Walking Stick Handles

Copyright © 2001, 2002 by Jim Wilson
(Click images to enlarge)

At my father's request, I made these orb-like walking stick handles from a chunk of walnut he had. The balls are about three inches in diameter. They were to be mounted on diamond willow sticks, but I don't know whether that's ever been done.

Here is the original block of wood...     The log had two large knots, many severe checks on both ends, and one almost complete split. I cleaved the block along the split.

The following pictures just illustrate some of the challenges I encountered trying to get two good handles out of that particular chunk of wood. As you can see in the last image, I wasn't entirely successful. One of the handles does show some checks. Click on any image to see an enlarged version.

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