[David Petersen]

in reply to: New books #16145

Have no fear, Etter. On my wages I can’t afford the stake, the firewood or even the match. 😛

[David Petersen]

in reply to: Ancient Edges #15882

Steve Graf said of stone points: “It has no intrinsic value other than that which we attribute to it.”

Steve, you’ve just defined the heart and soul of ALL art. Assigning aesthetical value to things is a definitive human trait. Antiquity provides additional aesthetical value, overlayered on our appreciation of the object for its own (intrinsic) beauty, as well as our respect for the artisan’s skill. It’s all fun.

[David Petersen]

in reply to: Ancient Edges #15123

A fun thread! Allow my unsolicited responses: First, my apologies to Paleo and Steve for conflating their prize points into one. And likewise to Duncan, who beat me to the point about someone already having done it, without me taking proper note and so being redundant. And Wex, there’s more than one kind of romance, thank the gods: some kinds tragically die from long familiarity, while others happily never do. Which is which is an individual issue. 😆 Tailfeather says “Another 8,000 years will bring us back closer to the archaic than the modern. I hope.” Me too! I would favor that happening the day I was born. Of course I’d likely be dead long by now, but I reckon I’d have had more fun, less stress and worry … and all that’s wild and good on Earth wouldn’t be extinct or in dire danger of destruction today if we still had the 10 million world population as we enjoyed during the Pleistocene and before. A happy thought, indeed. 😀

[David Petersen]

in reply to: 2012 Season Success Photos #14735

Jonking–That’s a sweet, streamlined, different looking little bow you have there. Can you tell us a bit about it? And congrats on the yummy cow! I too am eating cow this winter, “spoon meat.” 😀

[David Petersen]

in reply to: Ancient Edges #14731

Paleo– If your point is 8k years old it’s very unlikely to have been used on an arrow. Likely an atlatl spear point, or even a knife point (many “knife” blades back then were very short and look more like broadheads than knives today. Which doesn’t lessen its “Wow!” value at all.

On the other discussion here–whether or not to hunt with such an artifact–I see both views and (local laws aside and discussing this hypothetically) I personally would decide based on age and rarity of the point. There are millions of stone points in N. America, found and still in the ground. In some places and with some styles they are so common I’ve seen cigar boxes full for sale at swap meets. If I had a common point that was up to the task, I’d take it to a good knapper to have it very gently “sharpened” and then hunt deer or turkey with it. If it was a rare and special point for any reason–age, condition, style, quality of stone, or the only one I had–I’d frame it. Either way, the idea of a “full circle” hunt with an original stone point is about as romantic and exciting a bowhunting challenge as I can think of. But then, to make it full value, I’d want to make a bow from local wood and an arrow likewise. To hang an ancient point on a modern arrow and shoot it from a modern bow would feel to me incomplete and not very satisfying. But this is all fun to think about and I’m betting that somewhere, sometime, someone has already done this.

[David Petersen]

in reply to: Question about arrow stains #13654

Welcome, Jake. Yes, I second that stain/poly is fine for wood arrows. After all they’re not intended to last decades. If you’re making arrows only occasionally, its a cheap and easy way to go, though I’ve never gotten a satisfactory spray or paint-on finish; you need a dip tube. And if you move to the stage (aka addiction) where the arrow-building process becomes a joy in itself, you have far more options with analine (water-based) dyes, a dip tube and gasket laquor. With stains you’re limited to various shades of dark to light to enhance the natural wood grain. With dyes the sky’s the limit for colors and combos, and a tiny bit goes a long way so it’s not expensive. A dip tube is cheap and last forever and a can of gasket laquor lasts for countless dozen arrows. And both the dye and the laquor dry almost immediately. If you want to check any of this out, google Archery Past, Dave Doran, who sells it all and will be happy to discuss the options with you on the phone. You can get this stuff at most full-service trad archery suppliers, but I like Dave’s deep experience and friendly personal touch. He’s usually at Kalamazoo but has been under the weather so I’m not sure about this year/month.

[David Petersen]

in reply to: New books #12879

I second Etter on Cahill, for decades a hero of mine. That said, please allow a technical clarification. A “short story” is fiction, never nonfiction. A short nonfiction piece, like Cahill has written so many of, is an “article” if in a magazine or an “essay” or chapter in a book. Point being that Tim doesn’t write fiction. Like me, he finds reality far more magical and interesting than anything anyone could ever make up. Perhaps it’s a disease to think that way, but after reading a good sampling of Cahill I think you’ll agree. My favorite collection is his first, “Jaguars Ripped My Flesh.” As you may suspect, Tim is one funny dude (especially after a long night of drinking, but that’s another story). IMHO, as always 😯

[David Petersen]

in reply to: LL Bean Anniv Hunting Shoes #10378

Thanks, John. I reckon this proves that the Bean customer service person I spoke with hadn’t done her homework and you can get speed laces on these Anniversary replicas. Thus, you’ve just cost me some $140 as I’ll now have to order a pair, even though I have only a couple of years on my current pair. I’m wondering with the higher uppers made of unfinished leather, which I presume and appears in your photo to be softer, if the uppers might not sag down and wrinkle after some use. Let us know. I’m pleased you are pleased, so far. I try to recommend only things that have proven their worth to me over many years, and better yet if I’ve had dealings with the manufacturer–happy resolutions to customer service issues. But even then, feet and tastes differ so it’s always a bit risky. But in this case, many others here also wear and recommend the Maine Hunting Shoe, so we are on fairly safe ground.

