tips for beginners on procuring bow staves

[Josh B]

This is a subject that I see come up quite frequently with the beginners.  How to procure bow staves.  I travel the entire contiguous US and I have seldom seen an area completely devoid of bow wood.  So when I see things posted like "I only have access to boards" it baffles me.  If we could offer up some tips for these folks on approaches to getting bow wood, I think it would be a great help for them.   The easiest method I have is to simply observe likely woods along the road, locate the likely owner(farmer), explain what I'm after and for what and ask permission.  I have done this all over the country and never been turned down.  Another approach is tree trimmers for the city or power companies.  If you seem them working, talk to them.  The more logs and branches you haul off, the less they have to.  Wind and ice storms make a big mess of things.  Offer to help clean up the mess for some of the wood.   Always, I mean always clean up after yourself when you do harvest some wood.  These are just a very few ways of many in which to aquire Staves.  Feel free to add any other tips you may have.  Josh

[H Rhodes]

  In this part of the country,  osage and ERC grow along fence rows in the farm country so thick that farmers cut it all the time to maintain their fence lines.  If you spend some time getting to know land owners, it is possible to get lots of bow wood in exchange for helping out with keeping the fences clean.  Reading how much some of you long for osage, I know it is hard for you to imagine country where it is considered a pest! One man's trash is another man's treasure.  I have listened to some of the cattle farmers here in Sumter county complain about having to cut "a bunch of that damned ole bodark" off of their fences.

  Here in the Southeast, there are species that make good bows that are not really marketable in the local timber sales.  Hornbeam, elm, ash, hophornbeam - are not really prized by the timber cutters who are after oaks, hickory, and pines.  If you get to know someone with timber land, they probably won't mind at all if you cut some of these species.  Talk to landowners and see what sort of arrangements you can make. 
     
  I found a hickory mill in a neighboring city which manufactures drumstick blanks.  I have made good bows with the bark covered slabs that they cut off giant hickory trees when they are squaring them up.  These slabs go for about fifty bucks a truckload and will net you two or three dozen bows.  What I can't work with I cut up for the bbq grill!   It is amazing how much bow wood places like this just discard as waste.     
 

[rps3]

There is a catholic university near me that has osage on it's property, so I found the name of the priest in charge of the land and called to ask permission to cut some. Now everyone one around here calls them monkey ball trees, but I was reluctant to use that term with a man of the cloth, so I said osage orange. He said what's that, to which I replied, you know those trees that drop a big green round fruit. He said, oh, you mean monkey balls. He let me cut some.

[Dances with squirrels]

Put a call in to your local forestry service. Sometimes they can help. I had a forester put me in touch with a guy not far away with a big osage hedgerow on his place. The guy let me cut a big osage tree in exchange for making him a selfbow.

[ionicmuffin]

Like people have said, look for the woods that people consider trash. A friends dad was seriously considering paying me to cut the scotchbroom in his yard. It's these opportunities that give you the best chance at finding good wood to use. I will also be finding other opportunities like calling tree cutters and letting them know what kind of wood I'm looking for. In reality I'm surrounded by bow wood, but most often its just finding the right people or conditions. Ill be visiting a farmers property soon because hes got these fallen but alive BL trees.(these trees were pushed over in the winter, but now in spring they have leaves...) There may be a few that I can cut fresh too. Other woods I have available would be VM and Elm. All it takes is communication with the people responsible for the land or trees. Remember being polite and generous(offer them like $20 or something in return for their time and wood.) This goes a long way for building friendships(or at least mutual connections) that will get you 20 staves for $20. That's a pretty good price don't you think? So for the younger crowd just remember and apply these tips that you learn, you will be amazed by how quickly people respond to your desire, bring pictures of what you've made to show them in-case they are interested. Be patient and if they turn you down just ask if you can leave a phone number if they do happen to want to get rid of the wood or something. Also, if they turn you down, be nice about it, no one changes their mind about giving a douche-bag some wood they are attached to. You wont get someone to give you wood by saying, "Wow, why wont you let me have the wood? Its just some lousy wood that you really don't need!" Do you think you would want to give it now that someone has said that to you? prob not. Not saying that you guys out there will say this, but just remember manners, they go a huge way. It's like when I just hold the door open for all my classmates every day. People say thanks and smile, and even the guys have picked up on the manners.

[JackCrafty]

Most of my wood (90%) is cut or gathered without talking to anyone.  It saves time.  And there's less pressure.  I don't know about you but I don't like the phone calls that ask, "When are you going to come over and cut some wood?"  Many times my schedule is unpredictable.  Most guys I've met, that have weird hobbies, find themselves in the same boat.   

Don't get me wrong, I have permission to cut wood on various pieces of land, I just don't ever do it.  When I need a piece of wood, I just drive down an alley or two in the neighborhood and look though the clippings.  Sometimes I find something.  Or I go buy a fence post from the Co-op.  Ebay is also good.  I like the last option best because sometimes I can get seasoned wood.

Lately I've been buying wood.  Seasoned staves.  Lots of it.  Looking for the "free" or cheap stuff gets old.

[Josh B]

Well Patrick....that's probably the most common method of procurement  .  I..ahem..have used the grab and go method as often as any other I would guess.  I just figured that would get figured out during the natural course of gathering materials. Lol!  I didn't want to advocate anything that might be somewhat subject to potential misunderstandings.  Josh

[JackCrafty]

Yes, those misunderstandings are nasty little buggers...

[k-hat]

Yeah it never hurts to offer to make a bow in exchange for harvesting permission.  I even made one without telling the guy i would until it was done.  He loved it.

[JackCrafty]

K-Hat, you harvested some wood from my land too.  Remember? 

[DuBois]

I got some BL from the wildlife preserve. They consider it an invasive species here in Minnesota, as is buckthorn. Most folks want the buckthorn gone 
My first stave was from hundreds of trees downed for a road construction project. I didn't know what it was, as I was completely new to this and now know there was a lot of good wood there I missed out on   

[osage outlaw]

Don't forget to check your local craigslist.  I see people selling BL and osage fence posts frequently.  Just last week I saw an ad for someone wanting some osage trees removed from his front yard.  He just happend to live on the route I take to go home from work.  To bad all the trees were twisted and worthless.

[dwardo]

My top tips.

Folding pocket saw,
Cover of darkness,
Dont get caught. 

Try to do all of the above sustainabley. Dont go cutting a single tree from the middle of a park. If there is a thicket somewhere that wont miss a daughter trunk then no-body else will miss it. Collar every tree surgeon you come across and have a set of contact cards made up in your car read to give them.
If you want to contact a land owner have a bow with you to show them what you make and get them interested.

[Josh B]

All tried and true methods.  Dwardo, lol!  I read your method and had to laugh.  It reminded me of when I was a youngin learning to hunt.  My Dad told me, "I'm going to teach you the proper and legal way to hunt."  And then under his breath he mumbled, "you'll learn how its done the other way on your own soon enough."   There was a lot of experience in that statement!  I did learn the "other" ways soon enough.  It took me a long time to realize that I was cheating myself by using those other ways.  But for quick, easy and practically guaranteed results, the other was hard to beat. Josh

[k-hat]

Lol Jackcrafty there's a whole lotta TX i ain't seen yet and Midland is part of it .  Musta been another k-hat

I've actually had more offers than i can take advantage of, my problem has been convincing myself that they were serious and tryin not to feel like a mooch   Oh, and there's always the problem of "where'm i gonna put this stuff?".