George Shirley wrote:
....
> My ancestors here in the New World made bows from Bois de Arc, aka Osage
> Orange, native tree with inedible fruit. When I was in my early teens I
> made lots of bows from the straight limbs or from saplings. Cut,
> skinned, dried in the attic for about six months to a year. Really good
> wood for bows here in the New World. River cane made excellent, easy to
> make arrows. I used arrow heads cut out of galvanized sheet metal, easy
> to cut and sharpen, not very heavy. Bois de Arc makes good spears and
> quarter staffs too. Made a recurve bow once too, based on the Mongol
> horse bows. Went to the local abattoir and pulled a lot of cow horn out
> of the discard pile and went from there. Took a good while to do it
> right and, since I didn't have a horse at the time I sold it.

i would have liked to have seen it.


songbird