Wood questions

[northmn]

Sucking minerals up in the base makes sense however the flame in the birch tend to ripple when split like the curl in maple.

DP

[TPH]

Rolfkt, thanks for the pictures of the beautiful Scandinavian rifles and that chair is a delight! The birch you have access to is extremely good wood for gun stocks, looking at a collection of the military rifles of Finland will show that very well. Hard, dense and durable and many stocks show exceptional figure.

[The other DWS]

another speculation: 
Having shot a fair amount of both historic and modern arms over the years it's pretty evident that black powder loads have a substantial difference in their recoil characteristics.  I assume its because of the different burn rate patterns.
    The significance being that perhaps the, for lack of better term, "easier recoiling" of a black powder arm (particularly in the round ball era with lighter weigh projectiles than later conical slugs) made the use of figured woods more practical for non-military (meaning non-bayonet equipped) arms.

another  question:   Has anyone noted any correlation between figured (weak-grained) wood and relatively thick-walled barrel arms like rifles or straight grained (assumed to be stronger) woods for thinner walled barrels of fowling pieces?