Primitive Archery, Trapping & Woodsmanship w/ Mike Yancey

Episode Transcript
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(00:42):
the world of hunting, the icon and the North American
wilderness prepare We'll talk about tactics, gear, conservation. We will
also bring you into some of the wildest country on
the planet. Chasing Battery mikey Yancy is a long time

(01:05):
bowyer and primitive archer. Mike is an expert in the
field of making self bows. He also sells all types
of supplies primitive supplies for archery stuff. Mike teaches classes
for primitive bows, making primitive bows and Mike is a

(01:27):
longtime trapper and we have a very fun, information filled
conversation with my friend Mike Yancy of Pine Hollow Longbows
the Western Bear Foundation. These guys are fighting the good
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You're gonna enjoy this podcast with my friend Mike Yancy,
video everything and those things. They'll drop that much back up.

(04:54):
You just feel like an idiot. You're sitting there like,
how did I miss him that far? And you see
what he did? You know they're out there. Oh man,
Uh great, well, Mike, I've got I've got Mike Ancy
with me and uh Coby Colby moorehead the Baritex with
us here too. Mike. How many times have you been

(05:15):
to Africa? You were just telling a story about Africa. Yeah,
three weeks. I've been, uh took a two week trip once,
but I've been actually on so far as here twice. Yeah, okay,
co we were just talking about We're just talking about
I was telling Mike about how I'm I'm moving back
to the compound this year because I've focused on the

(05:37):
traadbow so much. I just, uh, I don't know, it's
not a particular reason. I just decided I was gonna
shoot the compound this year. But why that's relevant is
Mike Ancy is, uh, we've known each other for probably
ten years longer than that now, Yeah, probably so, And
uh you are you're for sure one of the leading

(06:01):
the national experts on self bows, making self bows, primitive
archery and so like if someone looked at me shooting
a recurve and a laminated long bow and thought that
I was a primitive hunter, Mike Dancy makes me look
like like I'm shooting a rifle with the with the

(06:21):
technology and the kind of stuff you're using. Mike. But man,
thanks for coming up here. You know, when I think
about you, Mike, You're like, uh, you're the real deal, man,
Like you're a wealth of knowledge. What you've chose to
focus on. I mean, you're you're an expert inside of it.
And I always appreciate having people like that. Uh in

(06:43):
my repertoire of of friends. Just you know, I just
have a ton of respect for you with all that
you're doing. I mean you've taken it to the bare
bones of primitive archery, all the way down to making bows,
making your arrows, cutting you know, uh, turkey feather fletchings. Um,
now do you flint in napp? I can struggle along

(07:06):
and make tools, but not hunting quality points. And that's
one thing. Uh. I guess I was a butcher too long.
I don't like getting cut. And when I flint nap,
I get cut. I draw the line and on my
primitive deal I kind of draw the line on string
material and arrowhead material. I want the very best that

(07:26):
makes sense. Yeah, I uh, I'm very particular on that
errow flight. And uh, I like modern chefts. I don't
have a problem with guys that want to use uh carbons,
even with the self bow. You know they will work
out of such a wide range of different bows. Well,
I like that philosophy. You know to me that if
you're you know, there's there's just certain sectors of anything

(07:49):
we do that we decide what we value. So I
like that you can make a self bow, which will
describe what that is later. But then you can also say, well, hey,
I'm not I'm not gonna categorize my arrows in the
same category as that, you know, find a way to
make it limiting and enjoy it, but still making an
effective tool for hunting has to be Yeah, you have

(08:13):
to be ethical about it. There's some guys that even
choose to shoot traditional that really probably shouldn't. You know,
it's not a cool little thing that you want to do.
It's a commitment to the effort that it involves. It's
not a hindrance once you get to that point, you know,
but you know the commitment. You've shot traditional for a
lot of years, and it's a it's almost a way

(08:34):
of life that once you get there, you know. It's
a method hunt, you know, and and I like that,
but it's a I've never heard that terminology. What do
you mean by I think I know? But tell me
what you mean by method hunt. You kind of go
through the stages in your hunting. You know, where you
you want to kill a bunch, you want to kill
a big and then you want to kill it with
the method. And to me, I've been hung on that

(08:56):
for so many years. Uh, I've put books animals in
the book. That's not that big a deal to me. Uh,
I'm more shot selective than I am animal selective. But
the method is what I like. I love reading about
these old timers that we wouldn't be here today without them,
and they had such a at their time that was

(09:17):
the only way to do it. Probably, you know when
the flint lock guys, you know in that era, but
just the different methods and a guy will study the
history and you kind of become part. It becomes a
bigger part of your hunt, especially when you make it yourself.
You know, it's uh, that method is a large it's
it makes it a year round deal where if you

(09:38):
really like bear hunting, there's nothing more fun than the method.
I went through the self bow deal where I wanted
to kill them all with self bows, and then I've
killed them with three curve and then with flint locks,
and now it's uh, you know it it adds every
animal that hunt. That method is more important to me
than than the quality of that that's a good that's
a good descriptor that's a good way to describe of it.

(10:00):
And you know, really everybody's doing that at some level.
They're not everybody, but most people because even with the compound,
guys are choosing that over a more technologically advanced weapon.
But you've just narrowed it down to just the core,
you know, ultimate primitive method when you're using a self bow.

(10:23):
But Mike, give me a little bit of history about yourself.
You grew up right here in western Arkansas. R Yes, um,
right on within a mile of the Oklahoma line, right
on the you know, right on the Arkansas Kahoma line.
And are you down there around uh where that Thomas
Sparks Buck was killed. Do you know the Arkansas state
record that was the biggest typical in the southeast that

(10:44):
was for like forty years. That was out of Evansville
Natural Damn area just just north of me a little ways. Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah,
those are the mountains that I hunt right there. Yeah, yeah,
that's when I was raising. And we're fortunate in this
area that we live here in ark and so we've
got everything that a guy needs to make primitive bowls,
you know, which this is the historical range of the

(11:06):
o s age trees, and we've got flint, we've got
when Mike Yancey walked up to the Global headquarters. He
was walking up and said, hey, bike, and he was
eyeing my oh sage orange tree out here. Man, he
was wanting to cut it down. I could tell you here.
I was like, hey, man, I'm up here. I'm up here,
and don't look at my trees. No, I'm sorry, I'm

(11:28):
interrupting you, Mike. Tell me. Okay, So you were raised here.
Would you come from a hunting family? Yeah, my dad hunted.
He uh he bow hunted a little bit when I
was a kid, but he just uh, he never took
it to the level that I did. I was just
always fascinated with the the arrowheads you know that you
can find here. My grandma would find him in her
garden and give them to me. And that connection of

(11:49):
finding those and wanting to learn how they made that stuff.
From the time I can remember, Um, I had never
shot a self bow or even seen one until I
made one and and just started. I didn't have anything
to compare to. You know. The books were just kind
of starting to come out on making those and it
got to be a big thing, you know, about five
years ago. And now there's there's no secrets anybody can

(12:11):
learn how to do it. But that's what got me started,
and then it just evolved into a business that you
can so you can trace back kind of the origins
of this of of you like in primitive archery, did
when you're a kid finding air heads? Really? So you
have picked that up as a kid. Did you have

(12:31):
anybody Mike that interpreted that for you? Like I I've like,
did you have a a dad or grandpa or your
grandma that maybe would have been like, wow, look at
this air head? Cut? Because I say that because, um,
I find in my life that I traced back a

(12:53):
lot of the things that I value to very small
things that people I respected said, you know, like because
some people can pick up an air head and just
be like oh airhead. Yeah. I mean like I've had
people given me airheads before and I was like, why
are you This is an incredible thing. Keep it for yourself.
And I took the arrowhead um because that But the

(13:15):
point was that no value of it. But anyway, is
that a fair question? Did or did you kind of
come up with that on your own, like this is
a valuable thing. It was probably on my own, Like
I say, my grandma always gave me those points and
aarrowheads and stuff that she found. But the fascination was
there from the very first time. And I've got everyone
I've ever been given by her and the ones that
I found over my lifetime and the places that I hunt.

(13:38):
It's amazing that I'll find stone tools or points, you know,
when I'm hunting. It's just history repeating itself. And it's
so neat to go to a place, you know, sometimes
even in a different country, that you'll find tools that
they're basically using the very same stuff that I am today.
Just that connection is still there, and that the Mountain

(14:00):
Man era, the fur trade era, that that fascinated me
from the time I was, you know, twelve thirteen years old,
and it never left, you know. I just they settled
this country, you know, and the bear hunters were a
big part of that. The trappers were a big part.
So it's, uh, I don't know, there's a deep connection there.
Whether it goes back to ancestors, I don't know. It
could be, but I've always had that an understanding of it.

