Some of my wood I cut and cure myself. Other woods come from wood suppliers around the country including country sawmills. I also buy woods like Sitka Spruce and Alaska Cedar from companies that specialize in selling tone wood to guitar makers.

The calls I make require woods of instrument quality with particular thickness requirements, grain patterns and density, therefore I like to eyeball what I buy.

I constantly look for wood suppliers and saw mills when I'm on the road. I drop in and check things out and if I see something that appeals to me I buy it. I once came home with 400 board feet of black walnut in the bed of my pickup!

When on the west coast recently I stopped in at Goby Walnut in Portland, Oregon. I was like a kid in a candy store! English Walnut, Claro Walnut, Black Walnut, Oregon Myrtle and western Maple! The nice thing was that they had cut off pieces in usable dimensions in their "hobby" bins at a very low cost per pound or per piece. They are happy to let you pick through and I shipped home some really neat stuff in large flat rate postal boxes.

For box call lids you want clear, straght, verticle grain walnut, cherry or similar hard wood, usually called "quarter sawn". The grain should be parallel to all surfaces of the stock piece. For my call bodies I want wood that has been "plain sawn" or "back sawn". The wood grain should be straight and parallel to the surfaces which will form the sides of the call block. The top and bottom don't matter here.