Disclosed is a process for the treatment of wood strands suitable for the manufacture of OSB boards, in which the wood strands are treated with steam without drying after extraction, the steam being passed over the wood strands at a temperature between 80° C. and 120° C. and a pressure between 0.5 bar and 2 bar. Also disclosed is a process for the production of OSB wood-based boards including the steps of a) producing wood strands from suitable wood logs; b) treating at least part of the wood strands with steam; c) drying the steam-treated wood strands; d) gluing the steam-treated and dried wood strands and gluing the non-steam-treated wood strands with at least one binder; e) scattering the glued wood strands onto a conveyor belt; and f) pressing the glued wood strands into an OSB wood-based board.