[David Petersen]

in reply to: First Black Widow!!! #63760

Shag — I owned a BW once and it was a gorgeous bow. Congrats on getting one at a bargain price. If these analogies are worth anything, I haven’t bought a new car since 1969 nor a new spouse since 1981, and have never been left stranded on the road by either. Let someone else pay the price for that “new car smell.” 😀 I can’t think of anything that speaks better for a bowyer than the resale value of his art. Now go get some blood on it! 😀 Dave

[David Petersen]

in reply to: Santa came! New JMA Elkheart #63703

Kirk — Well, shucks, I’m afraid I blew my budget for my (recently) usual winter trip to AZ for Coues whitetail … on the bow instead. It’s odd, I know, for a guy who preaches materialistic minimalizim to act this way … but I’m an archer and art lover as well as a bowhunter. So likely it will be spring turkey–assuming that for a change that we have some turkeys locally to hunt. Elk is always first love for me, but increasingly I crave whitetail hardwoods and feral pigs. The latter, I fear, may never happen, given my limited budget and “elitist” ethics. Increasingly with age, priorities get harder to figure out. 🙄

[David Petersen]

in reply to: MFX carbon/Tuffhead build suggestions #62301

Tom — Sorry we got a bit off-topic. Your Sitka setup is nearly identical to mine, except my shafts are 82-85 spine and I’m using 300 Tuffheads for total weight around 735; 23/64 shaft diameter. Best-shooting arrows I own, even better than carbons and don’t ask me why. I wouldn’t worry about shafts breaking because an animal runs past a tree or falls over on one. The CE Heritage 250 carbons I use break just as readily as woods under those circumstances. It’s breakage when arrow strikes bone and penetration is still happening that we need to guard against, which is not uncommon with wood shafts and heavy-boned animals like elk and moose. And they tend to break not far behind the head. That’s why I’m experimenting with different reinforcements from behind the head to 4″ down the shaft. This past season I killed a small yearling cow and the broadhead barely nicked the back of the scapula, where the bone is thin and soft. I don’t know what else was going on in there but the SS shaft broke about an inch behind the head, seriously limiting penetration. By good fortune it was a heart shot and even the poor penetration was enough to get that very long head deep into the heart, while the rest of the shaft just feel out. Had it been a lung shot I might have had a wounded animal on my hands. So yet again, my equipment choices are further limited by ethics that arise from real experiences in the field. Either I’ll find a way to keep the woods from breaking, or I’ll return to carbons. Right now I”m very pleased with just coating the shafts 4″ with about 1/32″ layer of Smooth-On. And it’s all but invisible so doesn’t spoil the looks of crafted arrows. Not sure yet about the sinew wrapping and TiteBond3, but it sure looks cool.

[David Petersen]

in reply to: The New Year #61485

Right you are, Ralph. Throughout the South-speak states it’s “Y’all” singular, and “All y’all” plural.

This is a good night to stay home, no matter what time we go to bed. As a professional drinker friend (“professional” as PBS uses the word) likes to say of all the drunks on the roads, “New Years Eve is amateur’s night.” 😛

[David Petersen]

in reply to: MFX carbon/Tuffhead build suggestions #61203

Alex, Dr.Ashby’s studies show such a dismal failure rate with aluminum inserts that he has said they are the weakest link in any arrow system that uses them. I encourage you to switch to steel or brass before going after elk again.

Jay — I got the 4″ as minimal effective length from Ed Ashby, but we were talking wood arrows and that’s what I’ve been experimenting with. So far the Sitka spruce 4″ Smooth-On “socks” have proven indestructable. In straight-on impact tests with Ace blunts shooting in fire hardened trees that tend to bounce the arrows back, they have held up better than carbons, with tend to splinter under such intense impact. I’ve also wrapped some POC shafts back 4″ with synthetic sinew and one with serving thread, much like yours. First the thread or sinew, then two thin coats of TiteBond III (waterproof), and finally a spray of polyurethane. I did break one of the sinew-backed shafts, but it was due to a glancing blow mid-shaft. That’s what we often see when reinforcing the business end of a wood shaft–they break farther back. And that’s why Ed recommends 4″ minimum reinforcement. In the past I’ve used aluminum shafting to reinforce the fronts of 11/32 wood shafts (can’t recall the size but maybe 2413?), sort of a longer version of what Alex is using, and they worked well. But I didn’t like the setup, for no particular reason, and removed the sleeves. King Wouldbe has for years used carbon shafts reinforced with aluminum and he shoots some seriously tough Hogzillas with no breakage problems so far as I know. More ways than one to skin a cat and the search for the perfect arrow setup, for most of us, is even more unresolvable than the search for the perfect bow — simply because they’re so much fun to play, uh I mean experiment, with. 😀

[David Petersen]

in reply to: New books #59174

And this …

[David Petersen]

in reply to: New books #59141

Dersu the Trapper — V.K. Arseniev

The Tiger — John Vaillant

Both are nonfiction and both take place in the Russian Far East, aka Siberia, in the same exact region. All my life I have preferred nonfiction over fiction and have read hundreds of great books, always with an eye to truly great writing and story-telling. These two are among the very best I know of, ever, anywhere, period. And both have excellent films made from them–Dersu Uzala (reviewed in TBM longa go), best foreign film of 1976, and Conflict Tiger, a chilling documentary film by Sasha Snow, with rights to The Tiger (TBM review forthcoming) recently bought by Brad Pitt for “a major motion picture.” I can’t wait. I had to order a CD of Conflict Tiger directly from Sasha in England, but I’ve heard you can stream it for free if you know where to look online, which I don’t. But do yourself a favor and read the books first. IMHO

Good books are among the best things we can invest the precious moments of our lives in. If I have to be inside, I prefer to be inside a good book. Thanks for this thread and please, read your books on paper, not some electronic gadget. It’s traditional. 😀

[Author]

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