DIY primitive hunting bows and arrows

C

coote

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Apr 3, 2006
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I just came across this photo so I scanned it. It shows four bows that I made....probably the four most photogenic ones. I generally don't bother to make my bows look too fancy.
FourBows.jpg


The one on the left is backed with rawhide.

The one that is second from the right was a good bow, unfortunately it developed a compression fracture. I patched it with rawhide and hide glue, but I got nervous about shooting it. Just the other day I cut it up to make a knife handle.

The bow with the arrowheads painted on it - second from left - was made from a branch I cut myself. It pulls maybe 36 pounds at my draw length. With this bow and an arrow made from a bracken fern stalk I shot a wild pig. I think the pig and I were both quite surprised. Anyway, the arrow penetrated just deep enough to make a hole in its heart. That hunt was one of the most satisfying hunts I will ever have.

Anybody else hunt with home-made bows and arrows?
 
I have done it but only on white tail deer. Where are you located? Nice looking bows btw....congrats on the hunt.
 
I live in near the small city of Nelson in the South Island of New Zealand.

Dang... I wouldn't say "only" white tail deer. I haven't yet been bold enough to fling an arrow at a deer. I had my bow with me once when I saw a red deer broadside on at maybe 20 or 25 yards, but I didn't take the shot. I feel that I need a slightly stronger bow and a bit more practice.
 
I have taken squirrels and rabbits with my homemade bow's but not a deer or anything that size. I am just not sure the poundage I am drawing back will make a clean kill. But it did do a # on the rabbits and squirrels, I put small game heads on the arrows I used.
 
I love to hunt with my own gear. I have shot one Whitetail and lots of small game. For me it's like tying my own flys and catching trout on them. Satisfaction I can't describe. I don't have a primitive bow to shoot right now, seems everytime I get a shooter someone else just has to have it. Workin on a new one now, a long bow, but I also have a takedown in the works. No pics either:(
 
I want to made my own bow also, but don't know how to start. Can you give me some advice. Thanks.
 
It doesn't take a heavy bow to kill a whitetail within a reasonable range. It just takes a well placed shot with a sharp projectile. The first deer I killed was with a 35# recurve, a frontal heart shot from less than 20 yards. As with the pig, we were both surprised. Since then, I've seldom shot over 40#, and never had trouble recovering a solidly hit deer.

Codger
 
M Specwar said:
I want to made my own bow also, but don't know how to start. Can you give me some advice. Thanks.
Click to expand...
Start to Google search it will give more advise than you can imagine:thumbup:
search:stick bow
bamboo bow
self bow
sinew-backed bows
bow wood
boyers bible
 
When you said wild pig I was thinking about the boars we have here on the NC/TN border. They get as large as 450 lbs and I dont have the nerve to shoot a self bow at one.
 
450 pounds!! Dang. You would want a powerful bow and a heavy arrow with a very sharp, sturdy broadhead. I imagine that those hogs would have quite a thick shield over their shoulders too... so you would have to be very careful about arrow placement.

A 200 pounder would be considered big in NZ, although they do allegedly reach the 400 pound mark sometimes. The one I skewered wouldn't have been more than 50 pounds.
 
Coote,
450 is damn big here too, they do reach that size but it is far from common. The biggest pig I have ever killed was 327 lbs on the hoof, and it dang near filled the back of my toyota truck. I am from the area that Mike is talking about and have seen a lot of hogs come out of there, 450 is rare indeed.

Here's one for you http://www.snopes.com/photos/animals/hogzilla.asp, most of the really huge "wild" hogs I know of I have a strong idea they were fattened in a pen. :rolleyes: Chris
 
That is a lot of pork.

I have an elderly farmer neighbour that told me about a big pig an acquaintance of his killed. I am a little hazy on the details, but I have absolute faith in my neighbours integrity.

A hunters/farmer's dogs bailed a pig. The guy goes in to get it (knives are commonly used by hunters here), but the pig is far too big to tackle. So the guy breaks off a sturdy sapling, gets behind the bailed pig, and works the sapling into the body through the pigs anus... causing it to die. I guess he shoved it around a bit causing internal damage (and I doubt that the pig stood still). This pig was allegedly in the 400 pound category. You'd have to wonder about that guy and how he decided on that particular course of action.

Now this story sounds so outrageous I had trouble accepting it. But like I said, my neighbour is a perfectly upright gentleman with very strong morals.

Another story I like is about a friend of my Dad's (I think I may have told this one here already, sorry). He was very fond of his dogs. One day up the back of the farm the dogs bailed a decent pig. The farmer got to the bail and dived on the pig to hold it away from his dogs. When he reached for his knife, it wasnt there. He couldn't let go of the pig without him or the dogs getting hurt, so he rolled with it down into a nearby gulley and drowned it in a stream. One tough guy. If he were around today I would have liked to have bought him something like a Becker Necker as a backup blade.
 
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