Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Around the Campfire => Topic started by: ionicmuffin on April 19, 2013, 01:42:08 am
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So, As the title says, what started your journey? Ill start with mine.
As a boy, I was like most others my age; I loved the Indians, thinking it would be so very exciting to be like them. Time and time again I would "build" a bow. What I was really doing was not bow-making, but it sufficed for my interests. Patrick, a good friend of mine, would make these bows with me. The one time I had made a decent shooting bow Patrick and I wandered around the yard, terrors of the neighborhood. My sister and her friend, who happened to be Patrick's sister, where out in the yard, "Shoot near them." Patrick says, and doing just that, I shot, hit his sister's eyelid, and got in big trouble. In consequence the bow was snapped in half by my dad, and that was the end of a "good" bow. The rest of my childhood seemed to involve bows at some point or another. When we moved I had found another stick that seemed like a good choice for a bow, and, for a while it held up.
That's just part of it. I just recently was able to find a story that i had forgotten about until now. Sign of the Beaver. I am going to buy it again, but i have to say, it was an AMAZING book, great read and well worth my time. Its about a boy whose left at a cabin while his father goes to fetch his mother and sister and leaves him there. He is barely making it, up until the natives help him out. He learns to make a bow and arrows, he learns to navigate well through the forests, he learns to hunt, and be self sufficient. One of my all time favorites for primitive fiction.
What is your story? why did you start?
Before i forget. I was like 8 or so when i shot his sister, bad deal, didnt intend to shoot her in the eye. Shes got perfect vision even today. The eyelid was the part that got the impact and it was on the bone.
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I have always been interested in Native American life. I have found several artifacts. I found my first arrow head when I was very little, probably 4 or 5 years old. I was playing in a creek bed and found a rock shaped like a Christmas tree. I didn't even know what it was at the time. Luckily my parents did.
Although I was a compound shooter, I wanted to try a longbow but couldn't afford to buy a new one. I put an ad on Craigslist looking for a used one. Some guy offered to make me a selfbow in exchange for some osage from my property. I helped him cut and split some. That got me interested in making a bow so I cut and split some for myself. By the time that guy finished my bow I had already made two myself. And in my opinion, my second bow was much better than the one he gave me. I have been hooked ever since.
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To old to remember, ;) :) I think it was I am tight and it cost little money, nothing but time. :) I don't Golf don't fish much don't care for sports or TV,so I needed something to keep me out of trouble. ;) :)
Pappy
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I've always been interested in the outdoors and I liked pretending to be an indian more than a cowboy when I was a kid. It really started when I read Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs. That books is what started the gears turning in my head. From there I got curious about natural cordage, the friction fire, and it just hasn't stopped.
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We made simple bows as kids out of green cedar limbs but I didn't carry this bow making past my early childhood.
I shot a Bear recurve in the early 70s, tipped to the dark side for a number of years when compound devices came out but never felt like I was carrying a bow. In 89 I got fed up with technology, sold my wheels and bought me another recurve(Bighorn), got real good with it.
One day in the early 90s, I was walking down the road at my hunting club and ran into a guy I didn't know who was toting what looked like a limb branch with a string on it. I asked him"do you hunt with, THAT?" He answered "yes". Next I asked "ever kill anything with it?", "killed a deer with it the other day" he said.
I am getting real intrigued with his bow about this point and asked him how he made it. He said" come over to my house and I will show you". A few days later I was at his house and he showed me his method for making a bow. Wasn't long before we were great friends, Joe Bogle is his name, super nice guy and one of my best friends to this day.
As many of you know, once the bow bug hits you are in it's control for a lifetime. First you make a bow, then another, then go crazy cutting bow wood and finally try to pass on the craft to anyone who expresses an interest. Bow building is truly a rich and rewarding addiction.
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Satisfaction in making your own equipment and it's cheap to boot.Course our money is only worth as much as what the government says it is which is'nt much of a comfort.The stuff made by hand seems worth more to me.Differnt values I guess.
