in addition to the type of wood, how it is treated can have a significant impact on its properties. wood for gunstocks should be slowly dried, to prevent grain collapse and splitting, and also to preserve the natural color of the wood; custom stockmakers will buy blanks that have been dried two to three years and then dry it for several additional years before working it into a stock. careful selection can yield distinctive and attractive features, such as crotch figure, feathering, fiddleback, and burl, which can significantly add to the desirability of a stock. while a basic, straight grained blank suitable for a utilitarian stock might sell for us$20, an exhibition grade blank with superb figure could price in the range of us$2000. blanks for one piece stocks are more expensive than blanks for two piece stocks, due to the greater difficulty in finding the longer blanks with desirable figure. two piece stocks are ideally made from a single blank, so that the wood in both parts shows similar color and figure.