It's one of the most beautiful materials and regardless of age it's the pens that I ended up selling the most. Most men are buying this for themselves or as a present to another man, even if they didn't at first know the story of the wood. It's just looks really classy and woody.

I'd just cut those claims in half and be pretty safe. If its pitch black its easily over 1500 yrs old, closer to 2000-3000. It's a shame to skip it even if those claims are a little bit overexaggerated

It's a walnut oil finish (the edible kind), it needs no more and I love this finish over any other on bog oak.

 

[yaroslaw]

Bog oak from the Midlands in Ireland have been carbon dated by Queen's University, Belfast as dating back to 4464 BC + - 9 years.
I would not be disagree with their assessment nor would I believe that every bit of bog oak is the same age.
Love your pens, by the way, Yarek.

Alan

I hear you. I have worked with so many different pieces of Bog Oak - different colors, textures, densities, mineralizations. All from pretty much the same rivers through Ukraine. Trees fall all the time and they are preserved in bogs (in Ireland) or rivers (Ukraine).
And I did get only one piece RC14 dated from internationaly recognized lab, but I can guarantee you my pieces are all of the different ages. It's not about labs/Unis not being right. It's also possible that different conditions lead to different preservation of wood.

I've had pieces that were by the looks younger than 1000yrs and older than my dated 3000yrs, but looks are sometimes misleading. Nevertheless I believe 7000-year-old bog oak would not be a "wood" anymore, given how fragile and mineral-rich is my 3000yrs-old board.
Should I mention that I change bandsaw blades after just a few meters of cutting bog oak?

Having said that, it's My speculation based on My experience. I would LOVE to see someone selling Bog Oak pen blanks in US make an independent assessment in a lab and not simply believe the age. It's the main reason I made this post. If someone is interested, I can hook you up with an internationally recognized lab in Ukraine that can make that analysis for decent money (for a business that values their reputation, at least). I did so cause I wasn't comfortable guessing the age of the wood, not because I wanted to make more money. I wanted a real answer about how old it is and I've got it.

It's not fair to others who take the age of their wood seriously and do not claim it's 7000yrs old.

And the main pain for me as a Ukrainian is I see those claims on Ukrainian wood more often than not((

 

[yaroslaw]

Bog oak from the Midlands in Ireland have been carbon dated by Queen's University, Belfast as dating back to 4464 BC + - 9 years.
I would not be disagree with their assessment nor would I believe that every bit of bog oak is the same age.
Love your pens, by the way, Yarek.

Alan

I want to reiterate that it's more about Ukrainian bog oak as it's the only type I'm familiar with. Irish one have different preservation conditions and therefore my thoughts may not apply at all.

 

[derekdd]

Beautiful pens.

Thanks for the detailed information. I wondered about those claims.

 

[wimkluck]

I like the wood. I see the age as a USP. Unfortunately it is not or only poorly available in the Netherlands. Do you sell bog oak or blanks?

 

[hokie]

If you think about it logically, it's not like oaks only started growing 2000-3000 years ago in Ukraine. Nor did all of the oaks that got buried in mud only got buried within a small time frame. It is entirely possible and even likely that logs of oak recovered in another part of the country have an entirely different history behind them. There is no obvious reason to doubt the claims of 5000+ year age from my perspective.

It all boils down to established provenance and trust. Coincidentally, I just bought a billet of bog oak from Hearne Hardwoods in Southeast Pennsylvania. I completely forgot to ask the sales people about it and so I emailed them a few days later asking what the story was and got this back from Mr. Hearne himself:
"...that oak came from Austria where it was carbon dated from 2500 BC at the University of Salzburg. They discovered it when they drained a reservoir that was built over a bog around 1900 and in the process of deepening the reservoir they found the trees in the mud."

I am perfectly happy with that history and everything I make with that billet will get that little blurb provided with it at well. If I was so inclined, I could probably contact the university and go through all of that, but I trust the source and to me, it's easier to just relay the actual story behind it than make something up, so I am content!

