2021 what did you do today?

[Pat B]

Yes Flem, hard mast is acorns and nuts. They usually ripen and fall this time of year. Soft mast, fruits, produce in the summer and into the fall.

[Roy from Pa]

Ok Pat.
We treat the dogs for ticks and heart worm and yes its expensive.
The wife is very particular about the girls.
We spray our boots and clothes with permethrin and it is deadly for ticks.

[Flem]

Our deer would love to have some hard mast for the winter! I really don't know how they survive on the slim pickings here. Must be why the whitetails are smaller out west, they loose weight all winter. I'm guessing with a high protein/fat diet the deer can maintain or maybe even gain some weight during the cold months?

[Eric Krewson]

Dogwood gets my vote as well, I have a lot of them in my yard.

The picture is from one minute ago of a dogwood in my yard.

[Jeff Freeman]

I ground some tapers for my personal longbow on the works. Maple and Osage. Center core under Some awesome Spalted Hackberry. JF

[Buemaker]

That should be nice one.

[Roy from Pa]

That's going to look sharp.

[Flem]

looking forward to seeing this with some finish on

[Jeff Freeman]

It looks plain right now. But it's really going to pop when it's finished 🤯😃

[Flem]

Did some experimenting with wood dye on leather. I know there are some leather workers here. I like working with veg tan, but never have liked the standard leather dyes and I have had no luck finding Aniline dye for leather. Its common stuff for wood, so I though how different could it be? Looks like turd chunks stained and air dried, but the color came out perfect for me. Nothing but dumb luck, I just happened to have these dyes left over from years ago. The light one is called Light Pear and the dark one is called Rosewood. I soaked them in the dye and check every few hours to see if it had penetrated all the way through. Took about 20hrs. Probably would take less time if the dye bath was warm and the leather was being agitated.

[Roy from Pa]

Looks nice, Flem.

[Crooked Stic]

I have another one piece recurve that needs finished. I was a bad glue line on the ramp. I removed the bad part and patched it. I was thinking that I would finish it and keep it. But way more weight than I can handle and no chance of getting enough off. It is 58 in. and 64@28 right now. But probably could be in mid 50s with some work. Is 1/5/8s now could be okay at 1.5. Limbs are pulling straight now and tiller needs a little work. If anyone wants it cover shipping and its yours. Got some pretty nice elm in it.

[Roy from Pa]

How is the surgery recovery coming along, Mike?

[Eric Krewson]

I made a wood carving mallet out of fresh cut sweetgum to see if it would crack as it dried, the stuff is so had to split because of interlocking fibers I thought I would see how it did while drying.



Then I got to thinking about a small walnut tree I cut out of a deer trail down in the woods near my food plot. It had been on the ground for at least 20 years, all the bark and sapwood was gone but the trunk was solid and as hard as a rock. It dulled my chainsaw cutting it.

I cut out a chunk from the trunk and squared it up on my bandsaw to put in my lathe, nice stuff.



I turned a quickie carving mallet from the block to see if I could, it came out nice considering I only invested about 15 minutes of time in it.



I only have a small hobby lathe but it is great for turning file handles, mallets or any other nick-knack I think of.

[Roy from Pa]

Very nice, Eric..

 

[Crooked Stic]

Thanks for asking Roy. Doing very well. Stuff is still black and blue  and incision is touchy. But cant complain.

[Roy from Pa]

 

[mmattockx]

Great to hear things are going good, stic. Fingers crossed it keeps progressing well for you.


Yesterday I picked up ~130bd.ft. of alder 4/4 boards. Our new place has alder kitchen cabinets and the cabinet guy wanted nearly $1000 to put a matching alder cap on a half wall in the living room. I found this load in our local Kijiji classifieds (our version of Craigslist) for $675. I will do the cap myself and have a pile of nice wood left over to make some shelving and maybe small pieces of furniture from and still be ahead $300 over the cost of the cap alone.




Mark

[Flem]

Those mallets look real nice Eric

How much do you guess they will weigh when dry?

[Eric Krewson]

The walnut one is dry and probably weighs a little less than a pound. I could make them big and heavy enough to use with a splitting froe. I think the froe mallets are called a "glut".

For carving chisel work you don't need much weight, that kind of work is a finesse kind of thing.