You can bow fish Pappy.Then you'll be fishin and hunting at the same tiome.
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I got tired on having to buy the next tech apparatus to keep up and started researching building my first wood bow. I think Jay Massey's "The Bowyers Craft" really got the juices flowing for me. I first hunted with a Shakespear recurve(1979) before I went high tech but that only lasted a few years before I bought another glass lam recurve, then a glass lam longbow all the while thinking about building my own wood bow.
I was reading a new issue ot Traditional Bowhunter years ago when I saw an ad for a new magazine called Primitive Archer. I immediately send a check for a subscription and waited for a few months(I think) for the first issue to come. I have been HOOKED since then. I still have my recurve and longbow but never shoot either. I've been shooting selfbows and wood backed bows exclusively for many years now.
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Read a field and stream article about 10 yrs ago that explained how a guy could make a primitive bow from a sapling. They said you could make the whole thing with a knife... Well, I tried and my first 3 bows were ugly and failures. Then I met a guy who said he would teach me and we started meeting every now and then. Made my first from Osage and couldn't believe how simple and primitive the whole process was. I kept picking my bottom jaw up off the floor and he could tell I was just hooked
After that bow I started making my own and we would still get together once-in-awhile. I have been totally absorbed with this addiction ever since. I'm like Pappy, in that, it is relatively cheap and keeps me out of so much trouble. You know the sayin "idle hands..."
Scott
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Always fascinated with the fact that the wood bow ran the world for thousands ofyears. Started making green survival bows around ten. Subscribed to pa in1993 and bought bows and arrows of native americans by jim hamm. Been hooked ever since. Taken afew breaks to do what teenagers do but have always found my way back
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Wow! lost of variety as to why people started ;D Keep em coming! :laugh:
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Hi my name is Leroy I haven't shot a compound for 16 years come june 7th.
Don't ask why I remember the date it's a family show. Had a old archery canada deer slayer recurve. Started playing around was hooked hard. Liked making quivers and arrows. Freind had a magazine shop he pointed out primitive archer thought I might like it. That's the long and short of it
Thanks Leroy
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For starters I am an NDN - Mountain Maidu from Northern California and Turtle Mountain Chippewa from South Dakota. I always knew I was NDN but was not raised in the traditions. Three out of four grandparents were all products of the NDN boarding school system. That means that a lot of what I should have been able to learn from them I did not. I did learn from them about family and working hard with what you got to make the best of what you have. As I got more edumacated in elementary, high school and college I learned more from a lot of poeple what it is to be NDN. Then I got a job that pays me to be NDN. It was always there and has been continually nurtured ever since. You also got to remember that "Primitive" skills are not just NDN, they belong to all of us in our histories at some point in time or another!
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thats very true Ben. I always think of primitive as Native American, but i suppose any culture with stone or other non modern tools would qualify.
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Love of the outdoors + Addiction to wood that grows straight = Primitive skills fool. ;D
Been making bows and arrows since about age 7. Got jump started in 2005 when I got slapped in the face by a savvy ebay bidder. I was angry for months. It was just a silly Native American bow and arrow set, Right? WRONG. So now I make my own.
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I got started 1987 I ordered jay masseys book the bowyer craft,,i have not been the same since ;D
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I took a trip out west to many of the national parks in 2009. I saw many museum examples of native weapons, and was immediately intrigued. As soon as I got home I started researching their bows, arrows, and weapons, and haven't stopped making them or learning about them since.
Jon
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Like alot of people, when I was a kid I used a stick with bailing string and horse weeds for arrows.
Later in life came the flint locks and that has carried over to archery. I used to shoot modern archery but it lost
most of its fun after afew years.
Just doen't get any better when you make and use your own equipment.