 

[David350]

Great looking pen, please stay safe...

 

[Woodchipper]

There are those who salvage sunken cypress trees in the Deep South. Many places, it is illegal to cut cypress trees.
Those are nice pens, no matter the age of the wood.

 

[yaroslaw]

If you think about it logically, it's not like oaks only started growing 2000-3000 years ago in Ukraine. Nor did all of the oaks that got buried in mud only got buried within a small time frame. It is entirely possible and even likely that logs of oak recovered in another part of the country have an entirely different history behind them. There is no obvious reason to doubt the claims of 5000+ year age from my perspective.

It all boils down to established provenance and trust. Coincidentally, I just bought a billet of bog oak from Hearne Hardwoods in Southeast Pennsylvania. I completely forgot to ask the sales people about it and so I emailed them a few days later asking what the story was and got this back from Mr. Hearne himself:
"...that oak came from Austria where it was carbon dated from 2500 BC at the University of Salzburg. They discovered it when they drained a reservoir that was built over a bog around 1900 and in the process of deepening the reservoir they found the trees in the mud."

I am perfectly happy with that history and everything I make with that billet will get that little blurb provided with it at well. If I was so inclined, I could probably contact the university and go through all of that, but I trust the source and to me, it's easier to just relay the actual story behind it than make something up, so I am content!

It's not that there are no really old Bog Oak trees in Ukraine. I know that there are, and I saw certificates from other people with very different ages. It's just the wood deteriorates, becoming more mineralized and less and less woody. Probably 30% of my board can be used to make pen blanks with a quality good enough to sell, the rest have small microcracks and deterioration all around. And it was very nice (visually) board that would be good enough for bigger projects like furniture or small boxes. And big procentege of all bog oak excavated ends up in a fire bin. I can use it being really careful and using a lot of CA. I can't imagine wood being twice as long in those conditions and being dense enough to be turned by a beginner.

I know I would prefer 2000 or even 1500 year old bog oak to work with because it's so much easier. This 3000 BO easily doubles my time making pens (and it's a bummer as I make a LOT of them) and I don't charge any different regardless of age.

Thing about trust is that you can trust your supplier, and if they went and rechecked their Bog Oak at a lab, it's great! Happy for you and hope to hear from you later how difficult you find to work with your billet being so old.
My main point was to encourage people to do the same and ask those questions from suppliers. And suppliers go and do the lab tests themselves. As I said, I'm just dubious, and I would be happy to be proven wrong.

 

[yaroslaw]

I like the wood. I see the age as a USP. Unfortunately it is not or only poorly available in the Netherlands. Do you sell bog oak or blanks?

I don't sell it because I don't buy it (it's always some wood for a pen situation) and a friend pretty much isn't interested in selling it (even to me). Besides. it would be really wrong if I post all that rant and then did a post "buy BO from me I'm the only one trustworthy"... %)))))
We talked with Ed from Exoticblanks 10 years ago about supplying them with a Bog Oak, I talked with a friend and it stopped there, it was not big enough profit to deal with international shipping and customs work (and yes, doing a lab analysis takes a big chunk of profit out instantly).

Having said that, a swap is by all means possible, but at the moment this particular piece is really hard to work with and I'm not comfortable giving it to someone who doesn't know how to deal with it. I'd wait until I get a somewhat less old and more pen-friendly piece.

 

[hokie]

It's not that there are no really old Bog Oak trees in Ukraine. I know that there are, and I saw certificates from other people with very different ages. It's just the wood deteriorates, becoming more mineralized and less and less woody. Probably 30% of my board can be used to make pen blanks with a quality good enough to sell, the rest have small microcracks and deterioration all around. And it was very nice (visually) board that would be good enough for bigger projects like furniture or small boxes. And big procentege of all bog oak excavated ends up in a fire bin. I can use it being really careful and using a lot of CA. I can't imagine wood being twice as long in those conditions and being dense enough to be turned by a beginner.

