Hazelnut stave "heaven"!

[snag]

I drive by an orchard of filbert trees (hazelnut) everyday. I always glance over and think "I should find out who owns that land and ask if I can do some pruning for them!"
I was a little ahead of schedule this morning and decided to pursue it. After driving to a couple of houses I found the owner. Really pleasant man. When I asked if he would mind if I did some pruning of the 4" diameter shoots he said that would be fine.  Then he asked me what I would be using them for. After I told him he said part of the deal was that I had to bring by any bow I built so he could see it! Deal!  Really excited about this because the younger shoots are really straight without any branches for a long ways.  My question is should I take the bark off of these and then paint the ends so they can dry in my garage? Or should I split them and just seal the ends? Or should I split them, take the bark off and seal the ends?
It's kind of funny how I'm excited over this find...haha

[Del the cat]

I find Hazel doesn't mind being seasoned quite quickly, so if you want to speed it up, split your poles (or saw 'em as they can twist a bit), de-bark, paint the ends and put 'em somewhere warm.
I've had one ready to work in a month by putting on a radiator that only gets upto 38 degrees C.
Have a look at my site (click the globe sybol under my username), there's a whole page of Hazel bows, I even got one with some bark left on, one of my fave' bows althought it's lost a few pounds now.
I've worked it green and then seasoned it too. It takes heat treatment quite happilly (350-400C is what I used).
I think Hazel is an under-rated wood if keep it fairly wide near the grip, pyramid style.
4" diameter is just right!
Del

[snag]

Del, that's good news! Now when I debark the staves this time of year when the bark won't come off as easily...I assume that is the case because of no growth going on...how is the best way to do that without gouging the back? Should I use a scraper? Or, if I'm real careful, the back of a draw knife? I'll check you site out. Thanks, David

[Del the cat]

I tend to use a draw knife to go down to the cambium and then I use the draw knife very carefully or hold it with the blade vertical and use it like a scraper, seems to work for me.
I'll leave a bit of cambium rather than risk cutting into the wood, it'll still dry out fairly quick as I think its the bark which holds in the moisture the last bits of cambium will scape off easy enough later on when you're finishing the bow.
Del

[snag]

Sounds good. Thanks Del