(14:24):
You know, it all made sense to me. I It's
not something that you know, I couldn't work on a
car for anything, but I understood how to make a
gun and a boat. You know, It's just it was
easy for me. Yeah. Do you have a pretty good
stone Point collection? Oh? Yeah, from from the beginning of
time to the more crude modern stuff you know. Yeah,

(14:46):
that's all stuff you found or do you buy stuff?
Never buy it, just find it. Yeah. It's crazy how
the earlier stuff is the better stuff. The further they went,
the worst they got. Tell me what you mean by
that the quality the the points, not the material, but
like the technology now, just theship, the crashmanship and the

(15:08):
effort that they put into them. It's like the the older,
earlier points, the crashmanship and the quality was there, where
the the more modern they got. It's like they just
quit relying on the crashmanship and that the quality is
not there. They had, they had the availability to the
same materials. It's just, Uh, let's you ever found a
Clovis point here in Arkansas. I have. It's not they're fluted.

(15:31):
I wouldn't actually call them Clovis. Uh, They're close more
like Dalton's uh at that time period, because I've got
several fluted points that I found. So you're talking as
old as they get when you're talking the fluted stuff.
So describe what a fluted had, Describe what that means,
and about the time frame that that would be at

(15:51):
least six thousand years ago, but older than that. And
it's a when they made those points, they would take
up a way of percussion in a flute, a long
flute that runs right down the whole length of the point,
and they look crude, but that's the way they have
to them onto those at alettle. So it's a it's
a longer point, and so a fluted point means that's

(16:14):
kind of hold. There was impact percussion that chipped off
a big sliver vertically on the point as opposed to
like horizontally like a lot of times you think about
flint napp and you think about hitting the point on
the side, like chipping stuff off to the east and west. Right,

(16:34):
Is that is that? Right? Yeah? Those are side notches.
They did them on uh, either on the side or
the base, but on the closes they weren't. They were
that they had that flute that runs down narrowed down
the point so that they could put it into a
wooden shade or whatever, and that's what those are. Some
of the oldest that's the oldest technology of of stone

(16:59):
points in North America, well, Clovis Dalton. Yeah, yeah, it's
pretty incredible. You know, time is so deceptive because like
we live in and we just think this is normal
that we you drove here from fifty miles away. You

(17:19):
you know, like we just it's just we just have
this assumption. And it's amazing to me how easily we become,
like ungrateful is probably the wrong word, but like just
take for granted what we have because most of humanity,
when you look at the time frame that humans have

(17:39):
been on the Earth, this is like a really short
experiment where we have the technology that we have. I mean,
most of the mankind has been fed by stone points.
I mean, especially with time now considering the Earth now
has almost seven billion people. Perhaps we're starting to because

(18:01):
the Earth population was so slim, do you see what
I'm saying. I mean, like, but time wise, most humans
have been fed by stone points above agriculture, above what
we've been doing for the last couple of thousand years
and really last thousand years if we're talking about semi
modern technology anyway, incredible, it really is incredible stuff. Yeah,

(18:24):
we uh we think we know it all now, but literally,
life as we know it didn't really exist until like
the last hundred fifty years. And then if you go
back maybe even three d they were doing just what
we're talking about now. You know, it's not been that
long in the scheme of things that life was like
what we're talking about from the beginning of time until
just the last few hundred years. Things just really changed.

(18:45):
Why does this stuff fascinate us, Mike, because everything you're saying,
I mean, it's the same kind of stuff that I
think fascinates a lot of us. And uh, why And
I always ask people this because I try to answer
for me, why is it important? Because there's some people
that would be like, you know, the past is the past.

(19:11):
What you know, a lot of people, most people maybe,
but hunters would be a higher percentage of people that
would value the past. But like, what to you, what
value does it happen? It's respect? I think it. Uh,
it involves the animals that we hunt pursue. There's a

(19:31):
level of respect their forum, not not idolizing them, not
worshiping them in any way. It's just a it's a
level of respect, you know, And it's uh, I think
the the history of it and the method of it
is and animals are worthy of doing things the way
it's always been done. And when you research all that

(19:52):
and you have that connection with it. Um, Yeah, you
can take a matthews or a whole it and shoot
golf ball size groups, you know, at fifty yards and
that is very good, and you know when you owe
that to the animal. But they're all just like their
coal is a fish. But you take a wood bow
that you've made, You've cut that tree, everything came from

(20:15):
your area or whatever. If you trade for it don't matter.
The point is is the level of commitment to the
sport in the connection with it, and it all becomes
alive almost the Uh. You're you're taking trees that were live,
you're cutting them and seizing them. You're using raw hide, snakeskins,
whatever you want to use. It's all natural. It's all renewable,

(20:36):
and there's a connection there with the commitment while you're
doing it. UH used to when I was a kid,
I was making my own arrows, and you know, I'd
sit there at the coffee table in the summertime and
UH and fletch arrows in the summertime. You know, it's
just part of the hunt, you know. But when you
go that next level and start making your own stuff,

(20:57):
it it adds a whole different aspect to it. And uh,
I think a lot of people miss that. Uh that boat.
And as outdoor riders, I think a lot of times
we're our own worst enemy because those big companies they
pay the bills, you know, and they are the ones
that are advertising my little company. You know, I do advertise,

(21:18):
but as a whole, most of the primitive sports they
can't advertise. So it's not big money. It's such a
it's such a small piece of the pie. It's a
very small piece and it always will be. So people
are easily led by advertising that they think to kill
that deer, that bear, they have to have this camo,

(21:40):
this bow, this gun, and um, they missed the fun there.
Things don't make you happy and things don't make you successful.
It's that it's your ability with that equipment. Not that
there's anything wrong with those kinds of bowls. You know,
I shot them for years too. You know, I went
through a phase. Um, I got rid of a recurve
in the early seventies, late seventies and started shooting them

(22:03):
a bear white till hunter, one of most Crewish compounds
ever made. But at the time it was time, it
was you know the moon. Yeah, I thought, well, this
is a ticket, and so for years I killed a
lot of stuff with compounds, but just went back to
the old stuff and love it. Yeah. You know what,
when you when you you're your your first answer to

(22:24):
why you're attracted to the old way was respect for
the animal. As you said that, I was, I'm kind
of connecting that too, kind of the the well, I
recently read about how moose and elk and some of

(22:46):
these really primitive ancestors of the modern big game that
we have in North America, most of it, almost all
of it came across the Burying Strait during you know,
when the when the glaciers lord sea level, there was
a connection between Siberia and Alaska, and these animals came
across and at the same time humans were coming across.

(23:09):
And one philosophy, one one idea is that humans, you know,
totally killed out the big magafauna like the like the
the wooly mammoths, um all the really big game because
at that exact time that humans made it into North America,
you know, fifteen seventeen thousand years ago, all these big cares,

(23:32):
these this big megafauna died off. But all the animals
that had evolved with humans over in Siberia, they say
had already I mean, the human was a natural predator
of those animals, and they had already adapted ways to
survive human predation. Just like if you released a wolf

(23:54):
predator into you know, a sheep pen and the sheep
never it never had wolf predators, you could knock them out.
I'm connecting that back to you saying it's a respectful
way to hunt, because like it's it really is, like
you know, almost like naturally. A more natural method of

(24:16):
human predation is that, you know, because it's it is
quite unnatural for a predator to be able to attack
game from five hundred yards I mean, like there's nothing
that can do that, but to be able to get
within twenty yards probably max with a self bow. I

(24:36):
mean for most people, or even closer is where you're at,
Like that those animals have developed strategies to evade that
close range predation. Anyway, I'm kind of just layering what
you're saying because I like that, but I was taking
it back a step further to like, why is it

(24:56):
respectful to hunt that way? You know? Uh, and and
I think that's what that would be. One connection point
is that it's uh, it's it's we've been hunting that
way a long long time, so just the thought, yeah,
it's still effective. You know a lot of people think,
you know, uh, they'll look at them at a show.

(25:16):
You know, I'll have a table full of bows and
you know that they think they're cute little toys. They
don't realize how effective they are. And you know, truthfully,
you know, you've shot traditional for a long time, and
you know what they can do. A good made soft
bow is within just a few feet of a good recurve,
you know, or a good long boat glass boat. They're

(25:37):
not that there's not that big of a disadvantage from
a from a standard traditional Yeah, from traditional to primitive,
it's uh, there's a very fine line. And in fact,
some of the better made primitive bows are better than
some of the low end uh production type glass glass bows. Yeah. Yeah,

(25:57):
it's amazing. Yeah, um tell me, uh, let's go ahead
and define what a self bowl is. Sure most people
consider it one piece of wood, you know, cut tree,
split it and it's made from a piece of wood,
they will still consider it a self bowl with a
send you backing or a raw hide backing and snake.