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Raised in an environment with little money and the attitude that "if you need something, you can make it yourself. " Spent all of my free time growing up in the bush. Watching and learning. We grew up hunting ,fishing , helping out on relatives farms ,working hard and playing harder. Self reliant family . Very fortunate to have a great extended family (huge) where everyone shares what they know.Lots of access to tools ,wood and wisdom.Grandad was a pioneer in Northern Ontario (born 1896) . Raised a family of ten on the farm and trapped in the winter.My mother was born in a log cabin with no running water and no electricity. Taught in a one room schoolhouse when she turned 17. So as you can see ,I was fortunate enough to be only a generation away from the "settlers" that most only get to read about.
Yosemite- The residential schools happened here too. My friends were the children of the victims. A very black time that robbed the world of so much.
So, ..... that's it! I know feel a sense of duty to keep the old knowledge alive for our children . I think a lot of the others here feel the same.
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I'm just the tipical ranch country kid was a cowboy fight'n injuns and bandito's ::). But as most kids loved anything that sent something through the air at hire speeds than throwing. We made slings, sling shots (AKA wrist rockets) and yes green limb bows with bailing twine, fishing line, or what ever was handy for strings. cat tail arrows with a roofing nail stuck in the end for weight, pointed end in like a small steel blunt. We had wars with these set up's and they hurt reel bad when they hit you would'a got a good skin'n had we got caught. Started hunting in 81 with a new browning compound shot about 200 FPS back then we thaught that was fast. Like most archers I progressed with time 94 had a PSE with 4" overdraw set at 90 pounds smoked a big alum. shaft, that bow cost me two nice bulls in one morning and a wounded buck later on account my release was on my dash rather than my wrist. Saddly I'm a slow learner but I got a bear take down hunter and hunt'n became fun again. 2001 took a class with John Strunk built my first real bow. About the same time I had started researching the local Ochoco Natives cause where I hunt I see heads all the time and always wanted to know who was here before me. Been pretty serious hooked ever since or kinda in a way always was just took a while to figure it out.
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Peeing outside rather than using a toilet..... ??? :laugh: ;) ??? :laugh:
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Some great stories here! well bow101 i think that wouldnt be considered a primitive skill ::) :P
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Because Primitive was the way it was in the beginning thousands of years ago, and it's the way it will be for me when I die:)
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Got introduced by my neighbor to archery and while I shot compounds the traditional was always in my mind tried to make a few when I was little don't think I ever really succeeded, shortly after buying my fourth compound ( a hoyt that I had saved for a long time to buy, and still shoot about twice a year, cost close to a thousand dollars total ) I realized I had just enough money to buy the cheapest hunting weight fg bow on the market (Martin jaguar) which I hated ( on sale right now in the garage sale) and decided I could make something better than it. started to search online and decided this was something I wanted to do
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A Jay Massey book got Me interested in Primitive, then I found out a Guy that lived close helped People make bows. Went to a garage in Flint and met a Guy by the name of Gary Davis, and have been infected ever since. Bob
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My desire to want many, many, many bows and having ZERO money to get any more than one. Why not make them from wood myself I thought? 150 bows later I still feel like each one is my first, I love that feeling.
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Some great stories here! well bow101 i think that wouldnt be considered a primitive skill ::) :P
:laugh: yes but he qouted "primitive activities" not skills. Any way I think what got me going was making slings way back when I was a youngster.
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I have never had a compound bow that could take what I throw at a bow- it has to serve as a javelin and sparring stick-staff too as well as a bow. It needs to not suffer damage being dragged through the bush by the string. it needs to be elegant enough to look good but be rough enough to be primitive. it also needs to cost under $10. It must be able to shoot my 1000 grain arrows and my 100 grain flight arrows well.
I started slinging, then javelin, then.... I am now addicted to bows.
