Hi Midd, I stained my S&G boat. You'll have to sand excess epoxy off your scarfs which will destroy your stain job. Numerous other operations along the way will ding and scratch the unprotected stain so I would wait until the last moment to stain. You will get a faint line on your scarfs where the glue repels the stain; the workaround would be to color the epoxy with dark wood flour when you are making the scarfs.