This is an interesting point and I apologize if I missed it in your original post. You're saying it seems unlikely that people are making bog oak products from bog oak that is *truly* as old as they say because of the difficult way the wood behaves when it gets to the age they claim? That is a pretty fun fact! I had no idea. It makes sense though.

 

[BULLWINKLE]

Hi there.

I'm probably the biggest expert in Bog Oak given I've made much more than 1000+ Bog Oak pens over the last 10 years. I live in Ukraine (where there's a lot of it in rivers) and was lucky to meet and become friends with a guy whose father's hobby was finding and processing this exceptional material. I make him some Bog Oak pens, he gives me wood.
It's my main seller, just got an order for another 20 bog oak pens yesterday.

Having said that, I was always really dubious about claims on US sellers' sites about 3000-5000-7000yrs old Bog Oak. I was always telling my customers "it's probably 1500-2000 yrs old" with black wood and 1000-1500 with greyish-brown.

A year ago, just before the full-blown War started, my friend presented me with a big board (2"x4-5") of Bog Oak so I took an offcut and sent it for Radio-Carbon (C14) dating. And I have my certificate back, stating I have 2950+-75 year old wood.
It's almost pitch-black all the way through the heartwood after an oil finish, it has A TON of small internal "cracks", and it dulls HSS tools after just a few passes. I have to sharpen my skew several times just to take last finishing passes and if not fortified with thin CA at the ends it may self-destroy in a blink of an eye.

And now it seems to me like claims about 5000-7000yrs old bog oak are a bit "overestimated". I bet you really don't want to have and work with something older than 3000yrs. I would prefer to work with 2000 yrs old Bog Oak but I've got what I've got. And 1000-2000-3000 yrs for customers is really not that much of a difference. Some prefer more black, some prefer lighter colors, but it is about looks and not age.

It's not a fault of fine US folks who sell this material nor penmakers - C14 dating is rather expensive so no one wants to test materials unless they have a lot of it. And you really can't check the age any other way, as even if I show you a certificate (real certificate from a lab, not a useless piece of cardstock you get in a penmaking shop) there's no easy way to verify it was from the same piece of wood. And Photoshop can make things much more complicated in a moment...

So what's my take on it? Take it with a grain of salt. Don't overpromise your customers. They'll be happy to have 2000yrs old pen as much as 5000yrs old. I personally don't belive 5000 or 7000 yrs old Bog Oak is at all workable, seeing how fragile and mineral infused is 3000yrs old wood. But I may be proven wrong.

If you have any questions about working with this beatyfull material regardless of it's actual age, feel free to ask.

Cheers, Yarek.
View attachment 350918View attachment 350919

Привіт Yarek (online translator used-hope it's correct for hello and not something else). I couldn't care less about the age. Fact is that bog oak is a beautiful wood !
We have a wood here that is centuries old and beautiful. Also hard to work with as it's found in the Louisiana swamps where it has been under water for over 100 years. Very expensive and sold in large slabs that cost thousands of dollars. I can't find any place that has it in pen blank sizes. It's called sinker cypress. Point is the age is less important than the looks of the wood. That bog oak is beautiful. This table top sold for $4000.
It's expensive because divers go into waters with poisonous snakes and alligators, wrap chains around it, and bring it up with cranes.

 

[Curly]

New Zealand has Swamp Kauri that is 50,000 years old. Age isn't as important as the environment that the wood was in.

How about 50,000,000 year old trees. Now that's old!

 

[sorcerertd]

I love the pens and the etching is very well done, cleanly cut. I'll bet it would take a nice epoxy inlay well.

I still have several blanks (pen and hobby blanks) from Ukraine. I've purchased a couple times from BogoakStoreUa on Etsy and been pleased with the quality and the shipping time to the US. It seems like one batch I bought, may have been from another seller a while back, was carbon dated to 6040 years +/-. Either way, it's old and it's beautiful.

