Hand Carved Pinon Pine Bowl

After taking some time off to help my son move and to accompany Pam on some spring break excursions I broke the carving tools back out and tried my hand at a wood I have never carved before.  Pinon Pine is mostly used for burning in Chimineas as the smoke (and it produces a lot) is reputed to repel Mosquitoes.

I found a piece at a local firewood sales.  Everyone else goes there for firewood, I go to find unusual native woods to experiment with.  Now Pinon is a very sappy wood and has a strong pine fragrance.  I new it would not be good for figures but thought it would make an interesting bowl.   I was right.  I save some of the bark and made the bowl conform to the natural shape of the log I had.  It has a very interesting green and yellow coloration to the grain.  Just goes to show you never know what is hiding inside a piece of wood.  In this case a neat rustic bowl.

Since I carved this bowl from green wood I will let it sit for a few weeks and cure before I put any kind of finish on it.  Right now I plan to use a shellac to finish it.  Hand rubbed of course.

More Later

Go make some sawdust.

Bruce