softwood

softwood

Timber obtained from coniferous trees (mainly of the pine and fir families). With the exception of bald cypress, tamarack, and larch, softwood trees are evergreens. Softwood is mostly obtained from the Baltic, Scandinavia, and North America and is the source of about 80% of the world's production of timber. The term sometimes imprecisely means all soft and hard woods used as construction wood in temperate regions. Softwoods of longleaf pine, Douglas fir, and yew are much harder in the mechanical sense than several hardwoods.

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softwood

1. the open-grained wood of any of numerous coniferous trees, such as pine and cedar, as distinguished from that of a dicotyledonous tree

2. any tree yielding this wood

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softwood

Wood from the evergreens; usually relatively soft and easy to cut and work, although some woods so classified in the US are harder than others classified as hardwood.