Making driftwood?

[Chad55]

So I am plenty sick of trying to find that perfect piece of driftwood when all I really want is something that looks like branches of a tree... I was wondering would it be possible to take live woodout of my backyard and make it fish tank worthy? I know the chances of it sinking are slim but slate is cheap. So what I was thinking is taking a piece that I like and shaving all the bark off then bake it in a smoker for a day or so then attaching slate and being a happy camper...? Would this work or is it a bit risky?

Chad

 

[SCGeordie]

Here's a picture of my 'homemade' driftwood, currently soaking to get some of the tannins out.
This was a piece of oak cut at the begining of the summer when I had some trees in my yard trimmed.
I selected this piece to fit a 40g I'm setting up (thread to follow in a few days), cut it to size then took the bark off using a 'glass scraper' (razor blade type), then went to work with some sandpaper to get the 'weathered by the sea/sand' look. It's been soaking in (initially boiling) water for a couple of days to get some of the tannins out but there isn't really that much discolouration of the water so I'll probably be putting it in the tank this weekend.
Prepring fresh cut wood will probably be a bit harder (5 hot summer months dried my piece out a lot) and you may get more tannins but definitely do-able (the smoker would be used without smoke?).

 

[Chad55]

I could just use the smoker as a large oven really... i have a day off work tomorrow I think that's what I will do... Are there any types of wood that should be avoided?

Chad

 

[CLDarnell]

Don't use conifers...pine, spruce, fir, cypress, etc. Hardwoods work best.

I wanted to get a nice piece for quite awhile. Recently, I went outside to have a smoke and there was a really nice piece of branched wood laying right in front of my porch. It was debarked and weathered already. It must have been caught up in the top of my tree for quite awhile.

I cleaned it up, poured hot water over it several times, then weighted it down in my tank. It looks good in there