[miamiclay]

Thanks Rob, for yet another great public service thread!

Two minor wood-pedantry notes -

Burls aren’t like knots. Knots are an internal indication of where there was once a tree branch, while burls are the roughly hemispherical ‘lumps’ which grow directly on tree trunks, often at the base. I’ll attach a pic below.

“African mahogany” - Ummmmm ... yeah. Like “Bulgarian Champagne,” the name alone reveals the falsity. There are only two generally accepted “real” mahoganies - Cuban mahogany (swietenia mahagoni, the original, the good stuff) and Honduran or Bigleaf mahogany (swietenia macrophylla); both are native only to the West Indies and South FL. I think both types are now considered “commercially extinct” and are protected by the CITES treaties (like elephant ivory), which I expect was the reason for the change by Rolex. Beyond those, you do find “mahoganies” described as Philippine, African, Indonesian, etc., whose wood or burls may somewhat resemble real mahogany, but which may come from any species.

NB - I am neither a botanist nor a dealer in tropical hardwoods, but the above is my understanding.

Burls, in place on a tree trunk -
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