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Wood Fence Materials: Available choices include Spruce, China Cedar, and Western Red Cedar.
Outdoor Structures for Fence: The most commonly used materials are Spruce and Western Red Cedar.

Western Red Cedar
Western Red Cedar shares many of the characteristics that redwood has. It is also a very stable, rot resistant wood. The main difference between the two is appearance. Where redwood is very uniform in color, cedar will have large color variations throughout the wood, ranging from a light tan to a dark brown and along with some reds.

This color variation will remain visible through a good translucent stain, and is one reason many people choose cedar.
It is not necessary to stain cedar or redwood for them to withstand the elements, but a stain is the only way to prevent any wood from fading to a silvery gray.

China Cedar
In the past decade U.S. has been importing “Chinese Cedar”. It is very important to point out that this is not western red cedar. It is named china cedar because it comes from the same family as cedar, Taxodiaceae. It comes from the tree Cunninghamia lanceolata, this species is a prized timber in China where it was originally used for coffins and temples because of its valued scent. China Cedar is pale yellow to white in color, with reddish streaks. China Cedar has been tested and compared to its counterpart Western Red Cedar (which naturally repels against pests and fungus).

Spruce
Spruce wood, often called whitewood, is used for many purposes, framing, crafts, decking, and fence. It is usually cheaper than cedar and just a little higher than treated pine. It is more commonly used than cedar and treated wood because of the price. It does have more a a tendency to warp and split compared to cedar, but not near as bad as treated pine will. It has half the life time of cedar does. Spruce is a bleach white color with little various in shades of white with some yellows.

MCQ/MCA #1 Treated Pine
Treated Yellow Pine is a commonly used option. Most often, price is the main reason for picking treated pine. From an appearance point of view it is far from the best choice. Yellow pine is an unstable wood by nature. When pine gets wet and swells then dries and shrinks back, it develops large splits and tends to move dramatically, both warping and twisting. It is not naturally resistant to decay and insects, so it is treated with chemicals to give it those properties.

As a framing material it is the best choice. Where it is not exposed to the sun, it does not have such a tendency to split or move. The chemicals added to the wood make it very rot resistant. However, for a fence you are likely to begin replacing boards within a few years due to splitting, cupping, and warping that will occur. If you do decide to go with treated pine make sure your hardware can resist the newly added treated chemicals in the wood if you don’t the chemicals will make the hardware rust.

***WE DO NOT CARRY TREATED WOOD BECAUSE OF OUR DRY CLIMATE IN THE PANHANDLE WILL MAKE IT WARP!!***