A cpl of my sticks

2203 Views 8 Replies 6 Participants Last post by cobalt, Mar 16, 2014

MJC4

Discussion Starter · Mar 7, 2014

Hey all,

I have attached a cpl pics of two of my canes.

The first one has a black cherry shaft with the bark intact, a hickory handle with a woodland camo paracord wrist strap. I have carved a wood spirit on the shaft.

The second one also has a black cherry shaft, debarked, and a red oak handle with a brown paracord wrist strap. I also carved a wood spirit on this one as well.

I really like the black cherry for sticks. Around here its plentiful, fairly strong, finishes well and holds detail in a carving better than soft maple or pine.

I started making sticks and canes about a year ago when I retired. I started caving on them last Oct after seeing some walking sticks with carved wood spirits in a gift shop on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Wife and I love walking/hiking in the woods and finding sticks for my new hobby is a bonus!

Mark

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CV3

· #2 · Mar 7, 2014

Those are fun wood spirits Mark. I am a fan for black cherry also. How ever it is not Plentiful around here. Thanks for sharing.

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JJireh

· #3 · Mar 7, 2014

Nice sticks! Looks like you are getting good depth on your profiles, WS carvers sometimes have a hard time with that. Do you draw it on the wood as you carve or just feel it through?

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Rad

· #4 · Mar 7, 2014

Good work Mark! We have a lot of black cherry on our property! It's considered a nusance tree -- however, the Amish like to use it in furniture, so there is a market for it!

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MJC4

Discussion Starter · #5 · Mar 7, 2014

Thanks for the positive comments!

JJireh, I don't draw the wood spirit on the piece per say. I draw a capitol T on the stick and use that as the start points for the eye bridge and nose center and just wing it from there. I started out carving watching vids of a guy up in Pa.(stix and stones carving) I have a long way to go to achieve that kind of detail. I have started carving owls, bears heads and wolves heads on smaller pieces. Hope to perfect them enough to incorporate them into walking sticks as well soon. In the mean time I'll keep whittling away and making loads of "designer firewood" for our camping trips!!

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cobalt

· #6 · Mar 7, 2014

designer firwood eh very up market lol

think most of us have been there

i do like the black cherry and i am pretty sure you will achieve your goal of incorporating your designs into the stick of your choice

Its always good to start with designs your confident in it teach you a lot , generally speaking i like birds the feathered variety ,to old for the other variety ,so this where i started but i have a different approch to carving .Most of my work i add to the shank.For me it gives a wider range of subject matter.

Most carvers here take different approaches wich i think is great as a wider range of ideas improves stick making in general and helps to improve your own work

so good luck and enjoy yourself

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gdenby

· #7 · Mar 8, 2014

Good looking sticks. I've used cherry a couple of times, and i like to work with. Nice looking wood, not too hard to carve. I've tried several different types of maple. Some of the soft maples really did seem to soft. I had 1 good piece of sugar (hard) maple. Very strong, but I found that small detail carving tended shatter.

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MJC4

Discussion Starter · #8 · Mar 16, 2014

I've attached some pics of one of my stick racks. Rack holds a dozen sticks/canes and was made out of the deck boards I removed when added on to our deck. I would have preferred to oil finish the rack, but as it was made from treated lumber (green tint after sanding) so I opted to finish with a brown oil based house stain. I have another one finished like this one and a third on the way which I think I'll make the top support board several inches shorter to allow for better display of canes.