After my agarwood tigerwood article was out, there was a number of readers who email me and ask about the tigerwood, some even show me photos of certain kynam which they told me, resemble the resin formation pattern of tigerwood.

I decided to write the part 2 of my tigerwood agarwood story so please excuse my poor writing :)

Among the photos, some were tigerwood alike but some were agarwood which was craved to "look like tigerwood", most of them are of course yellowish entry agarwood.

So how do you know if the tigerwood you hold is of good grade to many, first, if it really is a tigerwood log, look for the "Tigerwood resin flower" in my tigerwood part 1. Next, look at the outershell, whether the 3D Tiger spot are solid, resin color are black and not painted. Finally, observe if the tigerwood undergoes "compression" to make it sinking, which is quite common in the market.



In Asean, tigerwood has appeared in many countries and comes with different forms and beautiful shape. You can spot the "3D Tiger spots" in certain piece of agarwood, but most of the time, you need to light up to test the scent. Some solid blocks of Kyara also has this "3D Tiger spots". 

Now look at the photo below, is it a young tigerwood? Not, it's yellow wood with some similar 3D spot :)




Some Tigerwood comes in different sizes you may have one huge block, which is yellow and mid grade to be around 40kg and another high grade at 20kg. Some super fully resinated tigerwood are just like kynam, except that it is very hard and sinking grade, compare to the semi-sinking Kynam and soft texture resin. Oh yes, scent is different too and modern Kynam nowdays always sinks into water :)


Should you buy one?
If you like the decorative and solid style of Tigerwood, you can buy some smaller pieces in 10g-100g territory, most of the tigerwood blocks are meant for beads making, so keeping a few sample is more than enough. Unless you wanted to do your beads yourself :) Another knowledge for our readers, if your budget is ok, try to buy smaller pieces of matured tigerwood, there are many young tigerwood out there, some are really for distillation grade although it is very 3D :)