{"id":955,"date":"2014-03-21T17:01:56","date_gmt":"2014-03-22T00:01:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/?p=955"},"modified":"2014-03-31T09:28:22","modified_gmt":"2014-03-31T16:28:22","slug":"wood-sickness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/2014\/03\/21\/wood-sickness\/","title":{"rendered":"Wood Sickness"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brad Withrow-Robinson, OSU Forestry & Natural Resources Extension \u2013 Benton, Linn & Polk Counties<\/em><\/b><\/p>\n

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Wood accumulating in every un-used space may indicate a problem…<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n

This blog often carries information about insect or disease problems emerging in local forests and woodlands.\u00a0 Today I will address a sensitive but common problem in the local woodland owner community, starting with the question:\u00a0 Do you or someone you know have an irrational attachment to wood?\u00a0 Behaviors such as holding back low value logs to saw into boards hoarded for undefined future projects may indicate an important condition you need to be aware of, the wood sickness.<\/p>\n

Common signs of the wood sickness are large accumulations of round or milled wood in a person\u2019s yard, shed, garage or barn. Excessive buildup of chain saws and other logging tools, portable mills, and all sorts of secondary wood working tools are often also evident. Symptoms experienced by suffers may include dry mouth, shallow breathing and irregular heartbeat when near burl wood, quarter-sawn oak or spalted wood.\u00a0 \u00a0Quilted maple, figured walnut and live edges have been known to cause sweating and dizziness.<\/p>\n

People suffering from wood sickness often imagine great future profit, but are generally reluctant to part with any of the gathered wood, leading to an ever-growing supply.\u00a0 Thus, many hours which these men (yes, a great majority are men) could spend in productive family interactions are spent accumulating wood, arranging piles of wood, rearranging piles of wood, trading wood and shaping pieces of wood into other forms. The most common conversion is from round to rectangular shapes which are more easily dried, arranged and rearranged.\u00a0 But the wood may also be formed into floors, furniture, bowls and other household objects in the belief that it will lead to validation and acceptance of the sufferer\u2019s activities.\u00a0 There is of course little evidence of this ever happening.<\/p>\n

Left untreated this condition can become an all-consuming obsession that may lead to the substitution of many familiar metal or ceramic objects with wooden versions, among other things.\u00a0 Treatment options are quite limited, with no pharmaceutical treatments currently available.\u00a0 Rumor has it they are trying out support groups on Michigan\u2019s Upper Peninsula.\u00a0 In acute cases impacts on the family can be severe, leaving the \u201cwoodshop widows\u201d with little recourse\u00a0 but to retreat to the comfort of spinning wheels and sewing machines and the consoling fiber arts.<\/p>\n

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Wood hoarding is serious business for these two sufferers struggling to come to grips with the condition<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n

This article is not meant to stigmatize those with the wood sickness, but to raise awareness and understanding of those with this affliction.\u00a0 It is not limited to but certainly correlated with woodland ownership, and the suffers are commonly friends and family members just trying to lead normal lives while facing future years of retirement.\u00a0 We are deserving of compassion and understanding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Brad Withrow-Robinson, OSU Forestry & Natural Resources Extension \u2013 Benton, Linn & Polk Counties This blog often carries information about insect or disease problems emerging in local forests and woodlands.\u00a0 Today I will address a sensitive but common problem in the local woodland owner community, starting with the question:\u00a0 Do you or someone you… Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1151,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1151"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=955"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":963,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955\/revisions\/963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/treetopics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}