For centuries, the fast-growing balsa tree has been prized for its light weight and stiffness relative to density. But balsa wood is expensive and natural variations in the grain can be an impediment ...

Club Ochroma is the bar of choice on Barro Colorado Island, and I've arrived a little early for happy hour at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Station. It's 3:45 in the afternoon, and I'm perched on ...

Seizures of illegally harvested balsa wood more than doubled in Ecuador between 2019 and 2020. Timber mafias operating along Ecuador’s borders with Peru and Colombia have been profiting from the ...

Where does the balsa tree grow? Why is it so lightweight? What is it good for? Why do I even want to talk about it? Balsa trees were mentioned a few times in a story of jungle survival by a group of ...

Ecuador is the world’s biggest exporter of balsa wood, most of it shipped to China. Indigenous communities in Ecuador’s Pastaza River Basin say balsa is being logged illegally in their territories.

More than one of my childhood birthday presents included a balsa wood airplane. They came as assembly kits that were fun to build but not as much fun as tossing them into the air and watching them ...