How do you make a canoe paddle in the wilderness?

[Robin]

If you carry a SPOT, you have the option to be picked up by someone other than SAR. There is a button that sends out a message that you need to be picked up, but not an emergency. It sends your location as well.
All you have to do is make the arrangements with the proper folks before the trip.

Murats post reminded me that it was Ray Mears video that I watched and tried to explain.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

The topic was simply intended to be about the minimal tools necessary for a particular bushcraft project--making a paddle. It wasn't intended to criticize any real person who failed to do so, or to suggest that the situation has a high probability of happening to any of us. I'm not a wilderness canoeist, so I don't expect ever I'll ever need to make a paddle. But having spent the past three weeks researching edged tools and bushcraft skills, I'm interested in learning about those skills even if I never use them.

The paddle can definitely be made nicely with an axe and knife, as the articles and videos (which I'd already seen) clearly show. But a crooked knife isn't allowed, nor is an adze, as those aren't part of a usual paddling kit.

A paddle can also be made with just an axe and perhaps some bone scraping knives to help. The following video from 1954 has a bit of a staged appearance, but I assume it's honest. As a survival challenge, three guys are dumped into the water up to their necks near a shore with nothing but their summer clothes and one axe (and a movie camera). They have three weeks to get out. One guy, the bushcraft expert, is an Indian. They start fires, catch fish, make bone knives, snare a rabbit, kill a bear with a deadfall trap, build a birch bark canoe, make two paddles, and paddle out within the tree weeks. They don't show the paddle making technique.

[video]https://www.nfb.ca/film/survival_in_the_bush[/video]

I'm thinking that an expert could make a paddle with just a large knife. The log could be split the same way with wood wedges. The stop notches could be cut with the knife. And the slices could be cut off the log to the various stop notches by batoning the knife. This roughing out might be slow. All the finish carving could be more smoothly done with the knife than an axe. Just a theory. Maybe Ray Mears will read this thread and do it.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

find a relatively straight length of timber..and ahem use the timber as a double bladed paddle.

So you propose to do it with NO tools. Very clever. Sorry, but kayak paddles are not really the topic. That timber stick paddle would be exciting on the Yukon River, I bet.

 

[memaquay]

Glenn, just a side note before returning to regularly scheduled programming....I lived on a fly-in reserve a few hundred miles north of me for a couple of years. There were many men and women up there who would make the current batch of bush craft guys look silly. The interesting thing about those guys is they didn't have the latest knives, clothes or gear. Mostly they were in blue jeans or work pants and plaid jackets. I went hunting and fishing with them quite a few times on overnighters, there wasn't too much that would get them excited. Crooked knives were part of the kit on the trapline. If you haven't seen this video yet, it's one of my favorites.....
https://www.nfb.ca/film/cree_hunters

Those skills are disappearing now, but even 25 years ago when i was up there, most things like paddles were carved, snowshoes were still made, as well as moccasins for winter, hats and mitts and all out of moose hide. For those guys the thought of making a paddle wouldn't have occupied many posts on the internet, they'd probably get a chuckle out of us. They were no strangers to overcoming hardship either, which is really the key to this kind of thing, perseverance in the face of adversity and adapting to situations, something that the modern society is breeding out of us.

Basically, if someone needs a paddle bad enough, they will find a way, and there have been some good suggestions here already.

 

[Philtrum]

So you propose to do it with NO tools. Very clever. Sorry, but kayak paddles are not really the topic. That timber stick paddle would be exciting on the Yukon River, I bet.

Better take your meds, Glenn. This is what the original topic is about:
You've lost or hopelessly broken your paddle.
To stay alive, you must make a new one so you can paddle out. How?
What are the minimum tools needed to do the job? What are the steps?

Those questions have been answered, and I don't see anything limiting the topic to single blades.
No tools means using one's hands, which are, in fact, tools.

 

[Iskweo]

As Robin said, just look around for a carbon bent shaft floating by. Worked for us. Btw, not only is the shaft repaired on that one but I burned a hole in the face of the blade shielding the stove from the wind. I got yelled at for that one.

