I started by gently removing the bark and most of the cambium with my drawknife. I know some people like to leave the bark on until later in the process but I just don't like drawing out the bow on the dark, scaly bark so I take it off right away. I'm careful not to damage the first layer of sapwood so if I need to leave patches of cambium in places that's ok at this point. I'm extra careful around bumps and knots so I don't violate the back of the bow. I leave little islands of bark around the knots that I will clean up later with different tools.
![](https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-N1UQWUua4Jk/VM8NFJM8kmI/AAAAAAAAAbo/KOs_6vMRoWo/w433-h577-no/DSCN8553.JPG)
Next I take out my card scraper and start removing more of the cambium still being careful of the first layer of wood.
![](https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-dbZu_kpAddc/VM8NIUkLSQI/AAAAAAAAAcA/NzHHtuALvxs/w769-h577-no/DSCN8554.JPG)
There are still some spots where there are dips and valleys that the flat scraper can't get into. for those I use my curved scrapers to gently remove the stubborn cambium.
![](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-dJ9sFT2R5Ms/VM8NV10m-JI/AAAAAAAAAcc/qZ063z3nc4E/w769-h577-no/DSCN8555.JPG)
I clean up the knots a little but don't bother with them too much. I'm just trying to get off the bulk of the cambium so I have a decent surface to layout the bow. Once I rough out the bow I'll clean up the back more thoroughly. No reason to do detail work on wood I'm just going to chop off with a hatchet! This is what it looks like when I'm done.
![](https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-blbYxqsaGeA/VM8NqWStLfI/AAAAAAAAAcs/qaccLcFqgVw/w433-h577-no/DSCN8556.JPG)