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I grew up during the "War" in Cody, Wyoming. There were no TVs, freezers, or spending money! You could get a red rubber innertube from the gas station for free. The Saturday movie cost 14cents if you could sell enough milk bottles to afford it and watching the pictures of the war let us know it's progress! In the fall a dollar would buy a l00# sack of potatoes and 50cents would buy a sack of beans from the then called "Jap Camp" if you could afford it. If you wanted something you built it! There were two locker plants in town and we filled ours with wild game. Us kids could hitch hike anywhere with our fishing poles, bows, or 22 if you had one. We sold magpies for 5cents, prairie dogs for a penny, jack rabbits in the winter for a quarter and were lucky to break even with 22 shells costing 36cents. My sling shot, sling, bow, and single shot Stevens Junior were my weapons. We hunted and fished year around. Every family had a coupon book and the women traded with each other for the things they could afford to buy. If you wanted something you made it! Even in collage in Laramie I shot and sold jack rabbits to help with the expenses. So when did I start the primitive life? You could say I was born into it! Joe
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I shot a compound bow for several years but I always noticed that the trad. guys seemed to have much more fun.
I remember a group of them shooting at a matchbook (or something about that size) at 50 yards or so, laughing and
having a good ole time.
When I finally made up my mind to start shooting traditional I went to an archery rendezvous in hopes of finding a
decent used bow for sale. I didn't....
that afternoon a couple of primitive bowyers (current buddies of mine) held a bow building class and I watched one of
them take a black cherry stave to shooting bow in just a few hours. From that point on I knew that I wanted to build a
bow myself.
I think that most will agree that whether we start out building bows or knapping or whichever other skill we practice that
it's all sorta "tied" together and we want to learn those other, related skills as well.
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i bought my first Bear recurve from my uncle when he switched to compounds way back when.i was eight years old.he was having a garage sale and had that bow on the table.i asked him what he wanted for it.he said whatever you have in your pocket.i got the bow for eight bucks.i still shoot that old Bear today.it is my bowishing rig.that is how i got started.
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I grew up during the "War" in Cody, Wyoming. There were no TVs, freezers, or spending money! You could get a red rubber innertube from the gas station for free. The Saturday movie cost 14cents if you could sell enough milk bottles to afford it and watching the pictures of the war let us know it's progress! In the fall a dollar would buy a l00# sack of potatoes and 50cents would buy a sack of beans from the then called "Jap Camp" if you could afford it. If you wanted something you built it! There were two locker plants in town and we filled ours with wild game. Us kids could hitch hike anywhere with our fishing poles, bows, or 22 if you had one. We sold magpies for 5cents, prairie dogs for a penny, jack rabbits in the winter for a quarter and were lucky to break even with 22 shells costing 36cents. My sling shot, sling, bow, and single shot Stevens Junior were my weapons. We hunted and fished year around. Every family had a coupon book and the women traded with each other for the things they could afford to buy. If you wanted something you made it! Even in collage in Laramie I shot and sold jack rabbits to help with the expenses. So when did I start the primitive life? You could say I was born into it! Joe
Interesting story. Makes you wonder why some us are so appreciative of what we have and others don't give a hoot about anything including human interaction. Rats have more social graces than most people these days........
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Well, it really started with my Dad getting into hunting about a year ago. We have always been "gun" guys and used to work together at a local gun store. When he told me about a guy in his hunting course, I asked what he was gonna hunt with. He said a bow he made himself. Being the researcher I am, 3 week's later, I had a itch that has been looking to be scratched. So in the interm I have read a lot and watched a ton of video's. I now have a draw knife and stave on the way, and plans to go to the TN Classic next year and see where this all leads.
Paul F.