Nevertheless, here is my no paddle solution. Find a nice smallish tree with a suitable fork in it. Cut it off the right length. Cut the fork a suitable length. Tie anything....canvas, sticks, a shirt.... across the opening. Eh voila, one ugly but functional paddle. If you cant find a forked stick, tie two more pieces to it to make a triangle..cover that. Tie your frying pan to a stick.

There is always a way.

Christy

 

[Odyssey]

The survival NFB film is superb Glenn. Thanks for that. I wish they'd filmed some of the methods in more detail, but it was fascinating nonetheless.
The Cree NFB film is absolutely incredible. I really enjoyed a glimpse into these Cree families' winter hunt camps, and some of the cultural traditions still a part of their lives.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

There were many men and women up there who would make the current batch of bush craft guys look silly. The interesting thing about those guys is they didn't have the latest knives, clothes or gear.

Those skills are disappearing now

For those guys the thought of making a paddle wouldn't have occupied many posts on the internet, they'd probably get a chuckle out of us.

No doubt there are still a few places in North America, and around the globe, where traditional wood-survival-living skills and tools are still employed. But it's shrinking fast and invisible to most of us in modern society.

I think that's the central and serious core of the modern bushcraft movement: to revive, understand and to use (as a hobby) those disappearing skills and tools. Like any movement, there are more and less serious people as well as lots of jerks.

And the core of this kind of thread is to examine some of those lost skills in the context of canoeing. I've spent a lifetime paddling canoes but not in anything I'd call wilderness, and hence I've never developed any significant amount of bushcraft skills. But I think old dogs can learn old tricks . . . maybe with some new edges.

Thanks for the video. I'll watch it tomorrow. I like this kind of stuff. I was just reading about how Indians took down trees and made dugout canoes with stone tools and fire. I assume they made paddles with stone axes and chisels. They also had knives made of beaver teeth.

 

[Seeker]

Thanks, Robin and Murat... good stuff... Murat, thought of you right away when the situation was presented.

Townsend Whelen mentions making rafts out of a couple logs (just enough to float your weight) to cross rivers while backpacking, and mentions using a pole like a paddle (though he admits it's tough work, but good enough to get the job done).

I've got a spoon knife (on loan to a friend), and have reshaped part of my machete blade for use as a drawknife, but need to get a crooked knife. Seems like a handy tool.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Here come the labels again..."kayak paddles" for one use of a pole. I should just let that go. If I am in trouble Glenn wont be around anyway Poling is so widespread around here that many uses of the pole have been made. Some poles are double shoed..

and hey the modern poling repertoire includes the windmill stroke..

There are a lot of Maine canoers who never go anywhere with a paddle in the first place

Christy I like your idea but I doubt I would enjoy paddling a cast iron skillet!

 

[Robin]

.... So what you need is to find a tree of the right size, I would say no less than 10-12". Whit some of the branches, you have to make a few wedges to be able to quarter that log, so splitting it in half and then splitting one of the half in half again. Only need one of the quarter for a paddle. From there you remove the hart wood and the bark wood. you will end up with some what of a parallelogram, from there you start carving.....

In all the years I've paddled, I never broke a paddle beyond repaire. Never lost a paddle either. but crap can happen i guess!!

Cheers

Nevertheless, here is my no paddle solution. Find a nice smallish tree with a suitable fork in it. Cut it off the right length. Cut the fork a suitable length. Tie anything....canvas, sticks, a shirt.... across the opening. Eh voila, one ugly but functional paddle. If you cant find a forked stick, tie two more pieces to it to make a triangle..cover that. Tie your frying pan to a stick.

There is always a way.

Christy

I think these two ideas are very good, something I would seriously attempt if the need arouse. Christy's is pretty easy and Canotrouge's perfect if you carry an ax and find some cedar.
Thanks

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

Here come the labels again..."kayak paddles" for one use of a pole.

Oh, I was just playing a bit. Both you and Turtle suggested using poles as a makeshift double paddle. I do think that's a creative escape suggestion, but how to escape isn't really the topic I was after. I worded my OP in an inelegant and confused manner.

