There use to be a standard of the following. Plain was 0-30 degrees grain growth rings to the face of the board. Rift was considered 30-60 degrees. Quarter sawn was 60-90 degrees. But to be fair trees are rarely straight without taper and will exhibit several of these features along their length. A rift board can become a quarter sawn or a plain dawn board from end to end. The less change the more stable the board as a rule.
Blanks would seem like they would be so short that they would not vary from end to end but many have major changes in less than a foot. If bought several blanks when first starting out which were reversed so that the wrist was rift or even almost plain dawn and the butt end was quarter. Sometimes you have enough wood to reverse layout, sometimes you dont. Then they become fore end blanks often. Every stock seems to have good points and bad points. As long as I can get straight grain flow in the wrist Im happy. The problem with most saw men is they want maximum yield with minimal time and effort where we would rather have one perfect blank than several just ok to semi fancy blanks. Back when I was turning fancy pens on my lathe I learned that often a board could produce one one premium pen blank at the cost of several average ones. But one premium blank is so much better that any number of lesser blanks. Gunstocks are the same. One great or no great ones.
