Canoe Pole Project: Part 1

I've convinced myself to attempt another canoe-related project with basic carving tools. Lately, I've been fascinated by the poling videos on the NorthWest Woodsman site. Footage of him pushing his way up remote, shallow creeks made me want to pursue this part of the canoeing experience even more. After purchasing a cheapo ex-library copy of the classic books, Pole, Paddle, & Portage by Bill Riviere, I was convinced that I should at least try making a spruce pole.

Andy Hutyera's post on the Wooden Canoe Forums discusses plans for a canoe pole in detail, although these seem to focus on power tool usage, table saws, routers...not my cup of tea. More info the following PDF files...
• Making a Canoe Pole
• Poling A Canoe

A few online sources, including this descriptive one, make mention of using a prefab curtain rod from Home Depot, the aptly named "Home Depole". Others write about finding the perfect dead standing spruce tree with the perfect dimensions to chop down and finish with a crooked knife. My option found the middle ground...I ended up using one of the extra 12 ft long, 2x10 boards purchased to make the bark canoe building bed. It has been cluttering the garage floor for some time but I wanted to save it for something.

As luck would have it, there were no knots in the relatively straight grained portion 2 inches from the squared original edge. A chalkline was marked 1.5" from this edge, but later, I ended up marking out the future pole using a combination square for more accuracy. I also marked out other areas where poles could emerge, but all of these had some knotty flaw somewhere along the length. In the end, the wood was easily (but not evenly) split to reveal the rudimentary birth of canoe pole


Original board; Split out piece
Not as elegant as ripping an even piece with a circular saw, but with my growing aversion to power tools, this was the most appropriate manner to liberate the pole from the board. It was worked down with an axe, loading up chips in the communal fire pit and then further cleaned with the crooked knife.


"Semi-Old Fashioned" way of making a pole
The project gave me the first opportunity to try out the recently made Orien Blade crooked knife. The blade's offset and "crooked" blade angle took some getting used to. The blade was very sharp but tended to pull out the wood in scoops (a flaw in my technique for sure). In the end, I ended up using my flatter, home-made blade crooked knife to work down the edges. The pole is still a work in progress and will need to wait until my next trip up north to finalize.


Silent tools for the job

UPDATE: Pole has been completed - part 2 has been posted here

Kent Lund's New Snake Paddle

A previous post showed off some of Kent Lund's paddle designs including a replica of the 19th century folk art "Snake Paddle" posted on the Gould Auctions site. Here's a shot of his latest creations - another snake paddle (curly maple and cherry) and a native inspired paddle made from sassafras


Snake Paddle; Sassafras Paddle
Kent's 2nd snake paddle includes an interesting twist...a carving of a frog swallowed by the snake that makes up the shaft of the paddle.


Swallowed Frog
This one is also has a thinner blade (planed to 5/16th) compared to the first edition. Here are the 2 sides of the curvy tail - one painted, the other left in its natural cherry grain...


Here are closeups of the grips - a standard grip on the snake paddle and a flattened grip on the Sassafras version, which includes some decorative patterns made from a nail.


Grip designs


Decorative Pattern
After completing these fun paddle designs, I say Kent is the resident snake paddle expert.

The Edge Movie Paddle

A bit of paddle art can be found in the short scene from the 1997 film, The Edge. The lodge owner makes a bet with Anthony Hopkins' character by showing him one side of a canoe paddle and having him guess the image on the other side. On the side shown to Hopkins is an image of a black panther


With a whopping $5.00 on the line, Hopkins' character calmly recites that the image on the other side of the blade is rabbit smoking a pipe.


Elaborating on this native tradition, Hopkins later explains that the rabbit is smoking a pipe because he is unafraid; the rabbit is unafraid because he is smarter than the panther. This brief exchange serves as foreshadowing for the events ahead in the film...which features a very angry Grizzly bear later on...but that's another scene.

The symbol of the confident rabbit has been reincarnated in modern times as the Trademarked logo of Mad River Canoe company. A page on their site describes the legend further...

Native American legend has it that Rabbit was a great hunter and a bit of a trickster, but most of all Rabbit was confident in his abilities. So confident in fact, that even as Lynx circles the fern, planning his attack, Rabbit is free to enjoy his pipe, secure in his abilities to avoid this mortal enemy.

To film mentions that this is specifically a Cree legend, but that may be a bit of artistic license. Adney describes the decoration used on Malecite canoes on pages 86-87 in Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America It also seems that this imagery featured prominantly in the Passamaquoddy birchbark artwork of Tomah Joseph. Ferdy Goode posted some great pics of this Wooden Canoe forums.

Poplar Diamond Passamaquoddy - Part 3

While up north for the recent holiday weekend, I managed to get in some paddle carving time to finalize the nearly complete c. 1849 Passamaquoddy replica begun back in January. Here's a shot by the lakeside on a bright, brisk day using the picnic table "workbench". The communal beach all groomed and loungers all set for the upcoming tourist season.


Carving by the lake
After wetting the grain and sanding it down, I brought the paddle back home to the city. Yellow Poplar certainly makes for a lightweight paddle - my official quality control tester had a easy time lifting it with one hand and running around the place with it.


Rigorous Quality Testing
The major item I struggled with in this design was balancing the paddle...in the end it just ended up being too blade heavy. Kind of obvious I guess given the large shape and the relatively small handle. My feeling is that perhaps the original paddle documented by Adney would've been balanced, but only because the paddle was illustrated as being much longer than my replica (71.5" vs. my 58" version).


Adney's sketch - Diamond Bladed Passamaquoddy in middle
Had I digitally reduced the paddle to scale to fit my preferred paddle length, the blade size would've been unusually small. Still, in the future when replicating longer paddle designs to a my own functional paddle length, this will need to be considered if a throat-balanced paddle is the final goal.

In any event, it's ready for the decoration stage and I've decided to keep this one much more simple than the recent Northwoods paddle where I went overboard.

MAY 24, 2011 Update: Paddle finally completed...go to Part 4

Varnishing the "Copper Tip"

An earlier post about Michael Weiser's paddle warping problem got me thinking about preventative maintenance on the thinned tip of the Maple Northwoods Paddle. While I'm quite diligent about maintaining my paddles with oil frequently, I thought that perhaps the delicate end grain of this paddle may need a bit more protection.

The paddle had been decorated with a fake burning of Copper Tip protector and figured it would be an interesting touch to add some glossy varnish to this decorative embellishment, both to make it look more "metallic" but also to seal the end grain more thoroughly.

After delicately brushing some thinned coats of spar varnish to the tip as well as to the design with a brush, I ended up with a nice glossy finish. Here are some shots which captured the difference in tone in the varnish tip versus the oiled blade...




Varnish & Shiny "Copper Tip"