Mammoth, Elephant, Hippo, Fossil Walrus, Raw Walrus, Or Oosik Or Stellar Sea Cow?

Hi Rus, I use to carve a lot of elephant ivory in the late '70s, till I found out where a lot of it was coming from. Then I just stopped. Although there are legitamate sources for ivory, you would just have to research the supplier. Anyway what I'm trying to get at is ivory is safe to carve, health wise, it does smell a bit if you use power carving tools, and I would suggest that. Unless you find yourself on a long cruise. But I really find the fossilized ivories have a lot more character and variety. I've seen some really breathtaking knife handles made from it.
 
Made a kitchen knife for my best friends mom about ten years ago that had an oosic handle and nickle silver bolsters. The polished oosic was striking, had a lot of blues and green. Smelled pretty bad on the belt sander, and the specimen I had contained a lot of waste material, I think I only got two sets of slab handles out of a 15" chunk. The core of oosic isn't extremely solid, so if you go for this option your going to have to figure out how to stabilize it.
Good luck, can't wait to see pictures.
Oh, she used the knife for a few years until Dave told her what the handles were made of, then it was returned for "sharpening"
Sar
 
I love the looks and feel of elephant ivory. From what I'm told, it is also very durable. I'd get my hands on some legal ivory. The thing is, some of the elephants get culled every year; the meat goes to the villagers; so why destroy the ivory? I don't agree with the poachers, believe me. But I think the American public has swung much too far the other direction and now the political consensus, if you will, is that all ivory is bad. That's just B.S. in my opinion. Ivory is truly beautiful. Get some of the legal stuff.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top