Story: I love sticks

a reverse knee, like maybe an animal leg ;)
with the index finger a lift, and she swings forward perfectly placed for the next step :)
 
I would like some day make a walking stick of a good japanese bokken. Talk about a saberstick with that. I'd have to make some kind of handle to it and glue/pin it in place. The curving shape might make it quite interesting while walking.
 
Thank you Carl, you have made some mighty fine sticks there! A tree, forever destined to be upside down! ;)
I have a love hate relationship with this stick. I love it when I need it but I hate the fact that I do occasionally need it...
 
Last edited:
Having lived near a river in the Ozarks growing up, just off a "hollar" (backwater), I found many "Beaver" sticks, or saplings that had been cut down and stripped of bark by beavers. I tended to pick the larger ones that were right about my height. Trimming was accomplished using a cheap Pakistan lock-back, or my "Survival knife" (you know, the ones with the hollow handle, compass at the butt, and saw teeth).

These days, I have started choosing smaller sticks that are a bit easier to wield, and have a few in my closet for camping/hiking, or long days at the zoo or local Rennaisance Festival. I carve on these while I sit outside grilling, in the summer, usually with whatever knife is on me. Nowadays, it's mostly a Case/Bose Lanny's clip, or the 2012 Bladeforums Traditional Trapper.

One that I had harvested during a local "Wilderness Reclamation Project" was cut during late fall, and the leaves were already gone. Next summer, I was using the stick in the rain, and started smelling maple syrup. Yup, it was a maple sapling.

One of mine recently had a stint in a production of "The Hobbit" that my kids were in, and was used as Gandalf's staff.
 
Of course, if you carry a walking stick your clothes must be of the same style :D

IMG_2702.JPG
 
I like to leave the bark on and paint the ends for drying. They dry slower but dry they do, sweating through the bark. Then a long sharp traditional fixed blade to peel and shape them.
 
scrteened porch said:
I like to leave the bark on and paint the ends for drying. They dry slower but dry they do, sweating through the bark. Then a long sharp traditional fixed blade to peel and shape them.
Click to expand...

Oh always leave the bark on for drying. Take the bark off an uncured stick and put it away, and it will just crack up horribly. And for hornbeam and a few other woods, I leave the bark on anyway. I'll polish up the bark with 0000 steel wool, and stain and varnish.
 
I like me a good stick too. Reckon most of my bros and pa do too. Have to find my bro'a 'thumb stick' picture.

I'm only in my early thirties but don't think twice about taking my walking staff withe when I go for a bimble. My friend made me a smashing staff from a piece of Holly. A real good sun stick, he left the bark on, seasoned it and varnished it up.

60ADAE9C-09B0-4D59-932C-45FEBAF65A66-4112-000004349CFC541A_zps58d711f1.jpg


Really a very nice feeling stick. Has a nice thumb ramp, I suppose you'd call it....

B535DE3D-4C08-43D4-BCD0-C977D0110DA8-3945-000004320342064A_zpsc40dc6ea.jpg


....although I do fear impaling myself on it sometimes. It comes to my armpit.

He made simple ferrule from a piece of copper pipe, ringing the base and a wood screw in the centre to snug it in place.

A7D8D576-D2A4-434C-8FD0-B60F58D2FA33-3945-000004320D5D7DA3_zpsef48ddbe.jpg


Currently have a piece of Hazel seasoning for our lass, although now JB has gifted me a trekking pole, I may have to requisition it.

I'd love to be able to learn a bit of European sword-stick....
 
Last edited:
scruffuk said:
Dare I ask what a bimble is in your land?
Click to expand...
Lovely piece of holly, Scruff.
We don't have bimbles round these parts, though I'm reminded of J.K. Jerome's Three Men on the Bummel, wherein "Bummel" was German for pretty much what Sara said.
I always have a stick in the woods, but despite my grizzly eminence of years, I'm still big and ugly enough that people look askance at me when I have a stick at an academic conference, say. So I should remember to wear tweed instead of denim for such occasions.
 
Great post HFinn. My wife an I do a lot of hiking, she never leaves without a walking stick. There's something to be said about a walking stick that you personalize and carry on all your journey's. you can just look at them and wonder the stories they could tell. I carved a wood spirit in this one that she uses when we go out..

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top