# Cherry Smelling Cherry



## FaTToaD (Oct 19, 2009)

I got a couple pieces of ~6/4 cherry from a friend over the Christmas holiday and when I went to cut a piece off with my miter saw the other night I got a nose full of cherry cough syrup smelling sawdust. I've worked with cherry before, but all of that was from Rockler or a lumber yard. None of it had this kind of smell. It really smelled like cherries, or more like cherry cough syrup.

After reading Brian024's post about different looking cherry, I saw several comments stating that most cherry we work with is Penn cherry. If that's correct, what is Penn cherry?

I'm pretty sure the cherry smelling cherry I have came from a fallen tree, so I guess it's considered "wild cherry"? Is it usual for wild cherry to smell like this? I guess I'm just curious because the smell really caught me off guard. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

David


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## mpounders (Jun 22, 2010)

I have noticed that some cherry I have worked with has had a "sweet" smell…not unpleasant at all! Not as strong as cough syrup tho! I have also noticed that some of my walnut seems to have a choclatey smell….. I blamed it on lacquer thinner and lack of ventilation!


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## rtriplett (Nov 25, 2009)

My neighbor gave me the wood from a dying Cherry fruit tree. It has a very pleasant and strong Cherry smell. It is fun to turn wet, but it has a lot of cracks as it dries. That is the only Cherry that I have noticed as having a distinct smell.


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## reberly (Jan 14, 2011)

I love the smell of cherry when I mill it. I even had to try and taste the liquid in a pitch pocket to see if it would match the smell. It tasted like lightly sugared water with no cherry overtones. 
Rich


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## TopamaxSurvivor (May 2, 2008)

Careful reberly, you know what the squirrels do to make those pitch pockets, don't you?


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## FaTToaD (Oct 19, 2009)

Well, I'm glad I'm not crazy since other's have had cherry smell like this. It's certainly not a bad smell, but it sure caught me off guard.

Robert - Mine has a lot of cracks/checks in it as well. I'm not sure how much of it will be usable, but I can always cut some up to make the shop smell nice.


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## SteviePete (May 10, 2009)

This fall I sawed both black cherry and wild cherry (pin cherry) both had a strong odor…but different. Wild cherry had more and darker figure than black. Spalted wild cherry was especially sweet smelling-I could smell it in the shop for several days. Anchorseal needed to be repeated after about 6 weeks. One coating wasn't enough.


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## Nomad62 (Apr 20, 2010)

There are many kinds of cherry, I've sawn several and all smell wonderful. I just got done sawing up an old weeping cherry stump, all spalted and twisty… I sure hope it holds together as it dries. My fave so far is some silver-leaf maple that is also spalted, it smells almost exactly like Bazooka Joe bubble gum! And no, I didn't try to blow a bubble with it, lol.


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## FaTToaD (Oct 19, 2009)

Smells like Bazooka Joe? That's awesome, I like the idea of shop that smells like bubble gum from time to time. Add some sunflower seeds, dirt, grass, and a new leather baseball glove and I'd be set.


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## Midian (Apr 16, 2011)

Well, I'm not really a lumberjock, but I couldn't resist registering in this forum to answer this question. Indeed, the freshly-cut wood of a *Chokecherry* smells exactly like cherry cough syrup.


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