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I grew up during the "War" in Cody, Wyoming. There were no TVs, freezers, or spending money! You could get a red rubber innertube from the gas station for free. The Saturday movie cost 14cents if you could sell enough milk bottles to afford it and watching the pictures of the war let us know it's progress! In the fall a dollar would buy a l00# sack of potatoes and 50cents would buy a sack of beans from the then called "Jap Camp" if you could afford it. If you wanted something you built it! There were two locker plants in town and we filled ours with wild game. Us kids could hitch hike anywhere with our fishing poles, bows, or 22 if you had one. We sold magpies for 5cents, prairie dogs for a penny, jack rabbits in the winter for a quarter and were lucky to break even with 22 shells costing 36cents. My sling shot, sling, bow, and single shot Stevens Junior were my weapons. We hunted and fished year around. Every family had a coupon book and the women traded with each other for the things they could afford to buy. If you wanted something you made it! Even in collage in Laramie I shot and sold jack rabbits to help with the expenses. So when did I start the primitive life? You could say I was born into it! Joe
Wolf, people like you need to write down your stories. They might not become a best seller, or make you a million dollars, but they need to be saved and told. I love to talk with WW ll vets and hear their stories. Not just stories of war action, but just what they did day to day, and what they thought and wondered about, as the world was in a state of unknown. Stories from people growing up here at home during that time or before are very interesting as well. There is plenty written about the famous and powerful of the past, but it is the everyday guy that made us and the country who we are today. People like you paved the way for us coming after you.
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I used to make cane spears to throw around the yard as a kid (I still do at 27). I spent most of my time running up and down the creek and just being outside. For a high school "indian project" I made a blow gun with 12" cane darts (later on at home I had a friend shoot me in the side of the face with it. It stuck there.) Making things myself has always interested me. Somewhere along I learned that indians made bows out of hedge apple trees and at the time I stored it under useless facts I know. I've hunted with compounds for quite a while but since I recently bought a house and have a place of my own to tinker around at I've started trying to learn new outdoor skills (not necesarily primitive). So far I've trained 2 squirrel dogs, made my own maple syrup from the trees n my yard, grafted some pink and white dogwoods and at some point I recalled from my 'useless facts I know file' that indians made bows from hedge apple trees. After a few hours on Google and Youtube I found yall. Blessed with plenty of private land access I started by cutting my own tree. My first bow attempt failed about 1 month or 2 ago when I got it to full draw and I've been super busy this spring landscaping and hunting turkey and haven't had much time to work on my 2nd attempt. I'm also trying to postpone making another as long as possible so my remaining wood can season some more. Hopefully I'll have a shooter by this fall.
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Wow! I'm really liking all the stories so far! I never get tired of hearing these stories, keep em coming!
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Also, I'd like to add that another book that drove my archery craze to its limit was the Rangers Apprentice series. Great series about a boy who trains as a ranger(kings secret intelligence and elite archery corp) and as an apprentice, practices with a bow for many years and learns knife throwing, silent movement, stealth, investigative skill, and other skills. It really peaked my interest in bows because I was reading about some crazy accurate shots they did and it was all so amazing. I realize obviously that I would have to train for years before I could even be that good, and it would be several years of non stop training. None the less, I'm now more focused on getting accurate for big game hunts.
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My story is different. I didn't really know what drew me to primitive skills and weapons, fire making, etc, until I found a copy of a book I loved as a child and re-read Call It Courage, by Armstrong Sperry. It was written in the 1940s, and is a great story. A South Pacific kid named Mafatu is considered a coward by his people, and takes a canoe with his little dog, vowing to never return unless he finds bravery. He ends up stranded on a strange island with his dog, and has to fend for himself. He makes weapons, fire, shelter, etc. He faces his greatest fears, the ocean, a shark, a wild boar and an octopus and leans he has had courage the entire time, and what bravery is really about. He builds an outrigger canoe, and escapes when canibals discover him there. He makes his way home after a harrowing chase and ocean voyage and proves to his people he is just as brave as the mightiest hunter and fisherman.
The entire story is fun, and I am sure all the skills he learned to do I must have wanted to learn, as well. I still haven't battled a shark with a bone knife or a wild boar with a spear, and I still totally want to build an outrigger canoe one day.
Dane
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YES! THANK YOU DANE!
i have loved that SAME book! that was part of it as well!