(26:17):
Of course, the snakes just for looks. It doesn't add
any performance or durability. But uh, some people even will
consider a self bowl laminated like a board bow with
a bamboo backing or that type of deal. I really don't.
I think I consider that more of a composite. And
but a self bowl would strictly be one piece of wood,

(26:38):
one piece of wood. So like stock removal, like if
like you're starting out with a block and you're removing
everything that's not a bow run Yeah, yeah, you're following
those annual growth rings on the on the tree the
way it grew. You go through the sap and the bark,
take all that off, and then you follow one continuous
growth ring from end to end, and that's what keeps
it from breaking. And then you start removing in the

(27:00):
thickness to get the poundage that you want. And it's
they've been they've been doing it that way ever since
they started making bows, and nothing has changed. They couldn't
get it any better than um. Then they started out
with it's amazing the the different areas of the country,
like the western Plains Indians, they didn't have access to
a lot of the woods that we did here in

(27:22):
the South and the East and all of that, so
their bows were shorter. Almost all of them were sent
you backed, where our bows were longer and unbacked because
of our humidity. And then we had the availability of
good woods, So longer is better if you can get it,
but they couldn't, so there's different designs. And then like
the Mongolians, you know, they about conquered the world with

(27:44):
those little composite horn bows, but that's what they had
available to them. You know, they were seen you horn
and just a real thin little wood in the middle.
But you know they could shoot forever with them, and
they were very good. They, like I said, about conquered
the old world with them. So the self bows that
you're making, is that a direct replication of Native American

(28:06):
boats used to be. I started out with the old
Cherokee method. Tell me tell me about that. Yeah. Al
hern he is from Taliquo and his wife and him
are both of the Cherokee Indians. He was trained by
the old Masters and when he wrote his book there
was a big fallen out. They didn't want the old

(28:28):
elders didn't want those methods passed on outside of them. Yeah,
and had he not done it, it would have been lost.
And in fact, the Cherokee Nation has sent a guy
to me to teach him how to make bows so
he could teach the Cherokee kids. Yeah, so it would
have been lost if al hadn't have written that book.

(28:48):
And and he's still alive. He's a everybody owes him
a big favorite, you know, for for doing that. You know, yes,
you have interviewed him on articles before and a great guy. So,
but that's the book that I learned from. And it's
the book. It was called Cherokee Bows and Arrows. Cherokee
Bows and Narrows. An't sell it on your website, I do, though,
you said. But it's a good method, and that's the

(29:10):
one I started with. But then I developed a style
of my own after that. Okay, we'll tell me about
that that What does that bowl look like? The Cherkey
bows are long. They were big people. They had long
draw links. So most of them were you know, in
the high sixties as far as length, you know, probably
even some seventy two in bows maybe, but they're typically

(29:32):
just a long straight bow, no no reflex added to them.
They were just a straight kind of debo what they
would call them, and a lot of them even bent
through the handle. But they did build a handle bow,
which was very rare for the natives. Most of them
didn't build a real rigid handle sex. So it just
looked like it's just like the same consistency all the

(29:54):
way through the on the debos that bent through the handle,
they were just the same thickness all the way through.
Almost you would look at it and it just looked
like a bent stick. Right. But they did build handlebows,
and that's what they were famous for. Okay, what kind
of what was their preferred wood? Sage is the o
s age tree throughout the southeast Native in the Arkansas

(30:15):
River Valley and the Red River Valley. That's where now
the Cherokee's primarily came from the Carolinas. Yeah, Georgia, the
US back there say they were trading for it that
in black locusts, you know, is that right? Yea? So
they were making self was that a black locusts? Yeah?
Is that? But it's not as good as I don't
like it. It doesn't have the compression qualities that the

(30:36):
O s GE does. It'll crush on the belly on
the on the compression side, the side that's bend into
you but doesn't have enough strength. But you know, it'll
make a bowl, but I would do a lot of others.
When did those tribes begin to have the technology to
make a bow a self bow? I guess they always did. Well,

(30:58):
I've heard uh. I was thinking that, you know, because
they use addleaddles. I was thinking it was like years
ago that yeah, that's probably about yeah, it's it's I'm
not an expert on that, somewhere in that range. So,
I mean, there was a time period when all the
tribes here were pretty much using ad laddles and spears.

(31:20):
And then what's amazing to me is that all across
the globe kind of at the same time, exactly everybody
got this technology of a stringed bowl, which is hard
to imagine how news spread or how I what do
they call it? Um there's a term, there's a term

(31:43):
used to describe and I think it's I don't even
want to say, I can't remember, but where basically technologies
spawn at the same time, but they're not connected, but
it's just because of the the technology beneath it. So
you would look in like archaeological records and you would think, well,

(32:04):
these people had to have communicated, but but they didn't.
It's just that it was kind of this natural progression
of just like human thought. Almost uh uh. I think
it's called cod converted. I I can't remember what it was. Anyway, Well,
they've associated that, that associated that with like uh Tesla

(32:27):
and uh Edison with electricity. Both of those guys came
up with that idea at the very same time, unbeknownst
each other. And it's been all through history and like
you say, in the Arrowhead type deal, they covergent evolution
maybe what it's called spontaneous knowledge, I guess, but they
they they learned it. You're right that the points they

(32:50):
made them all over the country at the same time,
and I'm sure to a point they were in contact.
Some is just a little slower, but even in Europe
they were building. Um, they're finding stuff that is just
like ours at the same level of in the archaeology,
they're digging stuff that was being done at the same

(33:10):
time it was done here. And it's it's nuts that
all over the world. They were doing the same things
at the same time. So these so these cherkey bows
were made, uh they were, they were a longer bow.
And and then let's see uh as as oh say,

(33:33):
George's like the el primo self bow material. To me,
it is you can use some other woods and like
the in the Pacific Northwest they have Pacific you and
that the English longbows were famous for being made out
of you would and it's good, but it doesn't have
the durability and the ruggedness of Oh Sage. You can

(33:54):
throw an O s Age bow out of a tree.
You can go swimming with it. I mean you can do.
It's tough and it will just last forever, especially with
the grease finish. You can take some beargrease and beest
wax and heat that wood till it won't suck up anymore.
And I really think you could not wear it out
if it's made right in a lifetime. You just gave
me a new usage for burgrease. I adding it to

(34:18):
the list used it for? Have you used it for years?
It's amazing, man, Oh Sage. Okay, when I built this,
when I built this house, this property has a ton
of s George on it. I said, it's secondary. I
think this place was cut selectively, cut forty fifty years
ago and this was just kind of you know, farm country,
and so they left all the junk trees, you know,

(34:40):
and uh, around here, you do that, you're gonna get
some George. When I built my house, the guy that
was doing the footing, I've got a big state Orge
right there, and the one you were eyeing over there.
And the guy said, you're gonna want to get rid
of those. And I said why and he just said,
trust me, you're gonna want to get rid of those.

(35:00):
And I've got multiple George stories. Number One, this tree
has gotten so big that it overhangs my driveway and
all of my vehicles have dents in the hood because
of these we call horse apples o sa gerange fruit.
They're about as big as a softball, way about a
pound and a half. Falling from forty feet up dead

(35:22):
center of the hood would leave a dent in it.
Number One. For years, I blamed my kids for bouncing
the basketball. Really the boys playing balls im and I
would have these dents in my hood and I would
get upset with the boys. And then one day I
was out there and bam. So there's number one. Number
two they that would is so incredibly strong, like if

(35:46):
you uh. One time, I was on my tractor, Mike,
and I was digging something with the tractor and I
backed up in that tree right there had an old
limb there was only about two inches big that was
hanging off, and I t bone that limb right into

(36:06):
the dead center of my shoulder blades while I was
on the tractor, and any other it was a dead limb.
Any other limb would have broke, And I thought I
was impaled. I was expecting to look down and see O, say,
George taking out in front of my chest in anyway.
That stuff, it won't rot. I've got I've got posts
on this place, O say, George, posts that we're here,

(36:28):
probably from the forties maybe thirties, that are still functional posts.
And that's why I cut down, and O say George,
And I'm using it for post something on my barn.
Incredible stuff it is. Now you go to Texas to
get all your stuff, don't you know I get most
of it out of Missouri. Oh really yeah? Okay, but
so you travel to get staves? Actually right, I actually

(36:51):
had loggers that didn't know what it is. And they
can get more for it out of Bowood than they
can for the for the oak that they're usually cutting
for timber, you know, so they'll they'll grade it for
me and select it. And I've got some pretty good
loggers over the years that I've got a work in
relationship with that keep me in Bowood. And then I
cut as much as I can, but the demand that

(37:13):
I have, I can't physically cut enough myself. And that
stuff like you're talking about being so tough. If you
ever cut one commercially to get any number, you can
take a limb, there will be as big round as
a golf ball and it will hang up on another tree.
It won't break. The stuff will and I mean the
hand will have to cut a half acre trees to

(37:35):
get one o s age to fall because they'll hang
in everything and they just won't break. But there it's
amazing wood. But when you cut into a chainsaw, you
almost wouldn't believe if you hadn't see it, if you
if you didn't see it with your own eyes, you
wouldn't believe it. When you cut it with a chainsaw,
its sprays a almost glowing sharp truths bright yellow sawdust.

