Well, I was in the shed yesterday digging around for some snake skins and came across a sliver of fire killed sassafras that had been up in the rafters for a long time. I decided to see if I could chase a ring on it. It was tiny, full of borer holes, and had some rot on one end as it had been a standing dead fall.
I chased a ring (they were very thin) and to my suprise got under all of the insect and weather damage into some nice clean wood. I scraped a little bendy in the handle bow 54 inches long maybe 30@24 out of it and tillered good. My wife and I shot it about a dozen times and then......CRACK
It lifted a splinter midlimb at a tiny pin knot. Upon further examination, the ring was so thin (but not violated) after sanding near the knot it just tore like paper.
Lessons learned:
1: Sassafras is easy to work and beautiful wood
2: Borers generally stay in the sapwood (at least in the pieces I have)
3: Better back it if the rings are thin
4: Sassafras wont stand the abuse Osage will
I only spent about 3 hours on the little bow but it was a good experience...I set it aside but may try to wrap the splinter with sinew and hide glue. What about rawhide or sinew backing? Probably too late at this point, I'd always be worried about the splinter under there....Anyhow, Cheers, Dave
