The Teak tree
They are trees with a large, straight and cylindrical trunk, which grows up to 30-40 meters in height and up to 1.5 m in diameter. The lower section of the trunk, under the lower branches, can even exceed 10 m.
The leaves are opposite and very large (30 to 60 cm), oblong, velvety. Teak loses its leaves in the dry season.
The flowers are collected in inflorescences and are white and fragrant.
The fruits are round, edible drupes. Teak has been blooming and bearing fruit for around 20 years.
The wood has a color that varies from pale yellow to bronze and sometimes tends to red. It contains a natural oily resin which makes it extremely resistant. It is not even attacked by termites.
Wood is used in the construction of outdoor products, ship decks, musical instruments such as the didgeridoo and in all those places where strong water resistance is required. It is also used for parquet floors.
Teak is easily worked and has an oil naturally produced by the plant.
There are also medicinal uses of this plant.
The sapwood of the teak is clear, while the heartwood is golden-brown, with greenish veins, sometimes black and gray. To the touch and sight it appears oily and with a characteristic smell of old leather. It contains an appreciable percentage of silica and is refractory to impregnation, even in an autoclave.
Its drying in the air is a rather simple process, particularly for the drums to which "basic ringing" has been practiced. The operation, which is carried out whenever you want to make the trunks more floating to make them flow easily, consists in removing a ring of bark near the base of the tree to cause it to die on its feet. The feeding is thus interrupted having cut the main ascent channels. Probably the combined effect of an "emptying" of the stem, by gravity combined with the consumption by the leaves of what is still available to them, allows a certain "cleaning" of the trunk, which will free itself from many coloring substances by taking, sawing act, a less variegated chromatic aspect.
Source Wikipedia