Blue Pine Lumber

Blue pine or blue stained pine is any pine with blue stain. Blue stain happens when bark beetles attack live trees. They kill the tree and introduce a fungus that creates the blue stain. The amount of staining can vary. From the photos above, you can see it varies from very light to very heavy staining.

Once the tree is cut into lumber and the wood dries, the fungus dies and won’t continue to deteriorate the wood. It leaves behind the colors that can be very beautiful. It gives a very rustic appearance.

Sometimes I have rough sawn blue pine available when I have pine trees die. I prefer when they don’t die. But with all the drought and unusually hot weather we have had in Southern Oregon the past few years, dying trees are not uncommon. The lack of water stresses the trees, and bark beetles come in and kill them.