(37:58):
That's just incredible. They're beautiful, and then they over time
quickly they kind of turned that honey golden brown, but
they go from a bright just yellow. Yeah, an incredible
would and you can't stop that from happening. It's gonna
it's gonna do that. The light makes it change. And
the more of that bow or that wood is out

(38:20):
in the sun, the darker it'll get. And those that
are finished with a grease finish, they seem to suck
up those. I don't know if it's ultra violet rays
that causes it or what, but they tend to get
darker faster, and they really get a patina to them
really quick that they age over and almost like a
slick gym floor finish after about a year of using

(38:41):
that grease. And that's just one treatment. Yeah, I'll be
darn Um. Tell me about you're you're hunting with these
self bows? Um, what's your what's your favorite thing to
hunt with them? You know it changes all the time
from what I hunted last I guess, But for years
it was Key's and then it went to antelope. I've

(39:02):
killed a lot of antalope with these bows. Um, I
was fascinated with them. Um for the first time I
went out west and seeing them out you know, in
the plains, they really fascinated me. But I've been fortunate
to go from you know, the Northwest Territories to to
South Africa and hunt everything in betwards in the Northwest Territories,
Cariboo back in the in the good the the end

(39:23):
of the good days of Cariboo. I was glad I
did it when I did. And uh, because the numbers
aren't there now, you know, in fact, a lot of
the Cariboo camps out of yellow Knife and on up
towards Arctic Circle, they're not even in business anymore. But yeah,
took two really good bulls with an no sage self
bow up there and um as I cutting on the moon,
you know, as all tom nothing higher than a rock

(39:47):
as big as uh. You know, you couldn't even hide behind,
you know, it's amazing, no cover. And when I got there,
I thought, boll, you can't do it. And uh, but
I had a good Indian guide and uh, he knew
their movement, but he didn't understand and bows. And uh
he asked me when they when I got out of
the plane, he said, can you run? I said, yeah,
I hadn't run, and we ran. Now, when those cariboo

(40:10):
would drop down in a in a drainage, we'd take off.
And this was a big tall Indian and I mean
he could cover some country and we we had a blast. Now,
we chased cariboo for a week and like say, killed
two bulls with with how close to jeffica. One of
them was about forty yards first, all right, further than
I wanted. And that's where I say he didn't understand bows,
because the bull was walking right at us. I was

(40:34):
hiding behind a rock and he was on the edge
of the lake. He was gonna walk right in front
of me and the things about forty five yards and
he starts schelling and shoot, shoot, shoot, And I didn't
want to shoot that far. But the bull standing there
doing this, you know, and he knew we were there
then and I had to shoot him quartering to me
at forty something yards and I put a as a

(40:54):
wiki head. I was shooting wikis back then right on
the point of his shoulder and dropped him in his tracks.
At went through bro broke both shoulders and dropped him
right there in his tracks. He said he had been
never seen a bowl hunter do that, but it was
I was forced into the situation. It's it wasn't an
ideal situation. And then the other bull, it was probably

(41:17):
a twenty five yard shot, and it was the last day,
and Uh he had always picked the locations, and on
I spotted those three bulls. He said, he almost like
we knew this was it. He said, where do you
want to get? And I said it was like a
terrace of rocks where the glaciers had pushed up these terraces.
And I said, right behind him rocks. And we went
up there and got behind him, and they fed right
by us. And when the last one came by, he

(41:40):
was the biggest, and I just raised up and just
thumped him at twenty five yards. It was cool. See
that's further than what I would have thought. What's your
what's what range? Do you usually want? Game? And you
know I want stuff twenty yards. I don't like it
a whole right closer fifteen is good, but twenty fifteen
or twenties my perfect. But I killed the bull, not

(42:02):
a bull, a cow elk in Uh in New Mexico
about five years ago, forty four yards and it was
one of those deals where that's a little further than
I like. But they were coming down the trail and
there was a hole in that trail in the brush
about the size of a five gallon bucket, and it
was right at the trail, and that the elk was
just filtering through there. So I knew I was either

(42:24):
gonna kill it or hit the brush and miss it.
So it was its ethical Yeah, and uh in double lunger,
you know, she went forty yards, you know, So you know,
those are ideal situations. And I've killed white tells, you know,
in that range before. But these bowls are so quiet
they if they're feeding, they don't have a clue usually
Now if they're standing there hunting buggers like we were

(42:46):
talking earlier and on that African stuff, that stuff is
wired like you would not believe. And the least my
bowls are super quiet, but they can react so fast.
So I try to shoot the stuff that's unaware. And uh,
because even fifteen yards on an animal, that's a where
they're gonna not gonna be where they were when you
turned loose. Yeah, so I like them close. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

(43:09):
That that's the most notable thing to me about shooting
a self bow from going even from my traditional bows
or compound bows. It's how quiet they are. Absolutely you
feel like, uh, it's almost like shooting a gun with
a silencer, you know, like you shoot a gun and boom,

(43:29):
you the sound and everything translates into an equivalency of
how dangerous that weapon is. If I can said that way,
I mean like you shoot a gun and you're like, yeah,
that would kill something. When you put a silencer on
a gun and shoot it all of a sudden, it
feels like a toy almost. It's like and the it's

(43:51):
all I've had that sense. I feel the same thing
when I shoot a self bow. It's like you shoot
it in that air us flying fast and thuds the target,
but you feel like you feel like nothing happened, you know,
because I'm just used to twack twack, and boy, you
shooting cell phone. It's just like right. Well, that being said,

(44:15):
most of the game that you shoot is reacting to
the sound of the weapon. It's not so much the hit.
I would almost bet most animals shot with the silencer
or a suppressed rifle will die and fall quicker than
those shot with one. Not the impact is the same,
The energy is the same and the same thing with
these bows. I've literally shot stuff that I don't think

(44:38):
knew that it was hit. I shot a black bear
in Canada one time, and and this was another one
of those deals where I was forced into a long
shot and it was over forty yards with the self bow.
But it was the only bait that that outfitter had
that was active, and it was set up for a
rifle hunter. And I thought, well, maybe he'll wander by,

(44:58):
you know, going to the bait, which was close to
forty fifty yards away, and I thought, I'm just wasting
my time, but maybe he'll come under me going to
the bait. Well it didn't. It went right to the bait.
And I had shot and shot that year. I was
really ready and it was so far away that that
arrow passed through that bear. It jumped back, like, looked around,

(45:19):
walked off, and then turned around and came back to
the bait and fell over dead. Never never knew it
was hit. Reacted to the arrow going on the ground,
you know, blowing through it, but it never heard the bow.
Of course, that far away, you know, I don't think
it would anyway, But it's amazing the quietness of these bows,
and you get quicker recoveries. A lot of stuff you
see fall, whether with the compound or a crossbow. Even

(45:42):
you know, they're so loud that they're running from that
noise of the weapon rather than the impact of the shot.
Right right. I've had the same experience with a with
a traditional bowl a longbow that was pretty quiet, shot
a bear and he jumped at the sting, you know,
and then just went back to feeding, just like I

(46:03):
don't even know what's happened here. Actually that's happening multiple
times now that I think about it. And uh and
then they just drop over. Yeah, yeah, they don't slips
through them so fast. Good way to go, Yeah, it
sure is. Um, what have you got big plans this year? Well,
I supposed to have have been in Africa, but that all

(46:23):
got canceled with with the the virus stuff. But I'm
going to New Mexico on an elk hunt here in
a couple of weeks so in October, and then um,
basically that's it for the rest this year. UM, next
year of rescheduled Africa and we'll go back there if
if things loosening back up, and then probably a moose

(46:44):
hunt with Gavin and Eric. They've got a new moose
outfit in Newfoundland. Oh that's right, Yeah, yes, yeah, they've
I've hunted their tribal land there and this is These
are buddies at Panana Scott out outfide service guys in Maine. Yeah,
they have a good bear operation. They're they're hard workers.

