Have made a sackload of holds over the years mainly out of what spare lumps of wood which i had lying around, which i guess is mainly pine. It is fairly soft wood but is easy to work with and has a nice feel to it when its on your board.
But it also matters what sort of holds your making. Simple shapes like slopers, edges, or crimps soft wood is fine. More complex shapes like undercuts or anywhere a lot of weight is gonna be exerted onto a small thickness of wood your gonna need a hard wood to stop the grain splitting.
Our local woody has been in constant use for over 10 years and the soft wood holds have worn a little more than hard wood. Constant brushing on the pine tends to bring the grain out which can improve friction but gets painful after a while.
Its not a great idea to use the wooden holds for feet, this really does batter the holds. They end up a grubby black, coated with rubber and the corners battered. You can only get em clean with a wire brush which fucks em up. A better option, if its for a board your building, is to have to have a pile of screw ons for feet. If you've got to stand on the wooden holds better make em a hard wood.
