Syringa Short Stickbow

[Gordon]

Several years ago, a Keenan Howard gifted me a set of short syringa staves that he had harvested from the high desert of Central Oregon. I was excited about trying a new wood and attempted to make a bow out of one of the staves and it failed because I had not appreciated that the nodes in the wood were weak spots and they developed cracks under tension. I stored the remaining stave in a corner and vowed that someday I would make another attempt. Fast forward, I recently retired and was contemplating what sort of bow I should make to best commemorate this life change. I have always admired the simple elegance and practicality of the short bows made by the plains Indians and decided that I would fashion the long neglected syringa stave into something similar. I recalled the reason my first attempt at a syringa bow failed and vowed to leave the nodes a little proud to reduce the tension on these potential weak spots. The stave was short and just a little over 1” in diameter so I decided that a bend through the handle bow would be the appropriate design and that I would let the width of the limbs be determined by the tiller. I also decided to make the belly flat so I could get maximum use of the belly surface area. I made the limbs symmetrical because I was not sure what orientation would give me the optimal string alignment. It turned out that the string perfectly bisected the center of the handle area without any adjustment which allows the bow to be shot left or right-handed with either limb on top.

The finished bow is 50.5” ntn and pulls 45# @ 21”. There is no leather handle or arrow rest because I wanted the bow to be as simple as possible – basically just a bent stick. I made no heat corrections to the bow, and it holds 2” inches of natural reflex. The tips are slightly stiff to reduce stack given the shortness of the limbs. The limb width at the handle is 1 1/8” and taper gradually to 9/16” at the tips. I left some cambium on the back for visual effect.  The bow is finished with an amber stain and Tru-oil. The arrow in the photos was made from a syringa shoot and was gifted to me by Dave Cheney. Syringa is excellent arrow wood and is extremely durable. Now that I have made a short draw bow, I suppose I will have to learn how to shoot it.

[rps3]

Sweet looking bow, with a nice unbraced look of potential energy. I had to look up syringa. Is it lilac?
I dont mind shooting a short bow, but only at short distance. I get frustrated with my accuracy past 15 yards or so. Best of luck in your practice.

[mullet]

Cool looking little bow, Gordon. I like simple, myself.

[portlandfire]

Beautiful bow!  Welcome back and enjoy retirement ...

[Pat B]

Cool little bow, Gordon.   

[Tuomo]

Nice bow!

Unfortunately, it is not syringa (Lilac), but rather mock orange. I have made bows of both species and that wood does not look like syringa (it should have nice purple heart wood). Instead, it is very similar to mock orange according to the cambium and the pith.

[Pappy]

Beautiful stick Gordon.
 Pappy

[Will B]

Beautiful stick bow. I love the cambium streaks on the back. Very nice bend like all your bows.

[bambule]

Nice work - as always. But are you sure it‘s syringa/lilac? Lilac is a very dense wood and I have build some bows out of it and never had frets or tensions failures - even with knots/nodes. It‘s so hard/dense, that the bow looks like a stick and bends for 65# :-). But maybe the European lilac is different to the American ones…

Greetz
Cord

[Weylin]

Great bow, Gordon! Nothing there that doesn't need to be. Glad to see you making bows. Congrats on your retirement! We expect to see a bow a week now

[backtowood B2W]

Nice short stick. The profiles are great! Making one of those is on my list, too. Shooting them, as well. Once, I got a pretty nice straight lilac - when I splittet it twisted almost 360degree 

[Gordon]

Hi Tuomo and bambule, I was told that it is syringa by the person who gifted me the wood. That said, I do not know for certain that it is. Whatever it is, it made a nice bow. And thank you for the compliments!

Thanks Weylin, now that I am retired, I will indulge more in making bows. Probably not one a week though as I also love to fish and hunt.

Thanks Dave, I'll show you the bow next time you visit. I think you will like it.

Thanks for the compliments Will, Pappy, and Mullet.

Thanks for the compliment B2W, but based on other's comments, I'm beginning to think this may be a different species of wood.

[Gordon]

I did a little research on Mock Orange on the Internet and discovered that it is also commonly referred to as Syringa though the species is not related to lilac.