Tamalpais NatureWorks uses four types of wood in its products, certified new-growth wood, recycled wood, salvaged wood and reclaimed or recovered wood.
Certified new-growth, is wood that has been harvested from a certified forest as being sustainable managed, such as SmartWood, an independent certifying organization. Certification is granted to forests owners who can demonstrate that they have and continue to meet stringent forest management practices. Recycled wood is wood that has been recovered from any of a variety of structures, such as homes, office buildings, warehouses, storage tanks, bridges and piers. Because this wood is old and is used does not mean that its value is less than newly harvested wood. In many cases recycled wood can be a higher quality than newly harvested wood. The reason for this is, much recycled wood was harvested from old-growth forests where growth was much slower and trees live longer. Today much of the wood coming from managed forests is second and third-growth, where trees are intentionally spaced further apart (or thinned) to simulate faster growth. With today's faster growth trees, wood has fewer growth rings per inch. For example, old-growth is generally classified as having fifteen or more rings per inch, whereas many of the second and third growth trees today have fewer than 5 rings per inch. The more growth rings a board has, the greater it strength. Salvaged wood comes from fallen or dead trees, due to old age and/or natural disasters, such as tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards or earth quakes. Recovered or reclaimed wood comes from old-growth logs that where abandoned long-ago in steep ravines, or lost in rivers or lakes on their way to the sawmill.

Wood is one of a few renewable resources that reduces our reliance on non-renewable fossil-fuels and lessens the emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. By using natural resources such as wood in a conservative manor we can improve our quality of life, as well as the quality of life of future generations.

At Tamalpais NatureWorks we are working to help you and our planet through the products we make, not just by using the various wood types described above but by designing and building products that last longer. We hope that our conservative use of materials and the design of our products will encourage you to purchase one or more of our products.