Just to clarify, what I'm using is NOT hophorn beam like Marlin and TJ use. Hophorn beam is also known as American Ironwood, and is typically lighter in color. I've been using Suriname ironwood which is much darker, even darker than the above pic (which may be the same stuff), and has some dark streaking in it. Like all ironwood, its heavy and dense and has the same sound quality as hophorn beam. I've used hophorn beam in the past but its tough to come by. As far as hophorn beam goes, there is a local callmaker around here named Ernie Moyer thats been using that on his calls for upwards of 15-20 so its not a new wood for box calls by any means, just not seen much because its tough to find. He used to sell them in local sporting goods stores when they were around but havent seen them in a while. Great sounding calls, especially for sawn and glued one siders. Ipe is totally different wood, its heavy and fairly dense but the grain of Ipe is completely different than that of ironwood. I've found Ironwood to be very similar in hardness and density to snakewood, without the figure of course.
