I've been reading a lot about "my first bow" on this forum so I decided I would like to tell the story of my first bow (and then some) but I also would like to read yours.
When I was a young'n (7) I built my first bow from a cherry branch and a piece of bailing twine. my logic was to make the big end small and it would work like the bigger people's bows! And it did work but not the best tiller, and I was so excited that I showed my dad..... But my dad being...well my dad, said "very nice son" and went back to sleep in his chair.
Then when I was 14 yrs old, I had read about bows and how they where constructed, never really understood but I had a basic understanding of the process. The one wood that stuck out to me was yew, I had seen it when i went hiking and fishing.
When me and my father where return from a fishing trip on the Nehalem river, some workers where taking care of a tree that had fallen over. I recognized this tree, it was pacific yew. I had my dad pull over and convinced the nice old worker to let me have a branch, he asked what for?
And I replied, "I want to make a bow."
"then here you are young man."
I took the fresh branch and I stuck It under the house. Didn't seal the ends or nothing, just threw it under there.
After I thought it was dry enough I whittled a bow out of it
it was 45" ntn 1" wide pulled 38#@ 21"
No sapwood and the back was slightly violated.
Later. When I was 14 we moved and set up home in a new town. We happened to live next to a man who was a Siletz native American and he built bows!!! But he scared me.
One afternoon he saw me shooting a glass recurve I had picked up at a garage sale. He shouted at me
"hey boy! Come over here!"
So I did lol he opened up his garage door as I walked over. There was stacks and piles of yew and Vinemaple.
"have you tried making your own bow?"
"yes, but I'm afraid it didn't turn out so good that's why I have this." looking down at the glass bow in my hands.
He instructed me to go and fetch the bow I had made.
"well, the wood is good....and it shoots. Looks like a good bow to me" he reported.
" would you like to learn more?"
And without hesitation"YES!"
He took no short cuts with me, but was very patient and taught me to make, what you would call a "paddle bow" along this journey he told me how, when, and where to harvest yew and Vinemaple. Harvest from the uphill side and from trees that are under cover bc there struggle for life made the wood stronger, do not harvest from a place near the ocean or salted air. Vinemaple needs to grow out, and then back up. Blah blah blah.
Though some of these things might not be true, but of his own superstition and belief.
Later he taught me how to apply sinew to the back. Oh boy was that painstaking.
He told me if sinew was going on the back then the white sapwood has to be removed, and he did so rather indiscriminately and violently with his draw knife.
I should mention this man was no Ishi, he was just an old truck driver who built the occasional bow, and liked his fire water
he had no children, I think this was his way of passing it on.
A few bows later and I was junior in high school... Gave my bows away and became a troubled teenager who would set park benches on fire and get in a lot of fights... You know the typical stuff hahaha
I turned 21 in 2011 and decided to go hunting for the first time in years..... Problem was I didn't have a bow... So I decided I would make one. And as I carved, hacked and rasped a piece of Vinemaple I relized what I had left behind. Began building more bows, found this forum, joined up and fou d that bows can be made from more than the woods I was taught, and some other methods I've never heard of before.
22 now, and have been experimenting with woods from my area and others. Loving every minute I spend in my garage, just whittling away! Very good stress reliever! Mind goes blank and you just focus on the wood.
Recently my niece built her first bow and I hope she sticks with it, and tells the story of "the time I built a bow with uncle Pinecone"
-Pinecone
