Mahogany Species Stock Video Footage

The three species are: Honduran or big-leaf mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla), with a range from Mexico to southern Amazonia in Brazil, the most widespread species of mahogany and the only true mahogany species commercially grown today. Illegal logging of S. macrophylla, and its highly destructive environmental effects, led to the species' placement in 2003 on Appendix II of Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), the first time that a high-volume, high-value tree was listed on Appendix II. West Indian or Cuban mahogany (Swietenia mahagoni), native to southern Florida and the Caribbean, formerly dominant in the mahogany trade, but not in widespread commercial use since World War II. Swietenia humilis, a small and often twisted mahogany tree limited to seasonally dry forests in Pacific Central America that is of limited commercial utility. Some botanists believe that S. humilis is a mere variant of S. macrophylla. While the three Swietenia species are classified officially as "genuine mahogany", other Meliaceae species with timber uses are classified as "true mahogany." (Only members of the genus Swietenia can be called "genuine mahogany.") Some may or may not have the word mahogany in their trade or common name. Some of these true mahoganies include the African genera Khaya (African mahogany) and Entandrophragma (sapele mahogany) New Zealand mahogany or kohekohe (Dysoxylum spectabile) Chinese mahogany, Toona sinensis Indonesian mahoga... Learn more about Mahogany