safe African wood

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SeanTrollope

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what wood is safe to use that occurs in relative abundance in southern Africa.

i would like to add a nice piece of wood to my tank but i find the ones that one can get at the lfs are either very bland or way over priced. since we have access to large pieces of land(bushveld) literally over the road. i would like to choose my own wood and cut it to size ect.
 
It would be easier for you to tell us what trees are around, then we can tell you if they're safe or not. I'm not sure us Googling 'African trees' isn't going to be of much help to you.

One issue you're going to face is that wood you put in your tank really needs to be long dead, so telling for sure what tree it came from might be quite difficult, unless you cut it fresh and store it somewhere for a year or so...

If you have any fruit trees near you, the wood from those is safe.
 
okay so there is no lack of dead trees lying around, and that list would be enormous.

one very common tree is a monkey orange. it does produce a fruit but no body eats it.
 
okay so there is no lack of dead trees lying around, and that list would be enormous.

As long as this; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Southern_African_indigenous_trees_and_woody_lianes ?

one very common tree is a monkey orange. it does produce a fruit but no body eats it.

Well, yeah, seeing as it's got strychnine in it's actual name I should hope they don't!!! By 'fruit tree' I meant things like apple, cherry, pear or plum. Citrus wood is extremely problematic, it is often slightly toxic; certainly to fish.

Mate, really, you need to give us some clue as to what's available to you.
 
right okay.

there is also stem fruit. and no there are none of the trees you mentioned
 
Jackal Berry – Diospyros mespiliformis
Stamvrug – Englerophytum megalismontanum
Buffalo Thorn – Ziziphus mucronata

these are some of the more common fruit producing trees
 
The first and last of those should be safe, although if you can 'test' them with some pond life (daphnia, or mosquito larvae; you could leave it in a bucket outside to soak and see if you get anything surviving in there with it) that would be for the best.
 
thank you very much. i managed to find another piece of wood of the same species that i have currently got in the tank i know it not to be harmful as its been in there for a very long time. its scientific name is ochna pulchra but is more commonly known as lekkerbreek
 

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