Mini Decorated Cherry Maliseet

Given that my full-scale paddle making has come to grinding halt with the ever present needs of a newborn at home, I spent some quality "me-time" getting back into the hobby with a tiny 1/5th scale Cherry Maliseet. The blank had been cut many months ago and with some bright sunshine on the balcony, I set to work carving with the spokeshave. Twenty minutes of work resulted in a cute little paddle for my boy.


Mini blank; Carved paddle & tools
For the decoration, I tried to free-hand some scroll patterns similar to the chip-carved Maliseet & Penobscot paddles I've been researching lately. The paddle was then sealed with melted food-grade coconut oil in case the little one starts nibbling on the edges. While lightly asleep in his colourful bouncer, I quickly snapped a shot in his first paddling pose. When he started to squirm, it actually looked like he was doing a forward stroke.


Decorative Scroll Patterns; Paddling in his dreams?
I think he has what it takes to be Canada's next Top Infant Model, but maybe I'm just gushing with parental bias.

McCord Model Canoes

In addition to the McCord Museum's collection of paddles, they've got a nice set of model BirchBark canoes of various design. Here are three examples with some details. Clicking on each pic will forward you to the Museum's info page on each item


Algonquin or Atikamekw Model


Atikamekw model circa 1930-1960


Passamaquoddy model circa 1900-1910
These ones aren't built to scale and don't have the appropriate number of ribs but they are nonetheless attractive pieces of canoe art.

Stunning Steve Cayard Canoe

DarelGabriel has uploaded a bunch of photos on his Flickr page showing off a stunning Wabanaki style birchbark canoe made by Steve Cayard. The winter bark etching is just beautiful! Etching out this negative image from the whole hull must have taken a very long time.


Steve Cayard built canoe
If I'm not mistaken, Darel is the brother of another well known Passamaquoddy bark canoe builder, David Bridges and who's got a fantastic album on his page documenting his gorgeous canoes. My boat looks extremely crude and very fragile compared to these canoes, which really show the beauty and workmanship of bark canoe construction at its finest.

Mi'kmaq Bark Canoe

Todd "Waterdancer" Labrador is a seventh generation Mi'kmaq who builds birch bark canoes in his native tradition. Mi'kmaq canoes have a very unique design, included very blunt, rounded ends, a lack of a stempiece or headboard support, and a tendancy to use continuous lashing around a single round gunwale. It's interesting to see all the various tribal adaptations to the basic design of the bark canoe.


Adney's plan for a Mi'kmaq Canoe


Setting the ribs


Finished hull with continuous lashing


Upright paddling
More of Todd's creations can be seen at www.waterdancer.netfirms.com

Aleut Kayak Paddle - Part 2

One incomplete paddle project that's been haunting me lately was the attempt at an Aleut style kayak paddle made with some left over walnut and maple stock (see the Part 1 post). The blank was cut out in the fall of '07, but the actual carving didn't being in ernest until the late Spring of '08. With the frustration of working with a a wavy grained wood that I shouldn't have used in retrospect, the paddle has been sitting and collecting dust in the locker room for months now. So in an effort to finish what was started, I decided to forgo any major pyrography decoration (wouldn't show up will with this dark piece of walnut anyway) and simply sanded it down and oiled it.

Aleut kayak paddles tend to have an interested off centered grip area with a spine ridge running the length of the blade. Here are some pics to illustrate this:


The offset laminated loom


Two shots of the blade powerface


Backside and Powerface pics
I'm not much a kayak paddler anyway, but intend to give this one a test trial in the spring and will report back then.