Raw hide from dog chews?

[Sidewinder]

I have heard some of you say you get your rawhide from dog chews. Are they long enough to cover a whole limb or do you piece them together. I also assume you just want the unflavored kind. Do you just soak them until they are pliable and untie them?  Thanks in advance for any input thats helpful.    Danny

[Pat B]

Dog chews will work but they are cow rawhide which is thick. You should reduce the thickness and you will probably have to splice them at mid limb.
 Ask on Trading Post for deer or goat rawhide strips. You will have to splice almost any rawhide. I usually overlap two strips at the handle.

[Sidewinder]

Thanks pat will do.

[bowmo]

I use dog chews from time to time. The huge dog bones, or even better this time of year the ones shaped like huge candy canes produce several 40 or so inch strips. The insides are filled with small pieces though.  They can work great if you put them on wet and stretch them like crazy as you glue them to the back.

[RBLusthaus]

I use them frequently.  Soak them in water to untie.  Lay them out on a flat board and nail them down to stretch and flatten them.  They will dry hard and shrink a little.  Take out nails and sand them smooth and flat.  Sometimes I do this process more than once.  As Pat says, they are quite thick and uneven, so the thinning is necessary.  Once thinned out, wet again to use on the bow.  They are usually not long enough, so I overlap at the handle.

Russ 

[paoliguy]

Maybe you could use the flavored ones as an attractant for coyote hunting???

[eponym]

I recently soaked and untied a large dog chew and it resulted in one wide (wide enough for 2 strips) piece about 35" long.

[knapperboy]

Maybe you could use the flavored ones as an attractant for coyote hunting???

haha best comment ever! Someone should give this a try!

[Prarie Bowyer]

The ones I get take days to soak and wrestle flat.  Hot water helps.  They also need to be decreased.  The best application I had I scraped the inside to get the fluffy steff reduced.   The scrubbed it with dawn on the inside using a scrub brush.   Wiped the wood with alchohol prior to gluing.


The one I didn't do this degreasing to came off when it shrank.  IMO for the effort I'd say buy a deer or goat rawhide.  Use what you need and sell or trade away the rest. 

I used a card scraper to thin after it was glued down.