(47:05):
But they've got a new moose and bear operation in
Newfoundland that has some pretty good numbers. So that ought
to be good. Hey, I'm going to uh, I'm gonna
look up your I wanted to look up your website
here because I wanted to read off. Um, let's see,
I want to read off what uh I want to

(47:31):
I want to read off your web store. Okay, so
you're Pineholler Longbows is who you are, and so this
isn't a I was just looking at this this morning. Um,
let's see Native supplies okay, colbe how many people that
you know have a website that Okay, I've gotten to
pineholl A long Bows and I'm on the Native supplies Okay. Well,

(47:53):
here we have buffalo horns for sale, calhorns deer toes
for fifty cents apiece full quill wild turkey tail feathers.
We've got some napped a heads for fiftars uh, stone
point blanks, stone knives, tanned badger fur, tan to beaver fur,

(48:16):
tan beaver tails, tan bobcat fur, tan, coyote for tan,
gray fox, tan mink fur, muskrat fur, possum, otter coon. Uh.
Turtle shells for five dollars each, yeph hold dear rawhide, whole,
dear wild turkey bard shoulder feathers. Um. Yeah, and all

(48:39):
kinds of turkey feathers. This is pretty cool. What who?
What are what are people doing with turtle shells making
Indian rattles out of them? On the hand rattles? Oh
is that right? Some of it in the dance competitions,
they'll use u they'll stack them up on their legs
and they rattle as they is a dance. And that's
the same thing with the deer toes. But really that

(49:00):
was my next question. People doing a deer toes. You
would not believe the sound of a dry deer toe
that rattles against itself. They have a sound string of
deer toes. Yeah. They had called a bustle and they'll
put I think like a hundred and fifty of them
on there, and they drill a little hole through the
tip of them and it's just the the outside of
the toe, just the black part of the deer toe,

(49:22):
and they look like a little black battles and on
those uh in those dance competitions, there's different categories, and
there's some they're historically correct and they have some of
their fancy. But when they put those deer toes on
their outfits to dance, it's the coolest sound you've ever heard.
It's just real neat and we sell thousands of them.

(49:43):
We have for years. I've got a huge company that
really has the niche for that business that I have
supplied them for over twenty years. So you're you're supplying
the deer toes. Yeah, I'll be done. Yeah where how where?
How do you get deer toes haaging houses here? You know,
they kill so many deer around here that that I've
got to just to have a special permitting to sell.

(50:04):
I've got it. I've got a letter of exemption from
the Game and Fish Commission because in their book it
says that no part of the deer can be sold
except for the antlers in the hide and I've been
doing the Senu and the h and the toes for
years and years, and uh, their lawyer, the guy that's
in charge of all their legal terminology, sent me. He

(50:25):
said the reason for the wording of that was people
were selling dear jerky and so they didn't want that.
But he said, mine is considered an off fall or
a waste product, and there's nothing wrong with the the
Senu and the deer toast. So but I kept that
letter of exemption to just have on file, you know,
in case it was ever brought up. But yeah, so

(50:46):
that makes total sell. Yeah, that makes seal sense. Now, Mike,
you also tell me about your boat classes. Oh, they're
they're blast YEA. I do group classes, you know it,
usually one or two a year. Sometimes we'll do them
on location and do a hunt in the evening and
build bows in the morning. But most time they're at

(51:07):
my shop here in Arkansas, and uh, I'll do one
on one uh and then I do the groups as well.
The groups are okay if um, you like a crowd,
and then you can get uh, if there's ten guys
in that class, you can get the problems that they
will create. You can see how I fix them, and

(51:29):
you can get a little bit more hands on by
doing that, because usually somebody's gonna mess up somewhere in
the building and I have to fix it for them.
So you can see how that's taken care of. On
the one on one you get more personal attention and
I kind of control it where they don't have as
much free time on their own and usually there's not
much to correct. But yeah, we do them into class

(51:51):
and so you gotta you gotta one on one, two
day self boat class that people could could go on. Um,
you got a lot of different things here. You got
uh let's see, you got a you got schedule for
one a spring stuff bow building workshop. Um, all this
stuff is really affordable to when you think about how

(52:13):
much you'd pay for a new bow. I mean you
can get a bow cheaper in the class or in
a in one of those instruction courses. Then you could
have me build you one. Yeah, and then you get
tell you you can learn how to do it and
get a boat. I mean I'll just say, what is
eight hundred dollars for a one on one class two
days with you come to Arkansas and you're with them

(52:34):
in a shop in in your shop building a bow
and they come out with a boat with the bow
and knowing how to do it. Yeah, that's incredible, rather
than paying me twelve to build them one. Yeah. But
there's some that just don't want to build a bow,
you know, and that's okay, But there's something that want
to learn how and um, a lot of them just
do it as a vacation. I have guys that don't
even hunt that will come take a class because it's

(52:56):
they like to do things with their hands, and they
look at it as a craft and a getaway. So
you know, I don't care what they do with them. Hey,
this is pretty cool too, Kobe. I think, uh, I
think I'm gonna send you down here for five day
predator trapping course in the Ozark Mountains with Mike Yancey.
That'd be fun. Yeah, so that you can come back
up here and take care of all our predators on

(53:19):
the estate here. Now you gotta so you have a
a predator predator trapping class and Texas and here that
people can come to and I mean for somebody that's
wanting to learn how to trap man Collie, that is
an adventure. Now those are my favorite to do because
they get to watch me trap, they learn how they

(53:42):
get to see from start finish, you know, how to
do it, how to finish the hides, everything, and you know,
it's a it's about as fun a vacation as a
guy can take, and especially the Texas class, because we
catch huge numbers of coats and cats. And you'd be
exposed two more cowdes being caught in a five day

(54:02):
class there than you would be on your own in
several years. You know, we catch big numbers. Yeah. Do
you remember years ago? You you're the one that taught
me how to flesh coons. Do you remember that when
I came down there and I had some I had
some coons and we fleshed the bear hide too. Yeah,
that was a booger. It was in the summer, but

(54:22):
it had been better in the wintertime when the fat
was jelled up. That hide turned out good though. Yeah. Uh. Actually,
you know what those bear hide chaps you see those,
that's the bear. That's the bear we saw. I took
this raw bear hide down to Mike and we we
fleshed it. And it was in May. I remember when

(54:44):
it was. It was in May and it was hot
in the in the in the grease, and you know
it's best to do it when it's cool so that
fats a little bit more solid. And it was just
a mess, but we did it and we uh spread
the spread the hide out on big sheet apply wood,
salted it. I brought it back home and I left

(55:04):
it on that ap plywood, stretched out, salted it multiple times,
you know, would rake the greasy salt off every couple
of days, put more salt on. Finally got it to
where the salt would stay dry after I put it
on that hide, and then I sent it to uh
who did I send it to? USA Fox? Yeah? Is
that who? Probably? Is that Tanning Unlimited might have been

(55:28):
back then. I was using them at one time, but
USA Fox doesn't too. But speaking of fleshing hides and
stuff stone knives, you would not believe how good a
job you can really do on a cape with a
stone knife turning ears. You can't hardly cut them, but
you can de serrated edge on that knife. You can

(55:49):
just zip, zip zip. When I'm up there in Maine
with gathering them on their hunts, I always have to
take care of my bears there and we'll spread those
things out and I'll take a carry salt with me
and you can put that on here as you're doing it,
and it helps you get ahold of it a little better.
And then that stone knife will separate from the hide
and the flesh. And uh there was a taxi dumber

(56:10):
Sara watching me do it one time and he was
just amazed that a stone knife blade will do better
than a modern steel knife fleshing and caping. Hey, look
at this. Somebody gave this to me. Evaluate the craftsmanship
on this. For me, I just had a mike a
a knife, a stone point knife, got a deer handle,

(56:34):
deer horn handle handle, it's got white tell whitetail send you.
And that's pine pitch. Pine pitch to do a pretty
good job. Yeah, it's all percussion work. You can tell
that he made He made that too, is uh my
buddy down in Florida. Um, yeah, he made that for me. Yep.
And you can touch these up. You can take like
a horse you nail or a finishing nail and you

(56:56):
can just pop little tiny flakes right on that edge
and that thing was sharping back up. But this right
here would be perfect for fleshing a bear hunting. I'm
amazed when people come in here. Sometimes I'll randomly pull
this out when I'm opening up a box or doing something,
and I'm amazed at how sharp it is. I mean,
I've I've used this for quite a bit of stuff

(57:17):
just around the office, just randomly for cutting stuff. I
probably do need to sharpen it. That's a good idea.
It's easy to do. One of the bears that I
killed in Canada one year, I kept the jaws and
I put in a city and blade in one of
the jaws and made a knife, and then went back
the next year and the bear that I killed the
next year, I completely skint, gutted and flesh that whole

(57:39):
bear with the bear jaw knife from the bear that
i'd killed the year before. So it just adds something
to it. But it's effective. I mean, it will really work.
It's amazing how good that stuff will work on hid
It is pretty incredible. Yeah, well, um, you know I
was gonna I was gonna say this earlier, but just

(57:59):
talking about primitive archery, traditional archery. When I first got
into it, probably the thing that I had to become
convinced of, and it was just lack of knowledge, laugh,
lack of experience was the effectiveness of them as a
killing tool. I think I had been um marketed to

