pappy I believe any species of wood is at its best as a sapling. They just seem more resilient to me.
That's not only your belief, it's a scientific fact. The juvenile wood (the wood laid down close to the pith during the first few years of a sapling) has microfibril angles that are quite a bit steeper than in mature wood. This increased angle makes juvenile wood take compression better than mature wood. There's tons of scientific papers comparing the compression strength in juvenile versus mature wood, and all will tell the same for each species studied. (One nifty paper also related it specifically to archery and yew longbow design).
There's a biological reason for that: saplings are strained more by the elements (wind) than adult trees, and this is nature's answer to that extra strain.
My gut feeling tells me this is also true for branches of fruit trees such as apples, pears, peaches, plums etc, which need to carry tremendous loads. All these species make for excellent bows, by the way, and behave similarly to yew in tension and compression.
Joachim
