A Little Fun with Cast

[beagle]

I walked back to the back forty (actually back ten) late this afternoon with the M700 .222 Rem in search of a coyote that's been hanging around back there. No luck on him but while walking back, I spied a hedgeapple about softball size lodged in a fork and decided I'd see how the 22-55-SP HP bullets I had loaded would expand.

To say the least, they performed impressively to me and to my wife who was along. I guess I succeeded in seeding about 1/2 acre before I went through the 5 rounds I had along. That may or may not be a blessing as hedgeapples are a nuisance in this part of the country.

One was off a bit and tore up the "apple" pretty good but the remainder were more or less direct hits and they just exploded.

Sometimes you forget how much fun you can have with cast bullets. Now, if only Wiley had cooperated......./beagle

[leadeye]

Stuff makes great fire wood or fence posts, I am always glad to find it. I heard today that it is used by stick bow makers when they can find a straight enough piece.

[Heavy lead]

Do hedge apples=osage orange?

[beagle]

Yep! Hedge apple = Osage Orange.

Most of these started off as fence posts and sprouted and have almost taken the country. It does make good firewood but man, it's hard to cut.

I've heard that it was originally used for bows by the indians but I don't go quite that far back.

Make mighty fine targets though./beagle

[Heavy lead]

I've seen a couple longbows and some small furniture items made from this, it's awesome pretty wood. We have some here in MI, usually like you say in fence rows mostly by roads, I'll bet a 22 caliber hp does explode them though, like an egg.

[leadeye]

I did not know it looked nice when finished, probably should check that out instead of burning it or planting it half way in the ground.

[Heavy lead]

If I remember correctly in is very golden orangy in color with darker streaks, but of course it would be hard to get a very big board out of it, but pretty. Being good to bows it must be tough, not just hard. I've never worked with it.

[longbow]

Osage is beautiful bow wood in both looks and performance!

It starts out electric yellow and gradually turns to a purplish colour when exposed to the sun light (effect of UV). The extent of the change may depend on individual pieces of wood or location grown or...?

Here is a link to a reprint of an old book describing the making of self bows from several different woods, osage being one of them:

http://www.fix.net/~ggoven/p35.html#yew

and here is a more modern site with some guys working on osage staves:

http://www.sticknstring.com/osagepage.htm

I have made self bows from yew, black locust, cherry, maple, oak, choke cherry, juniper and hazelnut ~ but not osage. I would like to try it can't quite come to grips with the cost of buying and shipping staves when I have other good woods to use. Good osage billets don't come cheap!

Longbow

[Heavy lead]

With a handle like that, I guess you had to know.
Thanks for the link.
Have to ask, do you shoot a longbow for hunting?

[Bob Krack]

As a youngster I remember wonderful camping trips with Pappy. Osage Orange abounds in the area we camped in Ohio. Terrific firewood but when it was time to extinguish the campfire, just pouring water on it would not do it -no way - no how! I remember dropping glowing embers in the creek and watching the embers slowly float downstream. Kinda scary looking back on that.

Vic

[TAWILDCATT]

beagle: you might look up that wood there may be a market for you.:coffee:[smilie=1:

[454PB]

Beagle, I have a .222 and RCBS 55 gr. mould. Mind sharing your load recipe?

[Bass Ackward]

Visual effects are the most fun. Hollow points made things a lot more intresting with 22s.

That's why water works. And water attracts more things that create visual effect.

Gotta leave the paper once in awhile.

[Rick N Bama]

Do hedge apples=osage orange?

The tree is also know as Bodock. A friend of mine used to make duck calls from it.

Rick

[waksupi]

The tree is also know as Bodock. A friend of mine used to make duck calls from it.

Riuck

bois d'arc

[TCLouis]

thus why many here in this area and in books use the common name which has become bodock, bodak or bodark.

I have some cut, I will try to get pics and post them.

[beagle]

I'm using 10.0 grains of WC820 and a small rifle primer. Haven't chronographed any as my Chrony bit the dust and since I got the new one, I haven't taken the time. Sized at .225".

Pleasant shooting load out of my HB M700 and a 4-16X Weaver.

I'm estimating maybe 2,000 FPS. They're pretty accurate as I dropped a starling at about 150 yards with it. May have been a fluke but as Elmer Keith said, "I was shooting at it and hit it so I'll call it skill"./beagle


Beagle, I have a .222 and RCBS 55 gr. mould. Mind sharing your load recipe?