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It is a great story. Everyone should read it. Mafatu has only himself and his skills to house and feed and arm him and protect his dog. He makes everything himself, and can only make a bone knife when he finds a beached whale skeleton. The skills he acquired from being forced to do "women's work" (since he was a "coward") at his villiage because he won't fish (his mother died at sea during a storm when he was very small) come in really handy as he survives. He was definately a hero of mine when I was a kid. And growing up in the city, it was all totally exotic. And having a real outrigger would be awesomely cool.
I love tiki drinks, too. They don't go into that in the book, however, but he does enjoy ribs when he kills the boar. :)
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I have been thinking about this, and it has been several things that got me started. I can remember finding some dart tips and some arrowheads (lost most of them now), got into looking for arrowheads again last yr. Then there is the fact that I have a little bit of native blood along with wanting to kill a deer / elk with all homemade equipment.
Now that I have started my journey in traditional archery. There has been two very pleasant side effect, 1st I'm getting to talk to a lot of nice talented people who enjoy this sport (you guys and gals) and mostly my 13 yr old son is getting into this with me now. He cut a small maple stave yesterday and now wants a board to work on.
Happy Hunting Ed.
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I'm not sure when or what started it for me, I grew up in the inner city, Buffalo N.Y., raised by a single mother.
I always loved nature and history, so I suppose that's where it started, and I'm kinda an artsy do it yourselfer, I always loved the challenge of learning to make things for myself.
Because of my love of nature, I learned to fish and hunt and that lead me into callmaking. I spent 20 years designing and making all kinds of game calls, still make them to this day.
I shot and hunted with a compound bow all of my adult life and then about 8 years ago a friend of mine invited me to join Hawkeye Bowmen Archery Club and I learned that there was more to archery than wheels and cables.
Fellow club member Dave Reed introduced me to Gary Davis and I made my first self bow with him and killed both a doe and buck with it that hunting season and never picked up my compound again.
I loved that first self bow! Named it Hawkeye Spirit! It was a special bow, it changed my life!
I made three more bows that were just OK bows, then last May at The Tennessee Classic, I won the stave donated by Clint(Osage Outlaw). Clint said it was from a Monster osage tree that yieled 100 staves! I knew that I had to try and make another special bow from this stave, and I think I did.
I'm going to miss the Classic this year because of a once in a life time adventure, if things go well, I'll post pics when I get back.
Kevin
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I'm not sure when or what started it for me, I grew up in the inner city, Buffalo N.Y., raised by a single mother.
I always loved nature and history, so I suppose that's where it started, and I'm kinda an artsy do it yourselfer, I always loved the challenge of learning to make things for myself.
Because of my love of nature, I learned to fish and hunt and that lead me into callmaking. I spent 20 years designing and making all kinds of game calls, still make them to this day.
I shot and hunted with a compound bow all of my adult life and then about 8 years ago a friend of mine invited me to join Hawkeye Bowmen Archery Club and I learned that there was more to archery than wheels and cables.
Fellow club member Dave Reed introduced me to Gary Davis and I made my first self bow with him and killed both a doe and buck with it that hunting season and never picked up my compound again.
I loved that first self bow! Named it Hawkeye Spirit! It was a special bow, it changed my life!
I made three more bows that were just OK bows, then last May at The Tennessee Classic, I won the stave donated by Clint(Osage Outlaw). Clint said it was from a Monster osage tree that yieled 100 staves! I knew that I had to try and make another special bow from this stave, and I think I did.
I'm going to miss the Classic this year because of a once in a life time adventure, if things go well, I'll post pics when I get back.
Kevin
I got one of those staves to Kevin. Still have to turn mine into a bow, but it would be cool if sometime Clint started a thread to show all the bows that that tree yielded.
Jom
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Yea Jon, 100 pics of 100 bows made from 1 tree!
That would be COOL!!
Kevin