(58:25):
and just didn't understand that that this wooden weapon, you know,
because in my upbringing would have been in the nineties.
I mean, we grew up shooting archery tournaments and all
that when I was a kid, and so, um, everybody
was big into speed. You know, everybody was trying to
shoot the fastest compound bow they could, and so that

(58:48):
was the that was the theme of the age, as
speed as everything. And so you started seeing these guys
that are shooting bows that were shooting a hundred seventy
per second as opposed to you know, high two hundreds
or even over three feet per second back in those
days was smoking fast. And you get this idea that, well, Gali,

(59:10):
if if speed kills, then per second probably probably wouldn't
even probably couldn't even kill a squirrel with it. But
that is the furthest thing from the truth. I mean,
I've been amazed at just as a traditional archer. I
mean that I've killed a lot of bears with the
treadbow total pass throughs, I mean, the very effective killing

(59:33):
weapons and uh and just a unique and fun way
to hunt for sure yep. To me, that speed just
equals a flat trajectory. It takes the yardage guessing out
of it for you, and that is a huge plus.
But with these boats, like you say, one reason I

(59:54):
went to hunting with them so much and and left
the compound. The hardest thing for me to leave the
compound alonge was for turkeys because you can draw and
hold so long and draw when you needed to and
hold so long and let them walk into where you
needed And it was hard for me to give up
that compound because I love to hunt turkeys with a bow.
But and the hardest thing for me to kill with
the traditional bowls were the turkeys, and it took me

(01:00:17):
forever to get it done. And then once I did,
I started killing. But it's tough. But the main thing,
most of the stuff you kill around here is gonna
be inside of twenty yards just because of our thickness.
So you know, that's that's traditional and primitive bowl range.
So I thought, for sure, you know, why not just
go ahead and carry them. And then once you start
doing it, and then you just start falling in love

(01:00:38):
with it. But that they've all got their place, and
definitely a compound has its place in my book for
for turkeys because I love to huntle the bowl. Now,
when you when you shoot your bow, are you holding
so you describe to me your shot process. I'm almost
a snapshooter, but I will anchor. But I lock into

(01:01:00):
a spot before I ever start the draw. I don't
do this aiming and moving around like you see the
lot of these guys do. I can't the bow. My
form is uh. I point my left shoulder at what
I'm shooting at, and I bend a little bit at
the waist and I leaned my head in. But I
have locked in my knuckle on my bow hand. I
know where I wanted on that animal, and I've picked

(01:01:22):
the spot and I locked into it right then. And
if that animal moves, I've got to completely go through
that process again because my mind has already made up
where I'm gonna shoot. And if here are you saying
you're kind of gap shooting. Now, I don't gap, but
it's a mental thing that my mind tells me where
my hand needs to my bow hand needs to be

(01:01:43):
in relationship to the target. So in a way, it
is gap. But I'm not like saying I'm not saying
he's twelve yards. My knuckle needs to be down here
at his feet. You know, it's not that it's just
from years of locking in in total concentration, and uh,
it's purely instinctive because I don't used the point of
the arrow in any way to to to aim at.

(01:02:03):
I'm conscious of the shaft. I'm lining up a point
from the target to the tip of my arrow, to
the back of my arrow, and I try to get
those three lines lined up mentally and physically. And then
I come to I put my middle finger in the
corn of my mouth, and I've already, like I said,
I've already locked in on one to under. Yes, I

(01:02:26):
shoot split. I cannot shoot three under with a tab.
I just don't like it at all, and it makes
the bows noisier. But for me, it just don't work.
I just feel like I've got more control with the split,
uh grip like that. But and then I've locked in,
and as soon as that middle finger comes to my mouth,
that that arrows on its way, and I try to
consciously follow through with the shot and not give into

(01:02:49):
it to look and see where it's going. I try
to stay in that form until the arrow hits and
and it's a big metal games. It's a huge mental game.
And I I saw that in Africa the last trip. It's, uh,
it's so total focused you know that. Uh it's hard
in a three D tournament to shoot eighteen targets or

(01:03:09):
whatever and be very focused on every one of them.
You know. It's Uh, it's you know you're gonna hit it,
you'll hit it. If you hope you're gonna hit it,
you usually don't, so you've got to be Uh. It's
it's as much mental, I believe it is this physical
after a point. Oh yeah, I think so. And how
did the how did the Cherokee shoot? I I guess

(01:03:29):
that they shot the same way, you know, I don't
know that they did any differently, you know, Um, I know,
uh I know is she um he shot? You know?
The issue was the was the supposedly one of the
last Native Americans in California that lived like Native Americans

(01:03:53):
lived for ten thousand years. And he um, he's the
one that taught Saxon Pope and Art Young how to
self bows. And he was shooting like like had a
real odd grip with his thumb. He used the knuckle
of his thumb didn't he or how how did he
he had Remember he had a pinch track grip, but
he pulled to his chest. But most of them, theyst

(01:04:17):
of those Westens, most of those Western Indians did that
because they were shooting shorter bows. They had a shorter
draw length. They were only they were shooting real stout,
little short bows, and most of the arrows are probably
only twenty two inches. They're probably pulling them. Maybe imagine
how you could be really accurate by so what we're
doing when we're shooting is we're pretty much drawn to

(01:04:38):
a line almost directly. I mean, like when I shoot
three fingers under, I'm almost putting there underneath my eye,
you know, but split finger, the air is a little
bit lower on your mouth, but still you're looking just
right over the top of that era and these in
like issue he he was his anchor point was you know,

(01:04:58):
eight nine inches below was I like down in his chest. Anyway,
I just can't imagine how they could have been accurate
very far, I think probably. And I can do that
to a point with those little Indian bows, you know,
playing with them, and there's days that you can just
knock a ball all over the yard and there's days
that you couldn't hit a beach ball, you know. I mean,

(01:05:20):
you just have good days and bad days when you're
shooting that type of shot. But maybe they were closer.
But on the Cherokees, I almost think they had their
way of living, Their way of shooting bows, their way
of building bows was very European style, and I'm almost
wondering if they didn't have some connection back then. You know,
they lived in settlements, permanent housing, uh farmed everything and

(01:05:43):
as far back as they can trace it, and the
way they shot bows in the way they built bows
was European style. So it makes you wonder. Yeah. Yeah, Well,
I think if you woke up every day and your
only option for acquiring wild protein for your family was
shooting a bow, you probably figure out a way to
get really good at it. I mean, really, you think

(01:06:05):
about the amount of effort that we put towards proficiency
with a weapon. Even as serious bow hunters like you
and I are, we really devote a pretty small amount
of time. And I mean, and and there's people that
practice way more than I do, I know for sure,

(01:06:26):
But I mean, like, if we woke up every day
and that's the only way we were gonna eat breakfast
the next day. Was if we killed something and we're
walking around with a bow in our hand all the time,
every day, every day of the year, we'd probably get
You probably get pretty good at whatever you did, you
know what I mean. And you know, they they would have.

(01:06:47):
I mean they were yeah, you know, to say they
were professional hunters, it's kind of a weird way to
look at it, but they were. That's how they made
a living, and so they were. You know, I guess
that's another way to try to un understand how they
could be pretty accurate shooting kind of a you know
what seems to us as an obscure, ineffective way because

(01:07:08):
we're trying to take this little narrow window of our
life that we've dedicated to be archers, and we found Hey,
if you draw it right to your eye, you can
look at right down the era and he'd be pretty good. Yeah. Uh,
it's something, Koby. What questions do you have you've been
too quiet? What is there a bow in particular that

(01:07:29):
you're most like proud of that you've made, Like one
that sticks out among others. Yeah, I've got a couple. Uh.
One is a Cherokee style bow that I'm made years ago.
That's uh just a bear grease finish. Um. It didn't
even have a rest on it. I built it to
shoot off your knuckle. I have since added a piece
to it. But I've killed more deer with that bow

(01:07:50):
than than i have any bowl I've gotten. It's as
simple as you can get. And then, um, I came
up with a design about um, I don't know, six
or eight years ago, and I call it a deer slayer.
And uh, it's a form that I built. It's got
it reflexes at the handle and then deflexes a little
bit and then reflexes back into the tips and I

(01:08:12):
send you back it And those are a very good performer.
They're really quiet. And uh that's the bow that I've
been hunting with mostly the last several years. I've killed
a lot of stuff in Africa with that model and
they've been really good bows. Now, when you say send
you back, describe that. I know what it is, but
people may not. What I use white tails, send you

(01:08:35):
mostly the backstraps, send you because that's I can get it. Uh,
for years, I just use legs in you. But it's
attending and it can be off a deer, elk, moose,
it don't matter, buffalo, and you dry it, hammer it,
process it, and then put it on by weight. Uh,
that's it's. It peels off in the like a natural fiberglass,
and you glue it onto the bow. And it adds