[beagle]

Yeah, this wood is yellow and the roots are orange. Very dense wood and has loads of sap in it. When dry, it acts like steel on a chain saw blade. Man, that's tough wood.....and thorny too. Pull one up with a tractor and the roots are all bright orange./beagle

[DLCTEX]

A resident of Wheeler , Buck Dollar, used to make laminated bows with Osage Orange. He had quite a following for his custom bows. I asked him recently if he was still makling them, but he makes too much in the oil field now to spend time on the bows, he would lose money. DALE

[longbow]

Heavy Lead:

Yes and no. I have hunted grouse and turkeys with my yew self bow. I have shot several grouse with it but not had a chance at a turkey yet. I am not much of a big game hunter though we have a good deer population here. I've hunted deer and bears with guns and recurve bow but so far not with the self bow. Maybe one day.

The bow is certainly capable, it is 57 lbs. and shoots well. I also have a 50 lb. black locust bow and 65 lb. oak bow. All would do the job if I had the inclination. I am more of a builder and shooter than hunter though.

Longbow

[Rick N Bama]

bois d'arc

That's what you educated folks that can speak French call it, we Rednecks just call it Bodock[smilie=1:

Rick

[35remington]

That osage orange makes hellacious fence posts.

I shot at a well weathered osage fence post with my Rossi two inch .38 and a hard 158 SWC going 800 fps. It left a lead smear - no penetration at all.

A lot of the hedgeapple here is getting taken out. These fencerows usually had a lot of grass cover and were prime quail habitat.

I see fox squirrels actually chewing on the apples to get the seed. I'd think the stuff would taste like eating a can of Lemon Pledge. They don't seem to mind it.

[Russel Nash]

All you guys who posted here about the wood are spot on.

Bodock as a redneck-ized version of the French phrase bois d'arc .

I'm not all up on French which I guess would translate into either "bow of the arc" referring to the shape of a bow, especially one pulled back, or it could be "wood of the arc".

I have heard of bowmakers standing on the brakes when they drive the countryside and spot a pile of bodock ....err... hedgeapple.... err... osage orange fenceposts out by a farmer's barn. They get all giddy about fenceposts as we would get giddy about seeing a bucket full of wheelweights.

Yes, that wood just seems to last, and last and last. It's super hard, never rots and is like impervious to insects.

About the only other wood lore I could pass along is how Baton Rouge, LA got its name supposedly. It's French literally for red stick. Baton like what a cop carries and rouge like in women's make up. I guess they have lots of those red aromatic cedar trees (i.e. cedar chests and cedar lined closets) (which I think are technically junipers :roll: ).

Yeah, it did seem like years ago the fence rows were a prime spot to flush quail.

Some people speculate that the turkeys have encroached too much on quail habitat.

Other people says it's all the danged coyotes we have now.

Others will say it's the feral cats.

Man! Oh man! The TV hunting shows make hunting quail and pheasant behind some well trained dogs look like lots of fun.

Maybe one day... for me...

(sigh....) :(

[vanilla_gorilla]

Never seen or even heard of them bodock trees down here. I can't help but wonder how good they'd be for handgun grips, though.

[felix]

Excellent. ... felix

[Russel Nash]

This time of year which trees are hedge apples (bodocks, or osage orange) is readily apparent when you see the fruit on the ground, or you have to drive around it when they land on the road.

It looks like this:

http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q101/chills1994/HedgeApple.jpg

and is about the size of large orange or grapefruit.

It might be just an old wive's tale, but supposedly placing one of these say like in the corner of a room is supposed to repel spiders.

Besides that and using them for chunkin' contests with air cannons and trebuchets, I really don't think there is that much use for the "fruit".

[Dale53]

I have seen deer eating the hedge apples. The trees are indigenous to this area (SW Ohio). They make wonderful longbows when faced with fiberglass.

Dale53

[longbow]

Dale53:

Osage makes a wonderful seflbow too. I would like to make one some day but no osage in BC and staves aren't cheap. If I lived down that way or even visited I'd be trying to get some back home to make a bow!

I'm currently working on a juniper bow and will be making another black locust bow after I think.

Yes Russel, I would be "giddy" if I saw a pile of osage fence posts. I might even wet myself!

Longbow

[docone31]

Longbow, did you ever make a http://www.primitiveways.com/pt-composite_bow.html
?
They look like quiet the bow.
I also bet you could get some saplings and start your own.

