The flanboyant limbs collected last week were completely striped. The wood if fibrous and it will need some extra time when sanded. After a week the wood is still heavy so I expect it to take 4..5 weeks to cure (dry out) before working on the limbs. In the meantime I started to work on the Willow walking sticks and aspens hiking staffs again.

I failed to stripe the willows right away so the bark/skin would not come off easily. I ended up soaking the limbs in my pool for two days to soften up the bark. What a difference. The water soaking works and the bark was off the two stick within 45 minutes.

Trick: Soaking wood already dried is a great way to software the wood to get bark off. If you have a pool test a portion of the limb fist the make sure the chemicals cause no harm. Then just drop them in and wait 1..2 days. The other method is using a tub to float the sticks. The wood ends need time to soak up the wood and saturate the bark to make it soft. There are many other tricks that make you life easier when making hiking sticks and walking staffs.

Back to the hiking sticks. I plan to use the willow as a wood burning hiking stick project. I believe I will wood burn willow leaves onto the staffs upper portion and then inlay a stone at the base of each leaf on the walking stick. I believe in true inlay where the end item is almost flush with the surface of the wood instead of sticking out of the wood as I've seen on some commercial sticks. When they are flush they are less likely to fall out of the stick.

Any way. If you have any photos of stick you make please fell free to add them to this blog.

Have a great weekend.