This is a world class petrified oak round from the Deschutes River Canyon in Central Oregon. It's a nice medium sized, richly colored fossil red oak round from one of Oregon's prized petrified oak deposits. The good quality red oaks are seen less frequently than the more common white oaks in this deposit. The cell structure in this one is really remarkable and much better preserved than lesser specimens you'll find elsewhere. The color variety in this exceptional museum piece even comes through in the micro-photo along with the distinctive structure of the log! It really is absolutely gorgeous! While our imitators attempt to match our offerings, the camera doesn't lie - this piece is truly world class and so is the finish - even under magnification it's mirror perfect and all you see is the cell structure, not sander scratches! This is a thinner slab that came from the Beck collection several years ago. Dan explained to me then that the slabs had come from yet another estate where the lapidary was doing some inlay work and cutting some truly world class Deschutes oak logs into thin slabs for that work but was eventually bought out by the Becks. I picked up a few of the slabs and came across one I'd set aside for strengthening before refinish it but had lost track of it in a truly chaotic rockshop. I've stabilized some internal fracture lines and backed the stone with fiberglass to give the thin cut added strength, then refinished it completely in our shop to produce a truly mirror perfect, museum grade collectible from one of the world's most prized fossil oak forests!
I've seen some beautiful oak rounds from the Deschutes River canyon over the years, and this beautiful, darker colored round is among my favorites! It's a gorgeous, full pattern log with beautiful, rich coloration that really shows off the wood grain nicely. The petrified oak found in Oregon is one of the most prized and the most collected petrified woods in the world. These deposits form the foundation of the best oak found anywhere on the planet. There are three principal locations for petrified oak in the state. Deschutes canyon produced the most wood with mostly black and white colors. Stinking Water Creek comes next with the famous "golden oak" that is still found from time to time but increasingly difficult to obtain. The most intense petrified oak colors were found in the reds and pinks of Swartz Canyon. It is on private ground that is no longer open to collecting (and hasn't been for decades) so what you see now is all that will be. The same is true for the Deschutes oak log deposit. The color in this finely detailed round is much richer than many Deschutes wood specimens, and few are this flawlessly preserved. The details of this round's rays, growth rings and cell structure are lost on the relatively small photo, but even here the medullary rays weave like the ribs of a basket through the annual rings from the heart all the way to the rind - this gorgeous grain is why wood collectors are so drawn to oak! This is a highly agatized log so it matched well with our skills to coax a gorgeous, lustrous polish from this beautiful specimen. It's just amazing how beautiful petrified wood can be and the fine oak specimens found in this remote Central Oregon desert location are among the finest in the world. This piece has fabulous cell structure and wonderful eye appeal. The wood grain is very visible in this piece both in the form of annual growth rings and medullary rays. This is a nice, medium sized specimen with incredible color, unprecedented contrast and a fantastic naturally round shape. It would make a wonderful addition (or foundation) for any collection. This stone has been professionally cut and polished on a special lap that produces a flat face and a mirror perfect shine. The polish really is liquid perfect - a difference in the quality products Sticks-in-Stones has built its reputation on! This choice round measures about 9 3/4" x 7 1/2" across. It's cut about 0.27" thick. Weight is 1.02 lbs.A nice, unique naturally wonderful stone collectible exclusively from Sticks-in-Stones Lapidary - eBay's Original Rockshop!