Bitternut Hickory

[Jude]

Hey everyone.  Been out of the loop for a while now.  Seems like since I got back from Iraq, the home improvement projects have eaten up all my time.  Last week I finally got out to the woods to get a nice straight little hickory I spotted back in November.  It's bitternut, as near as I can figure, but I need to go back out and look at the twigs to be sure, because there's a slim chance it could be pignut.  I split two staves off the side that had natural reflex, one for my son and one for me.  Looks like his got the bulk of the reflex, about an inch and a quarter compared to my half inch.  They had a pretty strong prop twist, so we chopped them down to near finished dimensions green, then clamped them to a straight board to get the twist out.  That seems to have worked.  This tree had nice thick rings, and next to no early growth wood, so we're hopeful.  Has anyone else used bitternut?  It's technically a pecan.  I'm wondering what we can expect for performance out of this wood.  Thanks, Jude

[Eric Krewson]

Lots of folk obsess over different kinds of hickory and what is best. To me hickory is hickory, all makes pretty good bows.

[DarkSoul]

Even the weakest species of hickory (I wouldn't know which one that is) is very strong. All hickory/pecan makes good bows.

[cracker]

I'm with these guys hickory is pretty much hickory. it's all tough stuff. I wouldn't wory about the early growth either It'll be fine. I've made many bows of hickory and yet to have one break. The first one I built had a five growth ring violation on the back on one limb and four rings on the other it is about 15 years old and still shoots.Ron

[Eric Garza]

I've used bitternut hickory, and in fact split a 14 inch log of it yesterday that I was gifted by someone who was otherwise going to turn it into firewood.  I've found it to be an excellent bow wood, and am always happy to use it.  I suspect you'll be pleased!

[okie64]

I have a really hard time telling the hickories apart. We got 4 or 5 different kinds around here and the only one I can tell for sure is shagbark. I usually just use pecan because I know for sure what it is. Bitternut should work fine.

[Jude]

Managed to pop back out there again today.  It's definitely bitternut.  I looked online to ID it, and bitternut is the only hickory with bare, yellow winter buds; all the other's buds are encased.  Still no leaves out here in Upstate NY.  The distribution map I found online showed a small pocket of pignut hickory in approximately the same area, but for the most part, we have bitternut and some shagbark, closer to the lake.  My little hickory grove is right in the middle of a hawthorn thicket, so it's lots of fun to get to.  I was looking to harvest some hop hornbeam I spotted last fall, but upon closer inspection, they were half dead and more than half rotten.  They looked like they might have been crowded out by the thorn bushes.  The whole area is former farmland, kind of swampy, and coming up thick with wild apples and hawthorn.  All the elm I find are long dead.  The deer and turkeys love the place though. 

Managed to clamp all the twist out of the staves; we'll have to wait and see if it returns during tillering.  They are stil losing weight, so they aren't quite dry yet.  I sealed the ends and put them up in the loft of my motorpool maintenance bay.  The heaters are still running, so it's nice and warm up there.  Hopefully, by sometime next week, we'll be able to cut the profiles and start tillering.  Next thing to do is split a couple staves out of the deflexed side of the log.  I plan to make a couple bendy handled bows for my younger boys, and I'll steam some reflex into the tips.

Hope you all have a great weekend,
Jude

[crooketarrow]

   If there still green do what I do to all of my staves. Cut them down to simi bow form put them between 2 saw horses and hang a cider block or 2 off the middle. Hickorys easy to reflex like this. No heat or steam involed easer and better bows in the long run.

[Jude]

Thats sort of how we did the first two, reduced them down close to the finished side profile, then clamped the twist out of them. Since the sudbury I'm building didn't have much reflex, I inserted blocks at midlimb, and clamped the handle to get a little r/d profile.  My son's holmgarde had plenty of natural reflex, but we had to place a block in the center and clamp the handle straight.  When his tips were clamped straight, the handle section still twisted off to one side.  It's funny how two staves, side by side in the same log, can act so differently.