(01:08:57):
performance as well as durability because as that send you shrinks.
You put it on wet and then it'll dry to
the boat right there, and then it starts shrinking, and
then as it shrinks, it adds speed to the boat
because it's already under tension. Yeah. God, that's an incredible
So it's incredible to think about. There was a time

(01:09:18):
when humans didn't know how to do that, and then
there was a time when they did, and like what
what I wonder what process informed someone that, hey, you
can take that chewy stuff, because there there would be
no logical connection between that silver skin off of a

(01:09:41):
backstrap and everybody that's killed a deer. It's processed. The
deer knows what we're talking about. I mean it feels
I mean like you could like cut it up and
like chew it and eat it. I mean like it's like,
I mean you wouldn't, But I mean point is it's
not like hard or something. It's not a bone, it's
not even it's not a cartilage. It's just this, uh you,
it's this super odd miracle substance that propped up mankind

(01:10:05):
for a long time. Yeah, that's pretty incredible. The Plains
Indians relied on it because they had lesser quality, would
you know. And it will allow you it's not a
it's not a magic cure to bad quality wood or
short wood, but it is in a way because it
will allow you to use inferior quality wood that normally
would not make a boat, and it will make a

(01:10:27):
good bowl in the right climate. In our climate where
it's human and wet, it's just mediocre. Out west, where
it's dry, it is superior. Because you can take a
juniper that will explode on you if you try to
make a self bow out of it, but you can
put as send you back into that juniper and make
a rocket launcher and it's it's amazing. And if if

(01:10:49):
it's tillard well, and that means if it's bend and
evenly and everything's right, that they'll last from now on.
You know, do you think the Eastern Indians judge the
West In Indians for using technology to their advantage. You know,
they traded the most sage, so they wanted I would
you know that was a huge trade item, was o
sage statement? Or if they sit around the fire and

(01:11:10):
made fun of the guys that you send man training wills.
Look at those boys over there. They don't make fun
because their bows were little little his bow is yeah,
and there's I was long. Yeah, I bet they did. Man,
nothing's changed. Yeah, that's pretty incredible. Yeah. Well, Uh, do

(01:11:35):
you have anything that you still want to try that
you haven't yet? Like you've done all this all this
stuff in the past and had all these challenges and
things you work through. Is there something like coming up
that you would like to try or a challenge you
would like to Uh. I still hadn't got a moose
killed with a bow, and I'll probably do that. And um,

(01:11:59):
I still got a lot of African animals that I
want to do, and I've got that all in the works. Um.
I'm working on a book right now, in the early
stages of a book at that UM. And it's kind
of an adventure type dual of all the hunts that
I've been on my life with these type of bows
and then I'm gonna also incorporate the building of them,
so it'll kind of it'll give a little bit of

(01:12:21):
the construction and try to pass on that challenge. You know. Uh,
if a guy ever read that book, uh, the History
of Hunting in the Great Smoky Mountains, Have you read that.
I've heard of it, I've seen it. I've never read it.
Those guys, those gun builders and bear hunters, they were characters.
Now they that they're a unique breed and they they

(01:12:46):
hunted a lot of bears and stuff with those flint
lock rifles that they built, and that stuff fascinates me.
So I've got some stuff that I'm doing. You also
make flint Yeah, I see the beauty in them, just
like I do a wood bow. I don't. I don't
distinguished a kill within them any different than stuff that
the bows that I've made, they with the guns that
I made there the wood and iron is Uh, it's pretty.

(01:13:10):
And there again, you know, we we want some mores
with them. You know, they they started progressing, you know,
towards the end of the or the beginning of the
Civil War, that kind of went to the percussion guns.
But before that it was flint locks and Uh, those are.
They're very very accurate. You know, a hundred yard guns.
You know that that's it, you know, But um, there's

(01:13:30):
some guys that can can shoot some of them a
little further. But yeah, there weather might slow you down
a little bit, but they're fast. People think that you shoot,
pull the trigger and that flint goes down and two
minutes later the gun goes off. That's not the case.
You know. When they're made right, they're very fast and effective. Yeah,
so it's just a fun way to do it all right. Now,

(01:13:50):
you had a last year, killed something last year with
your flint lock, didn't you. M Let's see, I'm just
remembering you with or maybe you've made a gun that
you were gonna hunt with. It seems like it was
last year. Maybe not, but yeah, I've killed a lot
of stuff with him. I've killed black bears um with
the flint locks, lots of white tails, um turkeys, u

(01:14:14):
uh Rio's, Eastern's and Miriam's. I'd have a grand slam
with a flint lock and a recurve if I could
go to Florida and kill killed those turkeys that I
hadn't killed an asolo down there with a with a
recurve or flint lock, but I'd have a grand slam
with that. So I like to mix it all up
and nothing about it. The with the flint locks. I
go back now and stuff that I've killed with bows,

(01:14:36):
I'm going back and doing it again with the black powder,
you know. So it add gives you another reason to
go somewhere and hugging you. You feel like you're you
you're carrying a rifle. I guess, well, and you are.
It does make it a little easier, yeah, it it
increases my range a whole lot compared to a sef bow.
So yeah, it's almost like cheating. Yeah, yeah, that was it.

(01:14:57):
The bowl making that got you into trap. The trapping
got me into the bowl making. Really. Yep, I've missed
one season since I was thirteen. I've got forty some
odd seasons of trapping that I was just fascinated with
it from the time I was a little bit of
kid and it never left. And and now, like I said,
I get to travel different states, and um, that was

(01:15:19):
always a goal when I was unable to do it
because of work, you know, I couldn't get away long
enough to go out of state and see if I
could you might those guys that are really good at
what they do where they're at, but you get them
somewhere else and they're like a fish out of their bowl,
you know. And um, I think trappers, if you will notice,
are usually your best turkey hunters and a lot of

(01:15:42):
times your best bear hunters and fishermen. They have that
they can reach, that they notice things that most people
don't notice. You know, they're just constantly aware of the
surroundings because you're trying to make an animal put his
foot in about a four inch circle and he's got
thousands stakers to run and and that bait's only gonna
work for so long. And it's just like bear baits. Uh,

(01:16:05):
there's no magic bait or letter. You know, you gotta
be close and get it in the right spot to
start with. So it's, uh, there's a lot involved and
that that's something that I took a lot of pride in.
Yet you ask about the bows that I might like,
but I think probably more so the ability to go
somewhere else and be good at what you're doing, whether

(01:16:27):
it be with a bow or trapping, it all kind
of goes hand in hand. That once you master that
trapping it seems like everything else just falls into place,
and you have an understanding of those animals and how
everything's got a weakness too. And uh, and especially with trapping,
you're trying to exploit that and know their habits because

(01:16:47):
there's things that you can do to get the odds
in your favor to make him put his foot where
you want it. And Uh, the ranches that I trap
around here, those guys would probably cry if I quit
coming because they're seeing all of the years now the
increase of their game, you know, especially their turkey crops.
That and I think the coats are a lot bigger

(01:17:08):
problem on the deer than people give them credit for
two that the deer and turkeys are really making a difference.
And um, I've got my foot in the door and
some ranches in Texas now that it's almost more than
I can handle to to take care of those ranches
there because of the demand for predator control, and it's
there's nothing more fun to me than to outsmart a coat.

(01:17:30):
Yeah it is. I'll be darn well. What's uh did
you ever make uh much money trapping? I mean, like
Arkansas is not El primo. Yeah, it's not so much.
The density. It's the quality, and we're right on the

(01:17:51):
very edge. If you get much past the tunnel on
very much further in my direction, the quality starts going down,
especially if you go sack and if you go west,
it's still good. But we're on the very edge of
still good quality fury and even down to that he's
talking about. The tunnel is a is where Interstate goes

(01:18:15):
through about twelve miles probably south of right here, So
you're saying north of there the first Yeah, yeah, it's
a different, holy different ball game. But uh yeah, we're
still on the edge of good fur. But yeah, as
far as I'm making money. The first year that I
left the meat business and retired and did the bolt
business full time nine years ago, I my wife and

(01:18:36):
I decided that we were gonna trap as hard as
I ever wanted to. And the fur prices had been
terrible since the nineties, and they didn't come back up,
you know, they crashed and it just never came back up.
And we were doing it just purely for fun and
to be able to do it because that's what I
wanted to do, and I hid it on. It was

(01:18:57):
just the perfect storm that the market exploded and I
had a furs shed full of fur and we actually
sold ten thousand dollars worth of fur that one year,
and and it was good for another year or two
after that. That's all just local trapping down there. That
was then Arganas. Yeah then, But now, like I say,
I'm I'm doing other states. But the stuff that I'm

(01:19:19):
catching out in Texas now it's in North Texas and
it's as good quality as a lot of the Western states.
You know that quality, Yes, you would not. It's like
two different animals if you look at our bobcats compared
to those North Texas for quality. But why, I don't know.
If it's altitude, and some of it is, Uh, they've

