Eastern White Pine for Construction

Framing lumber, trim, and flooring can all be made from White Pine. January 8, 2010

Question
A guy I work with is building a new house. He has a lot of EWP trees close to his house. I can have all the logs for helping cut them down. My question is, will EWP make good barn siding and beams?

Forum Responses
(Sawing and Drying Forum)
From contributor P:
Heck yeah. I use EWP for everything including framing lumber. Other than some plywood sheathing, my house, sugar house, and garage are almost entirely made from white pine.

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From contributor L:
Did you make the extra effort to winter cut your pine, or was blue stain a non-issue for your uses?

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From contributor P:
Blue stain was not much of an issue since the exterior siding/trim and much of the interior was painted. The wide pine floors were stained dark (early American) and did have some blue stain, but I think it looks good.

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From contributor R:
About 95 percent of what I saw and build with is EWP. I am hooked up with local tree services and really get more free logs than I need at times. Most of my customers purchase pine for their projects.

I have about 200 pine logs that were stacked in inventory over twice as long as I normally keep them before sawing. These logs have gotten infested with the blackhorned pine borers, which bore holes into the logs. I am selling this wood at a discount and it is being used for sheeting on farm buildings and other non-critical applications. The borers seem to die within a couple hours after being exposed to the outside elements. You can actually hear them cutting in the logs when they become active and you need to start sawing them ASAP.

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From the original questioner:
Thanks for all your help. I have only used hardwoods and yellow poplar. I do not have pines on my farm. From now on I will have to keep my ears and eyes open for more EWP.