 

[penicillin]

Bog oak from the Midlands in Ireland have been carbon dated by Queen's University, Belfast as dating back to 4464 BC + - 9 years.
I would not be disagree with their assessment nor would I believe that every bit of bog oak is the same age.
Love your pens, by the way, Yarek.

Alan

I have some of those scientifically dated Irish bog oak blanks. Read the certificate carefully. They were not carbon dated. They were dated based on dendrochronology - the tree ring pattern in the wood. The distinct pattern of annual rings (some thin, some thick) can be used to determine the years when a tree lived. It is kinda' like a fingerprint.

The lab report / certificate says that it dates to 4464 BC + - 9 years. The lab report is a PDF file that was provided by the seller. Based on additional research of my own, I believe that the certificate is authentic and represents a true dating of bog oak by an expert at a university laboratory in Ireland.

There is no easy way to prove that the bog oak blanks that were shipped to me come from the same wood that was tested in the lab. In theory, I could measure the tree ring spacing on the pieces I have, to see if they match the spacings listed in the report. If I ever do, I'll post the results here on Penturners.org.

 

[SabertoothBunny]

Those bog oak pens are amazing, great work. I have gotten some of that swamp Kauri wood, it surprisingly colorful. It comes out beautifully when finished.

But just as the bog oak was described as being delicate the Kauri is no different. I smashed a blank unintentionally when pressing it together, the ends just crumbled in like I have never experienced before. So it would seem that the swamp wood in general are delicate.

I recently acquired a box of North Carolina Cape Fear Valley/River bog pine. Quite nice looking wood, especially considering it is pine. It is amazing how many types of trees get pulled into the waters and sit for ages but don't rot. Very cool.

 

[Mike]

I love this stuff, great post OP and all the others as well.

Thanks,
Mike

 

[wimkluck]

Does anyone know if you can stabilize Blog Oak with catus juice?

 

[yaroslaw]

Thanks everyone for replies. Yeah, it's very muddy waters (hehe) and no way of knowing if a pen blank cut from the same tree that was certified.
But I agree with most - I was making Bog Oak pens for 10 years not having any certificate. I really didn't care as I love it.

Does anyone know if you can stabilize Blog Oak with catus juice?

Yeah, tried that for a pitch black pieces with cracks. I really don't like the result, Cactus Juice doesn't like to fill cracks (it is designed to fill no more than 0.5mm spaces if I remember correctly). Often you will see whitish/greyish streaks on black that could look somewhat ugly.
Tried also more solid pieces with an idea to help with engravings (as by default it is hard to have clean engraving on BO, pens on those photos are results of a lot of experimentation), and it's not worth it. You will still have open pores after stabilization that you need to fill with CA, it still soaks CA but might have those ugly streaks.

My hypothesis is that pieces that require stabilization are too porous to hold CJ inside. It's like stabilizing a sponge.

But I have found out that especially those pieces also soak in epoxy under pressure like crazy and you end up with a very solid piece of "stabilized" wood. This way it turns with carbide tools (HSS DIES instantly) and takes polish really well. I still have to make photos of recent experiments, one I blame success and one not so much. I hoped it would make turning crosscut BO easier - it is still brittle as hell for crosscut turning. I have managed to finish it only to crack when assembling (and I spent a lot of time preventing it from doing so) and messed up with a finish. The straight cut turned out very good though.

Made a few rings with very solid bog oak stabilized with Cactus Juice - it helps with dimensional stability on rings and looks almost not-stabilized (lots of pores). So it's a viable option just needs a lot of experimentation. In the future for those applications I would use epoxy. If you try though, make sure you have much more epoxy than you think you need Started with 50 g to fill few cracks, ended up adding 200g more for a block that would be 350g if there would not be any wood in it.