(01:19:41):
adapted over the years to the terrain. Their spots are
better than ours. You can even go with a bobcat.
A lot of it has to do with yeah, well,
but but the high quality has to do with not
just fur but spots because people want spots. Yes, and
you can even go into parts of western Oklahoma and
their their bobcats are way better than ours. These wood

(01:20:04):
woodland bobcats are the worst in the world. They have
to What makes them worse spots, the spots, the quality
of spots. Okay, So it's not fur density, not so much.
But even out there in Texas, would it be that
open country more open country cats need better camouflage about Okay,
that's it. They're in that stage and uh in that

(01:20:26):
open brush and they need more spots yep. And they
do have longer fur, it is more dense, but their
quality of spots is way way better. And the the
fact that a bobcat is worth more when it has spots.
It's totally a human external characteristic that we desire the
So there where do you know where the bobcats are

(01:20:48):
going and what they're doing with them? Most of the
market is like in Italy Germany, Um, what are they making?
Just women's garments and some vesting coats like the cow trade.
It's most of most of the is for trim on
pocket collars and stuff. Yes, but the cats are still
actually for for like jackets and stuff like that. Invests. Wow, yeah,

(01:21:11):
the Korea, China, when they're in Russia. Russia because it's
a it's not just a luxury item, it's a it's
a necessity item because of their cold, cold winners that
they still wear a lot of fur every day because
of needing it. I've heard that's where a lot of
coons and stuff go is in uh in Russia, yep.

(01:21:35):
And when bad yeah, and then when when the Soviet
economy is bad and the Asian markets are bad, the
for fur markets bad, and so you know they'd all
come back. That year that you made, you sold ten
thousand dollars with the hides. Do you remember how many animals?
And I'm interested in this because I live here, and
I'm just like, like, do you remember how many coons

(01:21:56):
you caught? How many this you caught? No? I don't.
It was a lot of coons that year, yeah, I
mean would have been like a hundred coons or would
have been no, not like a thousand, No, it would
been in the hundred coons, you know. And on the
mix of colds, bobcats, fox, you know, looking at uh
twenty five of each probably and on the cats maybe, uh.

(01:22:19):
Only in Arkansas, I catch about six cats bobcats a year.
But you go out to Texas you can catch that
many in a week, you know. And so it's just
the numbers there. I don't know what the deal is
out there. Their densities are just ridiculous. More of them yeah,
And part of it might be because those places are
so managed for deer, turkey and quail that it brings

(01:22:42):
them in because they've got a food source. And that
probably is a lot of case because they're hanging around
those feeders to ambush, so they kind of got a
captive audience. But the West has always been known for
having lots of colds. It just seems to be that way.
They've got kyles like we have coons. You know, My
buddy Jeff Lander told me a story and I don't
know if it's exactly the way it happened, but that's

(01:23:05):
the way I remember it. And he shot a turkey
over a feeder in Texas with a traditional bow and
as the turkey like fled from being shot with a bow,
a bobcat jumped out of the woods. And Jeff, if
I'll have to get the it was, it was either

(01:23:27):
it was some yea anyway, just to and he felt
like the bobcat was perched back in watching this turkey
just like him. He's over in a blind, you know.
Um And uh, anyway, it's a learned behavior out there,
and that's what we look for out there. They have
limited roosting areas and they're usually gonna be in those

(01:23:49):
branch bottoms where there's some big cotton woods where they
have roost trees. And those turkeys out west, they will
each gobbler kind of goes his direction with his little
bunch of hens, you know, and they kind of go
like wagon wheel routes that they've just they do it
every day. They're patternable where ours are, just wherever they're
at that day. But those birds out there have a

(01:24:10):
route that they'll kind of make a circle during the day,
and you can spine those ambush spots where those bobcats
will ambush those turkeys in the brush, And that's what
we're looking for out there, are those travel routes for
the turkeys to ambush the bobcats when they're trying to
catch the turkeys. It's just it's a it's a neat
deal that trapping class would be fun. It really is.

(01:24:34):
We started daylight and don't get done skin until dark.
We we we check traps and set till an hour
or so before dark, and then we're usually skinning until
a way after dark. So it's it's work, but it's
it's exciting fun. Yeah, Yeah, Mike, where can people find you?
How can people find you? Best ways on the website

(01:24:55):
and it's just Pinehole longbows dot com and of course
we gotta Facebook, but yeah, the website's easy. And like
I say, we're a full time business. It's uh not
just a hobby. It's a hobby that turned into a
full time job and it's uh, it's a way alife.
So I I help people that's never built bows before,
you know, every day on the phone. So I don't

(01:25:15):
mind a little bit of helping along there. You know,
I'm not gonna build it for him, but but I'm
there for for questions. That's one thing. When you buy
a piece of wood from me, it's uh, it's not
I'm not just for a one time sale. On there too.
To get you through the whole process and try to
encourage you to get it done and and go use it.
That's that's what I want to see you do. Yeah, Yeah,

(01:25:36):
you're it's clear that you're really passionate about about teaching
and you you enjoy that and and that's what it takes.
I mean, that's what makes a good teacher, somebody that
that enjoys it and wants people to learn. And uh
so yeah, that that's great, And you know, I don't
think I don't think many people know that this kind
of stuff exists. So you know, there's ah if you

(01:26:01):
you you could learn, you can learn more from you
either in the trapping class or bowl class, and just
a short period of time than you could and years
of personal research the bowl class especially will save you.
You know, most people can eventually club one out, you know,
and get it done. You might rick your shoulder and
never be able to shoot the rest of your life

(01:26:22):
if you shot it for a year, But but it
had sling an arrow. And that's that's what surprises me.
People could literally cut a limb off one of these
those stage trees you got in your yard and tie
a haystring to it and it feels shoot an arrow
across the yard. They're tickled to death, but they don't
realize they can build an efficient, high performance weapon out

(01:26:44):
of primitive materials. And that's where I can save them
a lot of trial and error and breaking stuff in
a short time. Great, Well, Mike, is there anything we
hadn't talked about that you'd like to now? I think
we pretty much covered it. Just don't don't limit your
opportunities man, there's so many things that a guy can

(01:27:06):
do with not everybody can travel and and go a
lot of places. If their families young, you know, they're
kind of health tight. But like we were talking before
we started this podcast, making one of these bowls yourself
and then going and hunting on your grandpa's place, behind
his barn or something and killing a white tiled dough

(01:27:27):
can be as big as any caribou hunt you ever
went on in your life. And and literally they add
up to if I, if I look back at the
big hunts that I've been on, the preparation and the
full circle completion of it is as important to me

(01:27:48):
as the adventure of the exotic nous of it. You know,
Africa is great, it's target rich, but still, you know,
killing something in Alabama with a bow that I made
on a friend's itches as much fun as any big
hunt you know you can do. Yeah, now that's a
great point. And I think anybody that's hunted with it
any kind of a primitive weapon, they would get it

(01:28:11):
because they've they've done it themselves. But you know, for me,
traditional archery brought back kind of the initial excitement and
love of archery that probably I had more when I
was a kid, when I just got into it. And
you know, we still have that same thrill, all of
us that are passionate hunters, you know, that that thrill

(01:28:34):
of hunting, even the mundane parts of hunting. You know,
that's why we are seriousness because we continue to enjoy it.
It doesn't get old. But man hunting with the primitive
weapon takes something like hunting the dough in your backyard
and turns it into an extreme, extremely exciting, extremely rewarding hunt.

(01:28:59):
It does it put that fireback in it. And uh
on the flintlock stuff. You know, we all grew up
hunting squirrels and learned how to be good in the
woods and stuff. Most of us started on squirrels, you know,
and that was our big thing. We were kids to
be able to do that. And I did that as
a kid, and then quit when I started deer hunting,
you know, as as I got older. But when I

(01:29:20):
started making these flintlocks, I built a thirty six Tennessee
style rifle. And those little thirty six is are just
like shooting a twenty two magnum that smokes that there's
no kick, you know, and and they're deadly accurate, and
it is my favorite thing to do right now is
as soon as the texts get gone, is to go
out with that thirty six flintlock and shoot gray squirrels.

(01:29:42):
You know, it's you're like a little kid again. I mean,
coming in with a string of squirrels with the flint locks.
So much fun. Achievement. It's exciting, that's achievement. So I
have some fun. Yeah, that's great. Well, thanks Mike. I
really appreciate it. I've enjoyed it. Uh and I hope
people check you out, check your website out, and um yeah,

(01:30:06):
just just let it be an option for them to,
uh to to get into some primitive type of of archery.
Flint lock. Yeah, Mike's a great resource for that. So
thanks for coming up. Man, you enjoy it. To keep
the wild places wild because that's where the very fluid

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