I wasn't meaning to ask how to escape the situation -- which could include hiking out, using a PLB, or calling Amazon on a satellite phone to drone drop some lumber.

I was asking a woodcrafting question: What tools normally carried by canoe trippers are the minimum necessary to carve a canoe (or kayak) paddle out of wood. I think we've gotten some good suggestions. The hardest part (for me) would be to turn a log into a board. Once you have a board, the carving of it into a paddle shape would seem to be the simpler task so long as you have a sharp edged tool available.

I also don't know how suitable the heart wood of different trees would be for a paddle. A paddle need not be more than 5" wide. Could you just cut down dead 5" tree, or use a dead fallen 5" log, and essentially plane both sides until you have a 1.5" board, or would the heart wood center of that board be unsuitable?

 

[memaquay]

No, not deadwood. You use live wood for paddle making in the bush. With a crooked knife, axe or regular knife, live wood is much easier to work.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

No, not deadwood. You use live wood for paddle making in the bush. With a crooked knife, axe or regular knife, live wood is much easier to work.

Thanks, I didn't know that. Any contrary opinions?

Can you just use a 5" live tree to make a board, or do you have to quarter a much bigger log to get the 5" board?

 

[memaquay]

Well, we're talking emergency paddle? The outside edges will be a bit soft if you just use a five inch tree, but it will do. I would try a tree easy to split, like birch, which seems to have been a favorite of First Nations around here. If you can't get a clean board split out of it, you could try the method Robin proposed of creating small segments to chip off.

I'm going to order one of these....
http://poleandpaddle.com/tools/crooked_knives

I might get his folding saw too, I've read good things and actually talked to people who have used this fellow's stuff.

 

[Philtrum]

The original question was, "How do you make a canoe paddle in the wilderness?"

I'd say the same way you'd make a canoe paddle in a civilized environment.

 

[memaquay]

Paddles in a civilized environment are made in a wide variety of ways. I've probably made around a hundred paddles, ranging from one piece paddles to multi laminates. The one piecers, the closest you would get to a wilderness comparison, were made with a bandsaw, a thickness planer, an electric hand planer, a manual planer, spokeshaves, belt sanders and a palm sander. The kiln dried hard wood that they were made out of would have not responded well to working with an axe and crooked knife. It's fairly easy to rough out a paddle with electric tools. Making a paddle in the bush is either harder or easier, depending on your level of "good-enough", but it is certainly not the same.

 

[Boatman53]

Before you go buying one of those crooked knives take a look at a hoof knife. Farriers use them for trimming horses hooves. The are very much like a crooked knife and much cheaper. You could easily replace the commercial handle with a custom fitted home made handle. Here is a photo of some of my knives. The bottom one is a crooked knife I bought in 1975 from Woodcraft Supply ( Hudson Bay Company never answered my letter) with a home made handle. Next up is a Swiss carving knife. Next is a Japanesse bent knife with my handle. The top knife is a hoof knife. Some can be found on line for less than $10.

I'll see if I have some other photos. I'm making a knife now and will be posting about it soon. I found the bottom crooked knife for most of my needs, too long.

Jim

 

[Boatman53]

Here is another hoof knife I found this summer 1903 patent date cast iron handle. The angle of the blade out of the handle is very comfortable.

And all stacked up to show the shapes.

Jim

 

[Seeker]

Given the choice, I would rather work with the center of a 5" green tree than with either a dead one, or a 1/4 or 1/8th split from a thicker (say 10") one, as the green wood is much easier to carve/shape with hand tools. I typically carry at least a folding saw and a hatchet (backpacking), up to a bucksaw and axe (canoeing), and frequently carry a spoon knife, just to play around with when I'm out. With a folding saw and hatchet, I'm confident I could rough out a "good enough" canoe paddle. With the buck saw and axe, I could probably do it a little more easily. Even with just my machete, I'm pretty sure I could also do it, but would dread the 'felling' part... A saw makes it SO easy to drop a tree... chopping with an axe is work... chopping with a machete is harder work.