treasure in the woods

[Badly Bent]

Went hunting thursday and the hunting was slow and when the hunting is slow the hunter looks for arrow shaft material. Came upon this arrow wood viburnum bush and the pruning began. Found a thicket of the stuff later on the way back to the truck and went home with about 18 more shoots to add to the ones I've been collecting since deer season began 3 months ago. Been making arrows from this stuff collected in this area the last couple years and its real good and durable shaft material.
Greg

[Pat B]

I've never tried arrow wood viburnum before but I have blackhaw viburnum growing here and it makes pretty good arrows. It does check badly if the bark is stripper too soon. I make most of my arrows from sourwood shoots or hill cane. I can strip the sourwood as soon as I cut it and never had it check.

[osage outlaw]

Does that have a lemon like smell when you break it?  I think I might have a lot of those on my place.

[Badly Bent]

Hi Pat. Bet that sourwood & hill cane make some good arrows, don't have either here so I'm usually collecting the viburnum or bush
honeysuckle. Both good but the arrowood viburnum is more durable in my opinion and looks nicer too. For cane I'm stuck with bamboo
tomato stake material from Lowes.

Hi Outlaw. Not sure about the lemon smell on these shoots but if you think this is what you have it is easy to tell by the leaves in summer and fall if you have a plant reference book. After your familiar with the plant you'll know it instantly any time of year with
or without leaves. Give it a try, I think you'll like it.

[richardzane]

Pat,
thats my experience too. it shrinks very tight. even tiny pin knots along the shaft can cause vertical splits if the bark is peeled too soon.
my mom has some kind of viburnum growing on the side of her house and i've been experimenting with shafts from it.
very dense, good spine even with a pithy core.

[Pat B]

I made a primitive arrow(only stone tools, pitch glue and varnish, turkey feathers and sinew wraps) from the blackhaw vib growing here and even though it checked pretty badly I made a successful arrow from it. I sealed the shaft with pitch varnish and made sure the varnish got into the checks well. Just like with checks in bow wood, they are mostly cosmetic unless they run off the shaft which is unlikely with a shoot shaft. Mike Houston(Hawk) carries this arrow in his hunting quiver for medicine but if needed it would do what it was built for.