To find good spruce you need to go right to the source. I enjoyed some wonderful walking with a customer who is having a Yawldory by Roger Long, N.A., built and wanted the Spruce for the spars, masts, and oars (my job) to come from her friend's land. We walked (i.e., bushwacked) and tagged a few nice Spruce trees.
Birdsmouth Masts under construction for a Michael Storer Goat Island Skiff. With Michael's blessing, Clint drew a yawl rig for the boat.
Varnishing the Sitka Spruce/Northern White Spruce Birdsmouth mast allows the grain of the Sitka to deepen and develop the contrasting lighter-colored Northern White Spruce. You get some of the benefits of Sitka for half the cost by mixing it with the local spruce we get hear in Maine and Canada.
The two masts are for the Goat Island Skiff, a birdsmouth on the left and a hollow-rectangular mast on the right. The mast on right is a customer's that I took in to check for chafing and leathered the chafed areas to prevent more.