[longbow]

docone31:

Nope! I am a simple lad with simple tastes. These certainly can be quite the bow alright and can perform very well but they tend to be complicated and time consuming to build. Also, unless made with modern glues can be a bit of a problem in wet weather.

I have backed with silk, raw linen fiber, linen cloth, rawhide and rip stop nylon (I used rip stop nylon when building bows with the local Scouts as it is cheap and effective) however, I have not used sinew or made a sinew backed horn bellied bow.

I lean toward traditional selfbows ~ longbows and flatbows, normally unbacked. There is something about the plain selfbow that makes me feel like a kid with a stick and string. Well, I guess I'm not a kid having been shooting guns for 50 years and bows for 45 years but the stick and string thing is valid!

I think I am hijacking this thread, sorry about that.

Longbow

[357maximum]

I replaced...IE splintered in a broken toe on the stock of my Charles Daly Miroku Venturr O/U about 10 yrs ago....There was no chance of making it match the original stock so I used Osage to "SET" the wound off and make it a proud battle scar (and the reason I got the gun cheap). Well it stood out like a lemon yellow sore thumb at first....now it has to be examined closely to see the difference between the original walnut an the osage. The only difference is the brown walnut lacks the real light purplish hue of the osage repair piece. To be honest I liked it better when it stood out....oh well.

Osage oranges to my understanding are only "TRULY NATIVE" to the Osage river area of Texas and certain parts Of Oklahoma.....they have been planted just about everywhere by the hand of man though....and at one time served as the first fences...Barbed Wire kind of diminished that use though.


I planted the border of my acreage with them 2 springs ago...they are about 2ft tall now and very picky...and full of ouchies. But by having limited openings...the deer should be awful easy to pattern,,,he he:twisted:


Osage is related to the mulberry tree...btw...and the two woods are quite similar. My dad builds self bows out of both and has had good luck with either. Both are beautiful wood in my opinion.

[94Doug]

They even sell the "oranges" here in Wisconsin at a few grocery stores. They don't really say what they are for, but spider control is what some folks buy em' for. I have heard just a few in your basement stuffed up in the joists is all it takes.

Doug

[fourarmed]

I made a guitar neck out of hedge (the local name here) once. Mighty hard to find a piece that doesn't have checks or knots in it. I have a walking stick I made of it. Full of spiral cracks, just like fence posts, but still strong. I have been told that the only way to prevent the cracks is to cut the wood green, and submerge it in water for a couple of years, then season it.

[scrapcan]

I would like to get a few small pieces that I could make straight razor scales (handles) out of. Any of you have a few pieces that are about 6 inches long, 1 to 1 1/2 inches wide, and about 3.16 to 1/4 inch thick.

Send me a pm if you have some or know where I might get some.

[beagle]

I picked up a couple of pieces once in the winter. Evidently they'd been cut in the summer as they still had leaves. I cut off the small limbs ...and thorns and set it up until next summer. Knowing how hard that stuff was, I figured I had a real walking stick. Soon as I removed the bark, it cracked.

The only stuff that I have seen that doesn't crack is what I cut along the river as driftwood. Real yellow and heavy. I haven't attempted to cut any but it doesn't seem to crack (cured underwater?). Really dulls a chainsaw blade too./beagle


I made a guitar neck out of hedge (the local name here) once. Mighty hard to find a piece that doesn't have checks or knots in it. I have a walking stick I made of it. Full of spiral cracks, just like fence posts, but still strong. I have been told that the only way to prevent the cracks is to cut the wood green, and submerge it in water for a couple of years, then season it.

[HamGunner]

There is a small community just NW of Springfield, Mo. called Bois D'arc and a good sized Mo. state conservation area with trap/skeet and shooting ranges. I have hunted rabbits there a few times in years past. We call the trees "hedge" in this part of the world and they make great corner posts/fence posts. Got to use caution if burning them in a stove. Might melt your old pot belly down.

Just a few miles to the South around Spokane, Mo. is where the Black Widow bows were born. They moved to a new location, but they are still in production. I don't know if they use Osage Orange wood, but they really make nice, although expensive, bows.

[billyb]

Here in Okmulgee there is a local Creek who makes bows the way his people have made them in the past. One of the guys i used to work with had him make one,he uses osage orange, and it was very pricey. osage orange, hedge,bois d arc all the same thing. Makes great fence post, hard to cut, they have a thick,white, ,sticky sap that sticks to every thing and thorns every where. Bill