TREADLIGHT FLOORING
"New Floors Restoring Old Growth"
Treadlight Brand -- Larch/Mountain Tamarack flooring. (Larch and Mountain Tamarack are different names for the same species.) This wood features a beautiful honey-and-cinnamon hue, with small, dark pinhole knots and very tight grain due to the small-diameter of the trees from which it is harvested.
All trees originate in forest restoration projects that are personally selected in Montana and elsewhere in the Northern Rockies, only from sustainable sites. They harvest only overcrowded, suppressed growth trees (thus the tight growth rings) and leave the larger trees to thrive and propagate.
Larch is the hardest of the softwoods while the tight grain of this small-diameter larch makes it harder still. Janka hardness rating of our flooring is 886 (comparable in hardness to black cherry, teak, black walnut) as tested by the U.S. Forest Products Laboratory.
Thickness: 3/4".
Order time: stock - allow 1 week; custom orders, allow 4-5 weeks.
Minimum on custom orders: 400 square feet.
Traditionally, small forest fires sparked by lightning or intentionally set by Native Americans have thinned Western forests, keeping them healthy and in the condition known as "old growth". For the last 100 years, however, humans often have used poor logging practices and have suppressed virtually all fires, making for many dense, overcrowded forests. Competing for scarce moisture and nutrients, the trees are stunted and "choked" - like an unweeded garden. Some trees have grown to only 6" in diameter over the last century. These overcrowded forests are also prone to burst into the large, high-intensity fires that in recent decades have become common in the West.
Foresters and ecologists agree that these forests desperately need some kind of thinning to restore their original health. At North Slope Sustainable Wood, they cull the small diameter trees in order to allow the old growth forest conditions to return, restoring the forest to its original integrity. Treadlight flooring and trim are harvested only from forest-restoration projects and not traditional logging sites. The forests become healthier, the danger of high-intensity fire is greatly decreased and they are left with a harvest of small trees, also known as "suppressed growth", that possess exceptionally tight growth rings, dense grain and hard fiber - perfect for Treadlight, our beautiful and durable flooring and trim.
- Hue: Honey and cinnamon hue, with small, dark pinhole knots and very tight grain due to the small diameter of the trees from which it is harvested.
- Grade: 2 or better.
- Origins: All trees originate in forest restoration projects that we personally select in Montana and elsewhere in the Northern Rockies.
- Hardness: Janka hardness rating of 886 (comparable in hardness to black cherry, teak, black walnut). View a Larch Flooring Analysis by the U.S. Forest Service.
- Dimensions: Thickness is 3/4"
- Widths: 3", 4", 5"
- Order time: In stock, allow 7-10 days; custom orders, allow 4-6 weeks.
- Minimum on orders from stock: none.
- Minimum on custom orders: 400 square feet.