Question about birch bark

[Clint]

I just cut two white birch trees down and peeled some nice big pieces of bark off. Has anyone seen a shooting bag or other rifle related things made from bark?

[TN Longhunter]

Cant say I have seen shooting bags or such out of it. A lot of camp items, (trenchers, baskets, covered boxes, etc..) can be made out of it.

[EricEwing]

Check out this stuff:

[Old Salt]

The thinner dry bark makes great tinder 

[jbigley]

Like the Old Salt  said, the inner bark makes great tinder. The outer bark also makes good containers. Generally,  they  are fairly stiff  but somewhat flexible ( think bark canoe) , which might make a traditional style birch bark makuk unsuitable as a shooting pouch ( think noise/ rattle factor).  Notice that I said “might”; I have no experience with a bark shooting pouch. The picture of the woven bark bag was pretty interesting. There is a lot of info on using birch bark available —possibly even something on YouTube —much more than I could put into this reply. At the very least, save the inner for tinder. HTH —JB

[Not English]

Clint, I haven't seen one, but how about a powder container? Wood plugs of whatever shape, top and bottom. Sealing up seams is pretty straight forward. It could be a mother "horn" or a personal container.

[Notchy Bob]

That pouch or haversack shown by Eric Ewing is interesting, and very nicely done.  I think the Finns have traditionally used woven strips of birchbark for many things, even footwear!

If you can find copies of Bernard S. Mason's books, Indian Crafts & Costumes and Woodcraft and Camping, you'll discover lots of ideas for birchbark crafts. 

Notchy Bob

[Vaquero]

In my copy of Indian Handcrafts by C. Keith Wilbur, M.D., there is the plans for Col. John Hawks (1704-1786) powder magazine container or of winter scraped birch bark.

Pine base with wooden pegs, 4 inches wide by 8 inches tall.

[Hungry Horse]

 I would suspect you virtually never see a birch bark shooting bag for the same reason you rarely see a ball bag made from a gourd.  They would be incredibly noisy unless lined with something like blanket wool. Noisy equipment would hinder you hunting success, and be dangerous in hostile territory.

  Hungry Horse

[WadePatton]

Birches don't grow around here, but we have Poplars, and the Poplar bark can be used for many things, siding is one.  I have a "bag shaped" item made from such bark. It was gifted to me, I know not who made it. I'll get a pic on here sometime.

Another bark note is that Summer cut (sap up) trees shed their bark much easier than sap-down harvested trees, for what that's worth.

[Clint]

Years ago, I had a friend who was much much older than I. Basil Tuplin was a full blood MikMac Indian from Prince Edward Island. He landed in Ct during the depression when he ran out of gas with his young family in tow. Basil spent his life as a cauker, working on wooden ships and eventually ended up at Mystic Seaport Museum. I had  run across a large white birch that had been dropped and was due to be cut up so I asked Basil how to remove the bark. He looked at me like I was an idiot and said "just cut down the length and take the bark off. That's what I did and the bark came off in one piece. I remember that the bark was about four feet by six feet, with a couple of knot holes. I used it to make Chipewa style bowls and stuff and was stimied somewhat on getting authentic stiching that would last. As a side note Basil also told me that if I ever wanted to make a bow for shooting arrows, to use the wood on the down facing side of a spruce tree that grew over a stream..After thinking about it, I realized that he was telling me to use compression wood. Little tid bits like that were common knowledge for people at one time. We will never know what we didn't ask.